Is a high sex drive positively correlated with success and contribution to the world?

[dominick]

I've spent a fair amount of my life studying successful people and I tend to find (although this could be subjective of course) that many of the world's most successful people (and often those who've done so much good in the world) have also had very high sex drives. There are some obvious examples such as JFK, Bill Clinton, MLK, Donald Trump, etc. Napoleon Hill writes about this a fair amount in Think and Grow Rich as well (the part about sex transmutation).

It leads me to ask two questions that seem very important yet relatively undiscussed:

#1 - If indeed there is a positive correlation between sex drive and success, does it makes sense to do things consciously to cultivate sex drive/sex energy in our lives? Many of us have been taught to suppress our sex energy and perhaps this has kept us from reaching our full potential. I wonder if any of the people listed above every realized this and consciously worked to increase their own sex drive/energy. (One thinks about a guy like Trump buying the Miss America pageant and being surrounded by beautiful women...that probably raised his sex drive a bit! )

#2 - How do you best find the balance between a strong sex drive and potentially self-destructive behavior? If it's important to have a very strong sex drive then the dark side of possessing that is being more prone to affairs and other similar types of behavior. Witness JFK, MLK, Bill Clinton, John Edwards, Magic Johnson, the list goes on and on. It's like you want to have a pot of water and warm it up enough so it's almost boiling but never actually let it hit the boiling point. And then keep it there for most of your life.

Really looking forward to hearing any comments!!

[kpreston]

Maybe it's not a correlation between sex and success, but a genetic issue that predisposes certain people to have high sex drives AND success.

[brandongilbert]

I think the drive for sex is just the drive to create.

Success is the result of being creative. I think the two energies are very correlated.

Very sexually charged people are usually very energetic as well.

It takes energy to achieve our goals

I actually wrote a good article on this exact subject called

Sex isn’t all about f@cking - Brandon Gilbert's blog: Sex isn’t all about f@cking

[jtracy]

My understanding is that a high sex drive is simply another way of expressing a highly creative personality. They're like two sides of the same coin. Napoleon Hill claims that the acheivements of great leaders can often be traced directly to the influence of women who aroused the creative faculties of their minds by stimulating their sex desires.

He also gives 7 other positive ways to stimulate creativity so one could choose another of them. So if you don't have a strong sex drive, it doesn't mean that you'll never accomplish anything in life. There are other ways to get the creative juices flowing. Success is about creativity and high vibration levels.

I would imagine that suppressing your positive energy in any way is going to be bad for your creativity and success. As for potentially self-destructive behavior, I guess we all engage in potentially self-destructive behavior except we don't see it that way at the time. Maybe the more behavior you are actually engaging in, the greater the risk that some of it will be self-destructive.

[Cran]

Maybe you should broaden your view of success, and think of some religious leaders who kept their sex drive well under control (exclude the founder of Islam, perhaps )

[Yasmin]

#1 yes I fully believe and have experienced time and time again that there is a strong link between high sex drive and success for both men and women and I am the later.
Society has taught us to suppress our sex drive and the result is a higher than ever rate of depression and stress related illnesses.
Ghandi appeared to suppress his sex drive for religious purposes but it is known that he slept between 2 virgins while he was fasting to maintain his energy.
High sex drive is chemically linked to a high testosterone for men and women. Testosterone is our youth hormone. It gives us energy, motivation and drive. Low levels cause low energy, depression, and decreased libido, erection issues. Testosterone is our get up and go. When we suppress our sexual activity we suppress the production of this powerful hormone. An important physical aspect of Sexual transmutation involves techniques that enhance and increase testosterone for men and oestrogen and testosterone for women. There are a complexity of hormone involved but lets keep it simple. Increasing and maintaining these natural chemicals in our body alters the chemistry of our mind and stimulates our creativity and inner genius.

#2 Finding a balance between a strong sex drive and being able to use it productively so that it doesn’t distract us and frustrate us is where the challenge comes in. Where your focus goes your energy flows. To control your focus you first need to have more control over your mind. Sexual Transmutation involves techniques to enable us to tap into the subconscious mind so that we can harness this powerful energy. So more than anything else the skill of Sexual Transmutation is an on going process of feeding the mind and inspiring our lives with high energy, well grounded mentors. Just like any great power, sex energy can be used well or misused. It can inspire us or lead us down a path of destruction. Turned On By Life

[Cristal Lilly]

Originally Posted by dominick

It leads me to ask two questions that seem very important yet relatively undiscussed:

#1 - If indeed there is a positive correlation between sex drive and success, does it makes sense to do things consciously to cultivate sex drive/sex energy in our lives?

actually, even under the premise that everything you concluded is true, the answer is still no. correlation is not causality. allow me to illustrate.
a research showed a big correlation coefficient between the rise in the consumption of icecream and the rise in temperature. if you increase the consumption of icecream, will that make the temperature rise?

this is correlation. whereas temperature might have a causal effect on the consumption of icecream, mere correlation means that two things appear simultaneously in a similar or opposite volume. nothing more than that. the causality in my example is a mere coincidence, and that's why I purposefully turned it around. one MIGHT cause the other, it's not excluded by correlation, but an established correlation gives you no reason to think there is any actual causality there.

so in your example, under the premise of the correlation being there and being high enough to be considered important, there is no telling if a)high sex drive makes you more successful,
b)success in life makes you more horny (this would actually be my initiative haven't thought about it guess, cause depression makes your libido drop, and opposite from depression is feeling you're accomplishing your purpose/feeling of success in life. though this is a logical fallacy.),
or c) neither causes the other

[jeff3]

Maybe the correlation is that the men you mentioned are more willing pursue their desires, in their cases it ended up being made public. What I mean is that the initiative required to go after something until they get it could just spill over into other areas of their life.

Also to be considered is the "testosterone factor", a high sex drive is basically a by-product of an abundance of the hormone which normally declines as men age. Testosterone is also linked to emotional well being, competitiveness, aggressiveness (in the board room or wall street as well as the boxing ring). Low testosterone can actually be the source of some types of depression. In the mundane world this is an important determinant of the average males success, his competitiveness that is. It creates an inertia where success builds upon success and continues even after this hormonal factor runs it's course.

The good news is that by using IM techniques and working "with" spirit the playing field is leveled and the advantage of using force is rendered.

[dice]

If you're working as a pornographer I dare say certainly! Sexy time!

[Michael Clyde]

Maybe.. But for every successful contributor you mentioned, you can counter with an individual who has a high sex drive that has not had major success and contribution to the world. We just don't here about them. You can probably see them in your own family and friends though. Likewise, you can probably find just as many "contributors" that have a low sex drive.

[pyrogen]

Originally Posted by jeff3

Also to be considered is the "testosterone factor", a high sex drive is basically a by-product of an abundance of the hormone which normally declines as men age. Testosterone is also linked to emotional well being, competitiveness, aggressiveness (in the board room or wall street as well as the boxing ring). Low testosterone can actually be the source of some types of depression.

I agree from experience.

I've noticed that the more "driven" sorts of women are often interpreted as being more masculine in some ways. They are less emotional and have a higher sex drive. They don't coo over babies, and partners tend to get frustrated with them because they aren't nurturing.

I've also noticed that my friends who were more "feminine" kinds of men, also lacked motivation and competitive drive, and had a lower interest in sex. The more masculine women who found them attractive got very frustrated with their low sex drive, and left them. I was also married to one of these sorts of men for a time.

My partner is a transgendered man, and I knew him before he started taking testosterone. Since he was born female, he had a normal female hormonal balance. Now he has male levels of testosterone. Since starting testosterone he has become very motivated and dynamic in ways that I didn't observe before, and his thinking is less emotional. 180 degree change.

But testosterone isn't the only factor. There's also a connection with the serotonin/dopamine system. "Alpha" wolves have higher levels of serotonin.

Again a personal experience observation... I was on Paxil for 2 years. Paxil/Prozac/Zoloft/that family of drugs (the selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors) block the reuptake of serotonin so that more serotonin gets utilized by your brain.

Here's how it works. Signals are sent in your brain via synapses, the junctions between neurons (nerve cells). Think of this as the post office. Now, think of a neurotransmitter (serotonin) as
a package being sent through the mail. Reuptake is like the package being returned to sender instead of arriving at its proper address. The SSRI drugs keep that from happening.

Paxil made me a social operator and more "Alpha" like. It was a force in ending my marriage, because the dynamics of the relationship changed. I became more of a go-getter. He married a passive daydreamer and two years into the marriage suddenly I wanted to go to med school.

Paradoxically, though, these drugs inhibit sex drive... so go figure, re: the sex drive and success connection. Since I'm female and have a *female* sexual wiring, i.e. it's short-circuited with romance and emotional stuff, it helped me out to have my sex drive short-circuited. I was able to focus on math for the first time, go figure.

[dominick]

Maybe.. But for every successful contributor you mentioned, you can counter with an individual who has a high sex drive that has not had major success and contribution to the world.

Sure, but that's not my concern. It's like the studies they've done on IQ which suggest that there are more men at both extremes. More geniuses but also more who are mentally retarded.

It seems like large quantities of sex energy has polarizing effects. It's probably similar to what Steve talks about in terms of light workers vs. dark workers (great podcast if you haven't listened to it yet!).

At a raw level high sex energy produces Mike Tyson the Greatest Boxer in the World for a stretch. It also produces Mike Tyson the Rapist who ends up in prison because of an inability to control that energy.

Indiscretions by Clinton, Kennedy and others may not have been as extreme as Tyson's but they point to men whose sex energy perhaps helped to elevate them to great success but also endanger their stature and reputation.

I think this is a topic *grossly* under-studied. If indeed the quantity, use and directionality of sex energy plays as large of a role as it seems it might in the success of many luminaries then the fact that there isn't a single book on this (that I've seen) in huge wealth of personal development material seems really strange. It's tough to even find much on Google about the possible correlation between sex energy and success.

And look, I'm not necessarily saying there's causation here. It could simply be that people who gain success and power are more likely to have many more choices available to them in terms of sexual partners. I get that. But if indeed there is a high correlation here then I think that's what could be very, very interesting to study.

[Scipio]

Originally Posted by dominick

At a raw level high sex energy produces Mike Tyson the Greatest Boxer in the World for a stretch. It also produces Mike Tyson the Rapist who ends up in prison because of an inability to control that energy.

I think the intense drive and overwhelming commitment to spend 10 hours every day boxing, and then coming home and watching video tapes of himself boxing for the rest of the day, is what caused Mike Tyson to be a Mike Tyson. Nobody wakes up as heavyweight champion of the world. No biological urge makes you the best in the universe. You have to enact sustained and unrelenting effort for that.

[pyrogen]

There are also people who were highly achieved and contributed much to the world, who were abstinent/celibate; they seem to dominantly be in intellectual type of fields as opposed to highly socially oriented fields.

The key might be extroversion more than anything else. Business and politically oriented people tend to be extroverted. Sex is a social activity. I think the drive that makes people want to be very social with people, tends to also make people want to have sex with people. I've known a number of introverts and extroverts, and it seemed the introverts were always less sexually motivated.

[oBakasan]

There are also people who were highly achieved and contributed much to the world, who were abstinent/celibate; they seem to dominantly be in intellectual type of fields as opposed to highly socially oriented field

But celibacy is less about having a low sex drive and more about resisting whatever sex drive you already have. Avoiding sex completely because of a low sex drive is nowadays called asexuality.

If we assume that a high sex drive makes someone more successful then think about what happens when a person with a high sex drive stops having sex - it'll just keep going UP and UP and UP. So in this regard, being celibate and having a high sex drive is the best thing you can get.

And the argument about the difference between social and intellectual intelligence doesn't hold water. You have to be bothintelligent and good with people if you want to succeed.

Finally, that list you've got is way too small to be really considered statistically significant.

[magi13]

I think that is not the issue of being successful, maybe more on the balance and harmony in your own mind.

To much of something is not healthy.

[bluedragon]

In Chinese medicine and Qigong it is absolutely so. Sexual drive is creative urge in its purest form - and it can be directed in any creative pursuit with tremendous success, that is, if you can control it, otherwise you just feel the need to release it through sexual intercourse. The cultivation of sexual energy (like in true Tantra practices) is essential for attaining and maintaining good health, as well as for attaining Enlightenment.
You will generally find their simplistic understanding of the world excellent and highly practical for explaining many phenomena that are difficult to explain, controversial or slippery when trying to explain them from different perspectives such as psychology, medicine or common sense knowledge.

[magi13]

That's an interesting concept. Still, I do believe it's best to be tempered with balance and knowledge. Not just pure drive from our basic instincts.

With respect to your opinion, I do believe in the memorizing, it's easier to remember provocative thoughts than those that are normal.

I'd like to request our readers to further support this theory with facts and references.

[satish lamba]

Hi everyone,

I am a new entrant to this forum. I am an engineer by profession but have always been interested in social sciences.
I have been of the opinion that people ,in all walks of life, with very strong libido are always acheivers and become leaders. Whilst searching this aspect on the net I found this site and was pleasantly surprised to see I am not alone in my opinion.
The case of Tiger Woods brought my thoughts back to this subject. Instead of trying to wilify these indivisuals my thoughts go like this
" Very high Libido results in success and of course brings in power and wealth. This power and wealth now urges them to fulfill their desires and they rationalize that their aim to success and power was to satisfy these very desires and having reached the top they plunge into the activities which are not socially acceptable. As leaders they always believe in calculated risk but some do get caught up."

I would be really interested if any serious study or any book has been written on this subject.

[Brutha]

I would be really interested if any serious study or any book has been written on this subject.

Ring finger length linked to City stockbrokers' success, claim scientists - Telegraph could point you in the right direction.

[Andrew Brunelle]

Perhaps it is true that many people with a high sex drive are successful, but I am sure that many people without a high sex drive are successful as well. So perhaps having a high sex drive and using to accomplish your goals is what we are talking about. It would sure make goal setting so much more fun if it turned us on.

As a man, the idea of sex is stimulating and exciting. If we could take those feelings and use them towards any real goal we have, it would most likely guarantee success or at least put it in our favor. I'll have to try this on one of my goals and see how it works.

[BitterFlower]

I think, for men, it's not necessarily high sex drive, but charisma (my opinion, I might find back up later). Charisma leads to more people swooning over you, and more opportunity for more sex. My primal side would throw my panties at all the guys you mentioned (but then my intellect takes over and and my primal side stands down). The more "wooden" people are the ones that get trampled in the fray.

Just my 2 cents.

[Chillax]

Succesful people have more sex, no suprise here

[Starby]

There is certainly a link, although it's not so much about success as the inner drive to create it. Sex is creativity, just as much as writing a book, painting a beautiful picture, setting up a website or any of the other amazing things driven people can achieve!

[SnerpGoodWord]

One other aspect is that a big part of female sexual attraction is to perceived power, money and success. It follows that men who want to attract these women as partners need to achieve some level of success.

In other words, the causal mechanism might not be so much creative energy as the practical requirements for attracting partners.

[Andrew Gubb]

I think sex drive is a reflection of your internal energy and vitality. I wouldn't focus on increasing sex drive, more on energy and vitality in general... that's what I think.

(I have a massive sex drive FYI I'm adept at channeling all sorts of other energies as well, when I love, hate, fight, grow, or go after my goals, I do so intensely)

[CatP]

Yes, as many have stated above, there is a clear link between testosterone and tendency to make it in the world (and make it with a bunch of women).

Of course, you can have high levels and still be a withdrawn nobody who just watches porn all day.

There is a radio program called This American Life, and they featured stories on testosterone (including a guy who lost all his T, and a woman who started taking a bunch of T). It was amazing, and I recommend people find it on iTunes (I think it's 99 cents).

[180]

Studying "successful" people I've found the same trend.

The only glaring exception would be Leonardo Davinich. But even then, it was believed he routed his sexual energies into his work, which translated into creativity and energy.

I think it does, to a large degree make logical sense that people with huge sex drives get a lot accomplished.

I don't want to say that sex is the end all be all, but it can be for many people. It's a driving factor in much of what we do. Lots of men make money just so they can impress beautiful ladies. Consciously we are unaware of it, but it's a very subconscious thing. Frankly speaking, we are lazy creatures by nature. I could get by daily with a bag a fritos and sitting on my couch all day IF and only if I knew that would effect me getting laid.

This isn't the case for everyone, but I think it's the case for many... High school, guys wanna be buff, for the ladies. Guys want to make money, for the ladies, guys want to popular, for the ladies. All in all privatively it revolves around mating and sex.

Women, on a very subconscious level ALL women want to beautiful. Why? To attract the perfect man. Again it's subconscious.

[RagsToRiches]

Originally Posted by dominick

cultivate sex drive/sex energy in our lives?

YES!

It makes tons of sense to do this.

Berries, nuts, healthy excercise, muscle mass, limit masturbation (twice a week max), have lots of sex , high-strength garlic pills (not when you have a date), ginseng pills, ginkgo bilbo, zinc, magnesium, etc.

If anyone knows any more ways, let me know because I am well into maximising sex drive - the most awesome kind of drive there is!

[jphaas]

my guess would be that most people have the potential to have a strong sex drive, but for a lot of them it gets inhibited by fear, poor health, not having great relationships, etc.... so I'd guess in successful people, the qualities that make them successful are qualities that likewise reduce the impediments to having a strong sex drive.