More than Just Sex (25 page)

As I said, she is called an ‘ex’ for a reason; it’s short for ‘exit’, and when you get out, stay out. If you really have to tell that funny story, make it a ‘friend’, or just tell the story without the need for a companion in the tale. Trust me, you will be doing yourself a huge favour.

IMPRESS HER WITH
YOU
NOT YOUR
STUFF

One of the rather more obvious keys to a meaningful relationship is that there has to be some real substance to the connection you have with the other person. While I’m sure we all like nice stuff and are more than happy to collect the badges and trappings of doing well, I don’t know one woman who would be with a man just because he has a nice car or house, or the big corner office with a thick carpet and a window. She wants to be with you and to connect to you in a meaningful way… it’s her genetic programming.

The only people you will impress with the stuff are your mates and superficial collectors of sparklies. The G.o.D. wants something much more. She wants a connection and excitement. She wants to feel that you actually get her and are genuinely interested in her. If she’s the right girl, then this should all be very natural for both of you.

Women are wired up from the inside out, while we guys tend to be wired from the outside in. Despite what you might think from the glossy magazines, guys are far more superficial than women. I can’t emphasize this enough. We generally care how they look, while they care how we make them feel. Get this right and you’re onto a winner every time. But there is another big pitfall awaiting you if you make ‘stuff’ your trump card.

When you play that game you have no idea what history you are competing against. You may go all in with your latest hot hatch, while the next guy or the ex trumps you with his Ferrari. You have no idea what you are playing
with, and can you imagine how foolish you will look and feel when you find out you’ve been gazumped by her past or her other options?

Don’t even go there. Impress her with the way you are and how you make her
feel
, not with your expensive or shiny stuff. There will always be someone with bigger, flashier stuff than you, but they are not with her in that moment, you are. Connect with her, be genuinely interested in her and you’ll build a bond that no amount of stuff can break through.

Girls may love to ride in their boyfriend’s sports car, but you will be her boyfriend AND have a sports car, not BECAUSE you have a sports car.

DON’T ASSUME ANYTHING

You will be aware from earlier that we all have a very destructive habit of making things up. Our brain needs to make sense of things and give meaning to situations, so the tendency is to take the available information and make it fit in the best way our imaginations can. But just because you think something doesn’t make it right, you know.

Any time you find yourself jumping to conclusions, stop for a second and ask yourself, ‘Is this definitely true?’ or ‘Could this be true under the right circumstances?’ and finally, ‘Am I just making it up?’ You will be amazed at the number of times you’ll catch yourself just making stuff up. ‘She’s not called,
that means
she’s not interested.’ Or ‘She has called four times, so
I think
she’s too keen. I need to get out’.

Most of the time, we humans do the best we can in any given situation. Most of the time we are not playing
games. Or if you are the kind of guy who does play games or has played games in the past, don’t make the mistake of judging everyone else by your standards.

I know one guy who could best be described as ‘a player’. He was a really good guy at heart, but he’d ruin every good relationship by assuming that the girl was either cheating on him or was just about to cheat on him. Why? Because that’s what he’d done to others in the past, so as soon as he heard one of the lines he used to use, like ‘I’m working late, can’t see you tonight’, he immediately assumed the worst and panicked. Of course the best way to avoid that particular pitfall is by not being a player in the first place but if you are, then at least don’t fall into your own trap with the thoughts in your head.

DON’T AUTOMATICALLY TAKE ON TRADITIONAL GENDER ROLES

Every relationship is different and, while she will definitely want you to be a ‘man’, she will not necessarily want you to provide for her. It’s tricky being male these days: our traditional role of ‘provider’ has been eroded, and instead you have to define how you are going to be in relation to her and see if that works for both of you in that particular relationship. Traditional gender roles don’t really exist any more (although you may find that changes if you decide to make the move from coupledom to familyhood), and you therefore have the opportunity to take on the roles that are right for you in your circumstances.

DON’T GO CHASING YOUR FIXING FIX

Let’s be honest, guys like to fix things, fact. We have DIY in our DNA; we are fixers by nature. When someone comes to us with a problem, our natural instinct is to figure out the best and most logical solution then sort that out. Add into the mix that the person with the problem is either someone we care about or someone we are trying to impress, and our urge to fix goes into overdrive. Find a solution, do it and move on, right?

Wrong… Quite often, the woman in your life just wants to talk
about
the problem, but she doesn’t actually want you to
do
anything.

Strange as this may seem, it is absolutely true and is one of the biggest unspoken frustrations in many relationships. It’s one of those unwritten and unspoken rules, and if you break it you are trampling on toes that you didn’t even know were there to be trampled on. Have you ever found yourself in the doghouse but had no idea why? Chances are that you have broken one of the unwritten rules. For the avoidance of doubt, your role is to be supportive but not necessarily the fixer, unless she asks you, of course, in which case quickly pull on your shining armour, saddle up your trusty steed and ‘help’ her to sort it out.

BONUS TIP!

Listen, it’s not that hard – but if you just CAN’T listen without trying to fix it, and particularly if she’s starting to rant (remember it’s not at you, it’s to you, even if it doesn’t
feel like it), set yourself a time of say 5–10 minutes (please don’t set a timer though) or as long as it takes for her to tell you the bare bones of the problem. During this time respond with active listening and supportive ‘umms’, ‘ahs’ and ‘wows’ AND when or if you can’t stand it any longer say: ‘Wow that is
[insert adjective of your choice]
, you know who would really want to hear about it – go and give your mum/ sister/best girlfriend a call and tell them.’ You’ve avoided the ‘fix’ and avoided the doghouse; who knows, you might even get a treat.

DON’T BE NEEDY – THERE’S NO NEED FOR IT

In order for you to have any kind of meaningful relationship you must first have a meaningful relationship with yourself. In other words, before you invest in ‘us’, you need to be comfortable in your own skin, with who you are, what you are and what you have. Please don’t make the mistake of looking to someone else to make you happy or to bring out the best in you when the best is so deeply buried that even you’re not sure where or what it is yourself.

If you find yourself being ‘needy’ in a relationship, then only one of two things can be true. You are either not getting enough attention or validation from the other person to satisfy you, in which case there is probably not much you can do about it; they are most likely doing their best and giving you as much as they want to give. Or you are unsure in yourself, and need reassurance from someone else that you or the relationship is OK. In either case, the problem is yours to fix, not hers.

A relationship should be somewhere that you go to give, not just to receive. If you give 100% to your relationship and your partner does as well, then you have a wonderful combination, which is twice the sum of the individual parts and exactly as it should be. If you go into a relationship looking for it to fulfil you, or make you better, then you are taking away half of its power. If you are not OK in yourself, don’t expect anyone to whom you are linked romantically to be your salvation. While they might be able to help, and they will definitely be able to be kind and loving, the responsibility for your wellbeing is yours alone. A relationship should be a place you go to give and share, not take and exhaust both of you.

HAVE ‘MEANINGFUL’ SEX

As we said earlier, it is a seriously bad idea to sleep with her unless you are really interested in a long-term relationship. Despite what ‘small head’ might be saying, let me give you one really good piece of advice: what might be fun for a few minutes can lead to a whole world of pain. For most women, sleeping with a guy has far more emotional significance than it does for us. I know you might find that hard to believe from a guy’s point of view, but it’s true. For most women, sex is an emotional thing and for most guys, at least initially, it’s much more of a physical thing. If you want a relationship not a headache it’s time to set sail on HMS
Authentic
. Have Meaningful Sex and remember the meaningful mantra, ‘if you are not that into her don’t get
into her!’ And if you are, wait until it means more than a little boost to your self-esteem.

OUTLAST A SINGLE AND YOU WON’T BE SINGLE

The average pop single is four minutes long, but the average guy has ‘peaked’ and is feeling rather pleased with himself in three minutes flat. On average, it takes women up to 20 minutes to reach orgasm. Hmmm? That’s right and, according to most sex therapists, it is the 15 minutes of foreplay (rather than the main feature), which reliably guarantee a ‘happy ending’ for your dreamgirl.

But judging from the average porn flick or locker room conversation, you could be excused for thinking that sex is usually measured with a calendar. So cut yourself some slack and know that as long as you spend a bit of time warming her up and you last longer than the average chart topper when you get down to business, then you are probably topping her chart, too. Most surveys agree that the average lovemaking session lasts from three to ten minutes. Not that any of this should be so surprising – the average hotel porn viewer watches for just 12 minutes. (You wouldn’t believe the research that went into this book!)

THREE STEPS TO HEAVEN

But presuming that you are going to have sex, you can at least be good at it. Today, women know what they want and you should not be afraid to give it to her. They have
most of the power in a sexual encounter and we have a responsibility to ourselves to be good at it. I know that for a lot of men, sex is about personal gratification. So long as you’re OK, what’s the problem? The problem, of course, is that if you’re not up to scratch, you might well find yourself being traded in for a more attentive model. The days of ‘there’s no such thing as premature ejaculation, if she can’t keep up that’s her problem’ are over!

Here are my top tips for satisfying your girl, all gained from talking to real women. I am not going to rewrite the
Kama Sutra
. Sex is just as much in the mind as it is in the body.

If you want to make a woman go weak at the knees, you have to start a little further up. No not there! Higher than that! The brain is the body’s biggest and most powerful sex organ. While sex for men is biologically much more of a physical thing, for a woman it is an emotional and mental connection that makes all the difference.

Step 1: Connect

Really connect and be present with her, as if there is no one else in the room. In fact, as we are talking about sex, it’s probably a good idea to make sure there is no one else in the room, but as you know, you can be just as distracted one on one as you can in a crowd. Make lots of meaningful eye contact and then do something that you might find a little odd. Set the intention of her being really satisfied ‘with’ and ‘by’ you. By ‘setting the intention’, I mean sort of
will
it to happen. You know the way that at 1–1 and with ten
minutes to go you
will
get another goal to go in? Or, if you’ve been speeding a little and you see a police car behind you, you
will
the blue lights not to go on. That’s exactly the kind of thing I’m talking about: set a really strong intention of her being satisfied and really connecting with you. Next time you are intimate, try it. It works… just don’t shout out ‘GOAL!’ when you score!

Step 2: Go to work

Pay attention to her and her body. Notice what works for her, and do more of that.

Actually take some time to study female anatomy. Gone are the days when you could be excused for not finding the G-spot without a wet suit and a snorkel. You are a modern man, and you are expected to know better. You might even like to think of sex as something else for you to practise and master.

Step 3: Time to bare all…

When she’s bare and vulnerable, bare your soul. We have spoken a great deal in this book about being deliberate and controlling various aspects of situations, but of course I am not for one second suggesting that this is the basis for a whole relationship. To be meaningful, your relationship must obviously be real and based on a lot more than a few slick language patterns.

That said, there is a time and place for everything and there is a time and place where things are most effective. It’s obvious, but worth emphasizing, that the
most memorable and flattering compliments arise from genuine emotions.

Most people, if asked, will say that the most significant compliments they’ve ever received were ones about the importance of the person or the relationship, rather than about any physical attributes.