Good Vibrations aims to inspire and guide you as a person, practitioner, and policymaker in incorporating asset-based approaches to sexual well-being and pleasure into gender equity work. It’s organized around 7 Domains of Delight – seven aspects of sexual well-being that spark both gender equity and sexual pleasure. True to its name, the guide is always in motion, ready to flow alongside those who use it.

The Seven Domains of Delight

This online guide provides a dedicated section for each Domain of Delight, with practical guidance on how you can create space for sexual well-being in projects, programmes, research and organizations. Good Vibrations contributes to both gender equity and sexual well-being by filling a critical gap in many gender equity programmes, which often overlook sexual well-being and pleasure, despite these being fundamental aspects of quality of life.

Good Vibrations also challenges the privileges and stigma that make sexual well-being and pleasure more accessible to men, heterosexual people and those whose sexual and gender identities are widely accepted in society. It confronts existing “hierarchies”, where society tends to legitimize sexual well-being and pleasure only for those who are gender normative or sexually active within accepted norms such as marriage or specific age ranges, while denying this possibility to others.

The Good Vibrations framework is intended for a wide range of people working in gender equity, sexual rights, sexual and reproductive health and education. Its main goal is to help gender equity work go deeper by ensuring that sexual well-being and pleasure are part of the picture.

It is intended as a guide for activists, practitioners, researchers, managers and service providers who want to embed an asset-based approach to sexual pleasure and sexual well-being in their programming and activities. You might also find Good Vibrations useful in your own life, with your friends and lovers.

However, Good Vibrations can also help those working in SRHR to ensure that gender equity and sexual well-being and pleasure are central to their vision for change and success.

How can I use the framework?

Use Good Vibrations to support the development of project proposals, design, delivery, monitoring and evaluation of education and community programmes, health service provision, advocacy and campaign work.

You can focus on a single Domain of Delight or learn about several – they are mutually reinforcing. Some Domains relate more to personal and relational expressions of sexual well-being (e.g. Domains 1—3: Sexual joy, Relationship joy and Self-love) and others to the enabling environments at community and societal level (e.g. Domains 4—7: Services that make you smile, Safe spaces, Nurturing communities and Equal rights and freedoms).

For each of the 7 Domains of Delight, Good Vibrations gives you the following information.

• What it looks like in practice: real-world examples of how focusing on sexual well-being and pleasure can contribute to gender equality.
• Delight diagnostics (i.e. assess your project or organization): tools to assess your project or organization, including key questions to help you, your staff or programme/project stakeholders:
• consider the place of sexual well-being and pleasure in your vision or mission;
• appraise your organization’s programmes, initiatives or activities to determine where you could make space for sexual well-being and pleasure.
• Activities you can use when designing and implementing projects and programmes.
• Outcomes and indicators that incorporate sexual well-being and pleasure and are synergistic with gender equity outcomes.

The Framework also provides resources, case studies and further reading, including:

• • research on how sexual well-being and gender equity are conceptualized and experienced by individuals, families and communities;
  • evidence highlighting the central role of sexual well-being in overall well-being and gender equity;
  • “good practice” case studies of existing projects, approaches and tools.

These resources can help you integrate sexual well-being and pleasure into programmes that aim to advance both sexual health and gender equity.

Why do I need Good Vibrations?

Most programmes aimed at improving gender equity or SRHR use deficit-based models – in other words, they emphasize risks, vulnerability and negative outcomes from sex, sexuality and gender. This is the case whether the programme relates to health services, community-based outreach programmes, comprehensive sexuality education or other similar initiatives.

While there is value in measuring and recognizing negative outcomes (e.g. to identify unmet needs and find ways to address them), dominant approaches have done so at the expense of recognizing powerful qualities, capabilities, local resources and social values.

An emerging body of evidence suggests that asset-based approaches are an empowering way to create change and to mobilize existing strengths. Asset-based approaches shift the focus from what’s wrong or missing to what is possible; from the weaknesses of stakeholders or communities to their strengths and existing resources. This can take many forms and is typically based on what a local area or population needs, rather than a prescriptive formula that purports to be universally effective. In sexual health, asset-based approaches promote sexual well-being and highlight the positive aspects of sexuality, such as pleasure, emotional connection and a positive body image.

In addition, sex and sexuality are rarely mentioned as an asset in relation to gender equity, except for occasional references to the need for access to SRHR services as an indicator for gender equity. Measures of pleasure and sexual well-being are missing from key indicators of gender equity and empowerment (e.g. those used by the World Bank and the Sustainable Development Goals).
Good vibrations addresses these gaps and brings together important work on sexual well-being, sexual pleasure and gender equity. It offers practitioners a rationale and set of tools and recommendations to promote sexual well-being, pleasure and gender equity for all.

How was the framework developed?

The Good Vibrations framework is the result of a collaboration between The Pleasure Project, Tabu Tabu and researchers Dr Ester McGeeney and Dr Rachel Wilder. Young and Alive in Tanzania provided additional research and Breakthrough Action supported this project through its extensive global collaboration with SRHR practitioners.

There were three stages:

1. Evidence synthesis.
2. Qualitative research that explored the intersections of sexual pleasure, sexual well-being and gender equity in practice for communities and service and programme users of Young and Alive in Tanzania and TabuTabu in Brazil.
3. A co-production phase where consultants worked with one staff member of TabuTabu and three at The Pleasure Project to develop the Good Vibrations framework.