This article is an excerpt from the Shortform book guide to "Mating in Captivity" by Esther Perel. Shortform has the world's best summaries and analyses of books you should be reading.
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What is Esther Perel’s Mating in Captivity about? What is the key message of the book?
Mating in Captivity looks at what makes up our individual sense of desire and our desire for our partners. According to author Esther Perel, although desire and love may have some fundamental contradictions, there are ways to balance the clashes, and ways to manage extra-relationship stresses.
Below is a brief overview of Mating in Captivity by Esther Perel.
Mating in Captivity: Unlocking Erotic Intelligence
According to most people and sources, modern couples are having less sex even though they have more sexual freedom than any generation that’s come before them. Now that it’s socially acceptable to have sex outside of marriage and we can do so without the threat of pregnancy, apparently, we’re not interested. It could be that we’re busy, stressed, tired, or overwhelmed by parenthood.
Or, it could be that modern domesticity and sexuality are an either/or situation—can we actually have both? Modern domesticity is associated with things like security, intimacy, and egalitarianism, while desire is concerned with things like play, aggression, jealousy, and risk. Even though domesticity and desire seem to be made up of contradictory ingredients, the author of Mating in Captivity, experienced couples therapist Esther Perel, believes it’s possible to retain desire in a committed relationship.
Here is a quick summary of the key points from Mating in Captivity by Esther Perel.
Individual Desire
First, let’s look at what shapes our desire. While desire is made up of the same general ingredients for everyone, everyone’s individual desire is different, as it’s influenced by our upbringing and personalities.
Family
From the moment we’re born, we start learning about relationships from our families. We learn how to show affection, express ourselves, and interact with others, and we carry what we’ve learned into adulthood.
The first major element we carry forward is our relationship with dependence and independence. We depend on our parents and we do everything we can to stay close to them, but we also need our independence. We’ll experience this same tension with our partners later in life, and we’ll react to it the same way we learned in our childhoods.
- Example #1—Unhealthy Response: When Dylan’s mother died, he learned he couldn’t turn to his father for emotional support—he was on his own. As an adult, Dylan pursues anonymous, unemotional sex because he learned that relying on others was shameful.
- Example #2—Healthy Response: Makena’s mother and father locked themselves in their bedroom for a couple hours every Saturday afternoon. If Makena wanted a snack on a Saturday afternoon, she had to wait or get it herself. As an adult, Makena can emotionally connect with her partner during sex, but she’s also comfortable temporarily focusing on herself and her own pleasure.
The second major element is our views about sexuality. If our parents were open about sex, we’ll likely also be open. If our families thought sex was shameful, we’ll pick up this connotation too.
The last major element is how our gender tempers our expression of our sexuality. We’re exposed to gender stereotypes and expectations from the moment we’re born. When girls grow up into women, they sometimes have trouble owning their sexuality and base it on whether or not others desire them. When boys grow up into men, their desire debatably falls into two categories—those who want their partner to initiate to confirm their own desirability, and those who are uncomfortable with their partner initiating because it makes them feel passive, and therefore unmanly.
Fantasy
A fantasy is no more or no less than a mental exercise in creating desire. In spite of the negative reputation fantasies once had with the church and psychology, science now acknowledges that fantasies are a healthy part of adult sexuality. They help us figure out what we want—but not in the way you think.
Unlike daydreams or other fantasies, sexual fantasies are metaphorical rather than literal. If you’re daydreaming about cake, you probably do want cake. If you fantasize about being a high-priced prostitute, you may not literally want to be a high-priced prostitute. Instead, what this fantasy might reveal about you is that you want to be desired. If people are willing to pay a lot of money to sleep with you, you know you’re wanted and valued.
You can share your fantasies or you can keep them to yourself. Either way, remembering that fantasies are a non-literal expression of self can help you learn about your sexuality without shame.
Desire within Our Relationships
Next, let’s consider desire for our partners specifically. It’s normal for desire to fade, or wax and wane, in a committed relationship. Balancing love and eroticism isn’t something we can do perfectly all the time, and a committed relationship gives us time to practice and play.
When we’ve decided it’s time to bring back desire, there are two ways to approach this: quantitatively and qualitatively. American culture tends to be big on the quantitative approach, which includes measuring the frequency and duration of sex, and medical intervention such as Viagra if necessary. However, the can-do attitude and emphasis on hard work that works well in other arenas don’t necessarily lend themselves to the subjectiveness of desire.
Mating in Captivity defines eroticism, or desire, as sex with imagination, and looks at the qualitative aspects of desire rather than stats. Imagination is made up of intangibles such as creativity, playfulness, and curiosity. In a sexual context, these intangibles tangle with longing and transform. The ingredients for desire become intangibles such as mystery, uncertainty, and aggression.
There are two types of tensions that make it hard to maintain desire in committed relationships: inherent tensions between the values of domesticity and desire, and external tensions between a couple and the rest of the world.
Tension #1: Inherent Forces
The values of long term relationships—commitment, intimacy, and egalitarianism—are at odds with some of the fundamental ingredients for desire—risk, distance, and power imbalances. The balance often lies in looking at your partner in a new context.
The author discusses three specific sets of conflicting values:
- Commitment vs. excitement
- Intimacy vs. mystery
- Egalitarianism vs. power imbalances
Commitment vs. Excitement
Commitment, and the security it brings, is a wonderful thing in a long-term relationship. You don’t have to worry about if your partner loves you or if your relationship might crash and burn at any moment. However, security has a deadening effect on desire. Fear of losing your partner was part of what made the relationship exciting.
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Like what you just read? Read the rest of the world's best book summary and analysis of Esther Perel's "Mating in Captivity" at Shortform .
Here's what you'll find in our full Mating in Captivity summary :
- Why it's difficult to have a good, erotic life within a long-term relationship
- What makes up our individual sense of desire and our desire for our partners
- Tips on how to retain desire in a committed relationship
