At the beginning of lockdown, I noticed there was a huge emphasis on everything you should be getting done while stuck at home. Get sick six-pack abs, uplevel—or start!—your online business, get 10K followers on your TikTok account, learn to make sourdough bread, and Kondo your entire home. Anyone with a partner better be having honeymoon-on-steriods sex with all this free time. No pressure.

Unsurprisingly, the extra stress, anxiety, and depression we’re experiencing in lockdown are not conducive to mind-blowing sex. Over 43% of participants in a study at Kinsey Institute at Indiana University reported a decline in the quality of their sex life since the pandemic began. Another study on female sexual behavior during COVID-19 showed that while frequency and desire increased, quality went down the drain.

If reading this has brought up a reality that you’ve been trying to avoid with yet another season of The Crown, fear not. There are many ways to reinvigorate your lovemaking, even in the midst of a pandemic. Spoiler alert: Pushing yourself (and your partner) to meet some imaginary expectation of what your sex should be like isn’t one of them. A “hustle” mentality doesn’t tend to lead to the connection, satisfaction, and fulfillment that we seek in our sexual lives.

Instead, things like mindfulness, savoring, intentional touch, gratitude, and good old communication are way more effective and more fun, too. Here are some of my favorite tips for bringing the passion and quality back into the bedroom (and wherever else you might find yourselves!).

Mindfulness and savoring

Our brain’s negativity bias wires us to look for problems and zero in on what doesn’t feel good. We are even more likely to focus on discomfort during a time of crisis. Negativity can cut us off from sensual and sexual pleasure and desire. Swimming around in negativity and painful emotions isn’t a turn-on for most folks.

But there are practices that can train your brain to notice and soak into pleasure and positive experiences.

My favorite exercise for jumpstarting sexual enjoyment is mindfulness of pleasure. To practice, focus on what feels best in your body for 12–15 minutes a day. Use pleasure as your object of focus in this meditation, the same way you would with your breath or a mantra. You might bring your physical awareness to a part of your body that is relaxed, or the feeling of being supported by whatever you are sitting on, or even a pleasant emotional sensation, like peace or joy. If you are having trouble finding a sensation that feels good, take a moment to relax your body and then focus on the relaxation, or bring to mind a past pleasurable experience and then notice and stay with the pleasant response in the body.

Studies suggest that practicing mindfulness can “significantly improve sexual desire and other indices of sexual response” in women, and is a “potentially promising treatment avenue for men with situational erectile dysfunction.” Mindfulness can also lower stress (a big libido killer for men and women) by increasing our sense of acceptance and equanimity.

If you’re not able to commit to a meditation practice right now, or just want to supercharge your pleasure awareness, give savoring pleasure a try. There are more pleasurable experiences on any given day than you might realize: those first few sips of coffee, the sun on your face, eating a nice meal, peeing when you really need to pee, to name a few. Pause and savor everyday pleasure when it arises, slowing down to really enjoy that caffeine hitting your bloodstream!