We’re going to talk about this whether it’s awkward or not.
The discovery of masturbation is probably the most universally life altering occurrence in a young man’s life. It’s the golden spike in the ground that divides boyhood from manhood and starts each kid down the path that will lead to the most stupid, idiotic, and glorious decisions of his life.
I like to believe that thinking and feeling is a skill that men have to increasingly master just as they have to learn proper communication skills, parenting skills, or Kung Fu skills.
I believe there are four organs that we each eventually (hopefully) learn to use to both think and feel, and it is only when we effectively can use all four together that we become truly balanced individuals.
When we are children we generally only use one. Our brains. Anyone can use their brain. It is only later in life that we will progress one step at a time to use the correct parts of our brains as well as the other three thinking and feeling organs, starting next with our penises, then progressing to our stomachs, and finally, if we evolve enough, we will start thinking and feeling with our hearts.
When I was still little enough to fit into a standard bathtub with Eric, the two of us used to lie down on our bellies side by side, and slide back and forth in the tub, rubbing our nethers on the smooth porcelain below. We were little and this was fun for two big reasons. One, we could get a pretty good sloshy wave going on both ends of the tub as we went, and two, we’d get boners.
There was nothing sexual about it. Both of us were still years away from puberty when we finally couldn’t fit in the same tub together. And I don’t know if my brother kept going with his slishing and sloshing fun when he went solo, but I sure as hell did. Sure, boners weren’t as funny when you were by yourself, but they were still pretty damn comical.
And when I was eleven years old, my innocent fun in the bathtub one afternoon ended with surprisingly explosive results. It sounds cliché, but I really do remember it like it was last week. I was on my belly, humming me some Neil Diamond, rubbing my willie up and down the length of the tub as I so often did, and suddenly what never really felt like anything at all started feeling really good.
What the…
I stopped humming and increased my pace. Back and forth. Back and forth. The more I did it the better my penis felt. And then, out of freaking nowhere, the danged thing had some sort of wonderful spasm, and my body clenched up against my will, I held my breath against my will, I clamped my eyes shut against my will, and I suddenly felt something shoot out of me and into the bubbly water.
Once it had passed, I let myself gasp a lungful of air. My breath was now even heavier than it had been all those years chasing the other kids around at soccer practice. I held myself perfectly still in the bathtub, looked down into the water, and shook my head in disbelief.
What was that? I just thought over and over.
I felt no guilt. No hesitation. No disgust. Nothing bad. I would learn later on that in my Mormon family, masturbation was a big no no. But at that point, I just thought the sin meant not stroking your own index finger in some perverse manner. Dad had never made mention of anything as glorious as this when he gave us the sex talk.
Once my breathing had calmed, I gave it another go. Nothing this time. So I drained the tub.
I dried off, and prayed as hard as I could that the next time I got in the bathtub I could find a way to repeat what had just happened. It was, after all, the most magical thing I had ever felt.
And whatever god I was praying to answered those prayers. The next time it took no time at all for me to get that magic feeling going again. And, just like the time before, I exploded into the water with what felt like the intensity of a fire hose and the magic of a unicorn sliding down a rainbow into a pot of fucking gold.
I started doing it often and with wild abandon after that. I learned that there was more than one way to get that lovin’ feeling. In fact, there were lots of ways and not all of them had to be in the bathtub. Months into it, and probably hundreds of masturbations later, I had never once felt guilt. I had never once felt like I was disgusting. I had never once felt that it was wrong. After all, how could something so wrong feel so right?
After accidentally telling us not to stroke our own fingers in his attempt to teach us not to masturbate, I suppose Dad thought the lesson had been learned, he was done, and he never again needed to teach us not to charm our one-eyed snakes; because of that, he never brought it up again. My friends, on the other hand, they were a different story altogether.
My friends were all raised as Mormons just as I was, and looking back at the often hilarious conversations we used to have as we went through puberty, I’d guess that their dads did a more thorough job of explaining masturbation and teaching them how awful, and sinful, and wrong it was.
The first time masturbation was ever brought up, I was at my best friend’s house. We were laying on his basement floor watching TV and suddenly he piped in, “dude, I seriously dare you to masturbate, right now.”
I had no idea what masturbation was. I’d never heard that word. “What are you talking about? What’s that?” I replied.
“Whatever. You know what it is” he demanded between laughs. I assured him I didn’t. He laughed again. “It’s when you rub your wiener until it spits jiz.”
He needed to offer no further explanation. I now had a name for my magic little secret. Did that mean other boys did this masturbate thing too? Did that mean it was something grown-ups knew about?
The way he was daring me to do it made it sound like it was wrong or iniquitous. After all, we only ever dared each other to do things that we could potentially be busted for. Jumping up and down on the trampoline naked. Stealing stuff. Shooting birds with his BB gun. And now, apparently, masturbating.
“Is masturbating bad?” I asked. “It’s not like I do it or anything, I’m just wondering.” I knew the answer. I didn’t want to hear it. I knew I needed to hear it.
Again my best friend laughed. This time a lot more uncomfortably. “Of course it’s bad. It’s like the worst thing you can do. That’s why it’s a dare.”
And… just like that, my new suspicions about the act were confirmed.
Suddenly I felt like the world’s biggest piece of shit. I thought back to all the hundreds of times I had masturbated to that point.
God must hate me.
“Well, I don’t masturbate. I’m not going to do that,” I told him matter of factly. “Why don’t you do it.”
His laugh turned into a nervous twitter. “I don’t do it either. No way. I just wanted to see if you’d do it. That’s disgusting and I’d never do it.”
We both just lay in silence after that, the TV blaring in front of us. And we never talked about masturbation again in the three years we remained best friends.
But from that night forward, I hated myself for this thing called masturbation.
And not in some feel bad for me, I’m going to be over-dramatic way. I literally hated myself for it. Mostly because I couldn’t stop doing it.
Every time I finished masturbating, in that amazing ten minutes when I was thinking with my brain instead of my penis again, I would swear to myself, and to God, that I would never do it again. Ever.
And then twelve hours later, or twenty-four hours later if I was really trying hard, I’d have another go. I’d feel another wave of self-loathing when I was done. And I’d promise God that it was the last time it would happen. I meant it, too. Every fucking time.
The further I crept into my teenage years, the worse my guilt and self-abhorrence got. Other friends would talk about how they never would do it. They’d laugh about it. Rumors would spread that someone in the group was doing it, and every boy there would laugh and declare to the group that they’d never do such an awful thing. I would laugh and announce to the group that I also would never do that. Then I’d go home and start my masturbation/prayer cycle all over again, believing that I was the only kid in the world who couldn’t stop beating off. I had no idea that they were all doing the exact same thing.
I learned a lot looking back at that. I learned that we each need to examine everything we have been taught is right or wrong and decide whether we actually believe it’s right or wrong, or if someone else’s beliefs are dictating our guilt to us.
I was taught that masturbation was wrong. Before someone told me it was bad, I did not think it was wrong at all. I didn’t think it was dirty. I didn’t think I was a misfit. I didn’t think I was weak. I never once had a negative thought surrounding it.
I left the Mormon church when I was 30, and when I did, I had to really examine so many things that I was taught were wrong or forbidden, and decide if I really believed that they were wrong, or if I only believed it because I’d been told so many times that they were wrong by others.
And you know what? I found that I did agree with many of the things I was always taught. Stealing is wrong. Deceiving others is wrong. Skipping out on your family as a father is wrong. Killing people is definitely wrong.
But other things no longer felt wrong to me. Not when I looked into my own heart and began deciding what was right or wrong with that organ instead. Masturbation, to me, is not wrong. It can be, in fact, just as magical and funny as it was when I first discovered it. Drinking alcohol is not bad or wrong. Premarital sex is not bad or wrong. To me.
And when I started drinking occasionally, or having sex outside of marriage from time to time, or masturbating to relieve stress, I learned that the guilt I so often felt for “sinning” was all something that had been extrinsically placed into my thinking by others.
Coincidentally, I also learned that within each of those activities there is a line that, when crossed, the activity becomes wrong to me. Drinking for much more than a fun evening feels wrong to me. Drinking to eliminate sadness or anger feels wrong to me. Drinking irresponsibly feels wrong to me. Also, sex with someone I’m not interested in having something at least a little longer-term with feels wrong to me. Sometimes. Sometimes not. Masturbating while humming Neil Diamond definitely feels wrong to me. Barbara Streisand is much more appropriate. And yes, I have done it.
But my point is, I learned that every person (at some point in their lives) has to zoom out from their upbringing and examine their beliefs of right and wrong. Wrong and right is so different for everyone and every person needs to dissect every aspect of it and decide if they actually believe what they practice and preach.
When we are able to honestly do this, I believe we have finally evolved to think and feel with our hearts more than we do with our minds, our guts, or our sexual organs. And thinking and feeling with our hearts is the only way we will ever live lives that are completely ours and that are genuinely fulfilling and free.
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