To Feel Or Not to Feel - Is Sex Better With You Have an Emotional Connection?

To answer the question directly - I have to say that both physical affection with a partner we are emotionally connected to and the same affections with partners we are not emotionally connected to - have their drawbacks and strengths.

To give some details, here is why I feel this way:

There is something about being physically intimate with someone you know, yet really do not know. Even if you've known them for years or even decades, if you've never formed a strong emotional connection with your partner, it can form a unique kind of mystery about whom you are being physically affectionate with.

That mystery is a large part of what draws us to each other, before relationships truly form. It's the allure of a new person, a new world and new sensations. It's a risk that can bring both positive and negative rewards.

Another plus to non-emotional sex, is that you are neither defined by your selected partner, nor are you confined to any exclusive relationship with them. If you didn't enjoy your romp with them, there is no reason to do it again. Likewise, non-emotional physical affection usually does not require either partner to be vulnerable or available to the other partner. This can be relieving if you are not the type of person who enjoys sharing feelings or if you've got emotional baggage you aren't yet ready to release.

On the downside, you really can't call it "intimacy" without the emotional connection, and so many people confuse this, only to find out down the road that there was little chance of the relationship going much further because intimacy and that emotional connection is one of the few requirements of a healthy relationship. It's not impossible to form a relationship out of the rough beginnings of a non-emotional relationship, but it can seem like dragging yourself backwards through a corn field because one or both participants have to retrain themselves to stop thinking of the relationship as purely physical.

There is just something fantastic about knowing that you have a partner waiting for you or coming home to you, whom you can love on and be loved on by. Not only do you have some degree of certainty that they will be there to be intimate with, but you also get the benefit of being able to help you explore yourself more thoroughly, and a chance to develop your own sensual skills while pleasing them.

At the same time, it can be more than difficult to always be attracted to someone when we've seen that nasty ball of hair they leave in the shower drain. Not to mention, sometimes you just want to find pleasure without having to go through the motions of dealing with emotions and issues going on inside your devoted partner.