Should You Set Aside Time To Masturbate?

We all have busy lives and packed schedules, and most of us have some concept of how to plan and space things out on our calendars. Work, social life, self-care, cleaning — all of these to-dos commonly get penciled into our day planners. But what about the ultimate self-care? Should you really be carving out dedicated space in your calendar to masturbate?

The idea of setting aside time to masturbate isn’t totally out there — after all, plenty of sex and relationship experts recommend scheduling time for sex in long-term relationships. And just like sex with a partner can't always be a spontaneous act (again, we're all busy), the same thing goes for masturbation. Though it can be difficult to find the time and the space to give yourself a bit of self-love — particularly for millennials, who often work multiple jobs and live with roommates — making a point to do so is actually super healthy and encouraged.

So, how exactly do you make time for masturbation? How do you ensure that you always have room for privacy, some time "off the grid," and staying unbothered? Iman Hariri-Kia, Bustle's sex and relationships editor and host of No Shame Sex Ed, chatted with Six, a human sexuality Ph.D. student and intimacy doula, to find out how to claim space and time to masturbate.

The first step, of course, is to remove the shame around having to ask for permission to do so in the first place. Though masturbation is still a taboo subject, there's absolutely no reason why you can't low-key set aside a little bit of alone time for yourself in your room — and no reason why you can't communicate it to partners and roommates. To learn more about how to assert your boundaries around this intimate act of self-love, check out the video above.

Host: Iman Hariri-Kia

Expert: Astrologer Six

Executive Creative Director: Lauren Sofair

Executive Producer: Whitney Buxton

Producer: Lauren Tegtmeyer

Director of Photography: Marshall Stief

Camera Operator: Jasmine Velez

Design Director: Andenew Ayele

Motion Designer: Jeff Donlan

Editor: Charlotte Carpenter