Are Fantasies Bad? Do They Make You Unfaithful? An Honest Exploration

Brittney and I have talked about fantasies — each other's and our own — more than most couples we know. Not because we're unusually progressive or unusually troubled, but because the honest conversation about desire eventually requires going there. And what we've found, consistently, is that the fantasies themselves are rarely the problem. The silence and shame around them usually are.

But the question deserves a serious answer, because the anxiety underneath it is real: if I'm fantasizing about someone other than my partner, does that mean something is wrong with me? With my relationship? Am I being unfaithful in some meaningful sense?

Let me answer this as directly as I can.

A dimly lit room captures the anticipation of an intimate encounter, as three figures stand poised in high heels, evoking a sensual fantasy.

What Research Shows About Fantasies

Sexual fantasy is one of the most universal aspects of human sexuality, cutting across gender, relationship status, orientation, and culture.

Dr. Justin Lehmiller's survey of over 4,000 Americans — the same research I referenced in the dirty talk post — found that the vast majority of people, regardless of relationship status, regularly fantasize about people other than their current partner. This isn't the behavior of the dissatisfied or the unfaithful. It's the baseline of normal human sexual psychology.

The brain doesn't have an off switch for attraction or imagination. Finding someone other than your partner attractive, or imagining a scenario involving them, is not a moral failure. It's the nervous system doing what nervous systems do — generating imagery in response to arousal cues, regardless of whether those cues are partner-relevant.

What you do with those fantasies is a separate question from whether you have them.

The Distinction That Actually Matters

The most useful distinction here isn't between "acceptable" and "unacceptable" fantasies. It's between fantasy as imagination and fantasy as rehearsal.

Fantasy as imagination is the involuntary or chosen generation of erotic scenarios that produce arousal without any particular intention toward acting. These are private, internal experiences that have no direct real-world consequence. The research on fantasy consistently finds that they serve legitimate psychological functions: releasing sexual tension, exploring dimensions of desire that aren't available in ordinary life, adding variety and activation to partnered encounters when consciously incorporated.

Fantasy as rehearsal is different — when the fantasy is being used to plan, cultivate desire toward, or facilitate emotional attachment to a specific real person outside the relationship. This is where the territory shifts from normal imagination into something that has real implications for the relationship.

Most people never cross that line. The fantasy remains fantasy — an internal experience that exists parallel to genuine desire for and commitment to a partner.

Does Fantasizing Make You Unfaithful?

No. Not inherently, not automatically, and not in the way that most people worry about.

Infidelity involves action, deception, and the violation of a specific relational agreement. A thought, however vivid, doesn't meet any of those criteria. The person who fantasizes about a colleague or celebrity while remaining entirely committed to their partner and their relationship's agreements has not been unfaithful in any meaningful sense.

What can move in the direction of infidelity — and this is worth naming — is the use of fantasy to cultivate real emotional or erotic attachment to a specific person outside the relationship. When fantasy becomes a vehicle for nurturing a real connection — when you're returning to the same specific person, building a private relationship with them in your mind, treating the fantasy as a substitute for what the real relationship isn't providing — that's worth examining honestly. Not because the fantasy itself is the problem, but because it may be pointing toward something in the relationship that deserves attention.

When Fantasies Become Relevant to the Relationship

There are specific circumstances under which fantasies move from a private matter to a relational one.

When they consistently feature a specific real person you have access to. Occasional attractions are normal. A sustained, intensifying fantasy about a specific coworker or friend — one that's growing rather than dissipating — may indicate something worth examining about either the fantasy or what it's directing you toward.

When they're driving behavior that affects the relationship. Using fantasies to avoid genuine intimacy with a partner, seeking to enact fantasies through deception rather than honest conversation, or allowing fantasy-driven dissatisfaction to create emotional distance — these are relational consequences worth taking seriously.

When one partner would feel genuinely violated knowing the content. This is a values question rather than a psychological one. Couples with explicit agreements about sharing fantasies have a different relational context than couples where the inner erotic life is entirely private. What matters is whether the shared agreements are being honored, not whether the fantasies exist.

The Better Question

Rather than "are my fantasies bad?" the more useful question is: what are my fantasies telling me?

Jack Morin's work on core erotic themes — which I've referenced throughout this blog — establishes that fantasy content is almost always symbolic rather than literal. The specific scenario points toward a feeling, a dynamic, a quality of experience that has erotic charge for you. Understanding that pointing is more valuable than either suppressing the fantasy or treating it as a literal desire that must be acted on.

A fantasy about being completely dominated might be pointing toward a desire for surrender and trust. A fantasy about a different kind of partner might be pointing toward a quality of presence or attention that's been missing. A fantasy about novelty might simply be pointing toward the desire for activation and charge in an intimate life that's become predictable.

None of those pointings are betrayals. They're information — about what you want to feel, what's alive in you, what might be worth bringing (carefully and honestly) into conversation with your partner.

The fantasy isn't the threat to your relationship. The silence and shame around it, unexamined, tends to be more so.

Ready to go deeper?

If this resonates, there are two ways to take the next step with Coelle.

Download the Coelle app — Guided audio intimacy sessions designed for couples who are ready to stop performing and start arriving. Download Coelle here.

Work with me directly — I offer one-on-one sex and intimacy coaching for individuals and couples, drawing on my background in sport psychology and years of personal somatic work. Navigating the fantasy conversation in relationships is a regular part of the work I do with clients. Learn more about coaching here.