orgastic potency

English

Etymology

Calque of German orgastische Potenz, coined by Austrian physician Wilhelm Reich.

Noun

orgastic potency (uncountable)

1. (psychology) The ability to experience full orgasmic gratification while engaging in the sexual act, a condition only possible for people without neuroses.
   • 1927, Wilhelm Reich, translated by Theodore P. Wolfe, The Function of the Orgasm, New York: Meridian, published 1970, page 79:

     Orgastic potency is the capacity to surrender to the flow of biological energy, free of any inhibitions; the capacity to discharge completely and the dammed-up sexual excitation through involuntary, pleasurable convulsions of the body.

   • 1967, Elsworth F. Baker, Man in the Trap, →ISBN, page xxiii:

     Establishment of orgastic potency brings about very definite changes in the individual — changes which are not properly recognized or understood by most psychiatrists even today. The recognition of orgastic potency was crucial.

   • 2015, Charles Konia, The Emotional Plague: The Root of Human Evil, →ISBN:

     Orgastic potency is always lacking in neurotic individuals. It presupposes the presence or establishment of genitality: that is, the absence of pathological character armor and muscular armor. Orgastic potency is usually, and erroneously, not distinguieshed from erective and ejaculative potency, both of which are prerequisites of orgastic potency.

Translations

ability to experience orgasm

• Finnish: orgasmikyky

References

• Reich, Wilhelm, The Discovery of the Orgone, Volume 1: The Function of the Orgasm, Quote from page 102, 1942, Seventh printing 1999, The Noonday Press
• Lowen, Alexander, Pleasure, 1994, New York: Arkana Penguin
• Lowen, Alexander, Love and Orgasm - A Revolutionary Guide to Sexual Fulfillment, 1965. New York: Macmillan
• SUMMER CONFERENCE July 15–19, 2002 / REICH’S CONCEPT OF SELF-REGULATION