Relationships Advice for Single and Married Couples

Relationship Advice: How to Be Romantic
Even When You're Not the Romantic Type

by John Souter

Love Builders is a Relationship Advice website designed to provide free advice to help single and married couples in the fine art of living together.

This site is emotional stimulus to help you find ways to improve and build your relationship. Love is at the heart of all our lives. Love is what we cannot live without. This site helps make love just a little bit easier.

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Adult romance often needs good relationship advice is so important to building a couple's love relationship. Now, many guys just do not consider themselves to be the "romantic type." This is unfortunate for them, because most women DO consider themselves to be romantics. It therefore stands to reason, if you want to please any woman who is a romantic at heart, you had better learn how to bring a little romance into your relationship.

Now you might be thinking: "Surely, a woman doesn't want me to fake being romantic, when I'm really not that type." The answer to that question is a most definitely "YES." All of us act in ways that are appropriate to different situations, regardless of how we feel. That's simply called be civilized. Most gentlemen don't start out with manners. They learn those manners as they figure out what is considered appropriate behavior in different situations.

In the same way, most romantic men don't start life that way; they learn how to act in ways that produce romantic feelings in their relationships. Regardless of how you feel about the subject at the most, remember that romance is a state of mind. Here are some tips to increase your romantic score (and also your lovability) from the opposite sex.

1. You can learn to be romantic. Even if you're not the romantic type you can quickly pick up the skills necessary to please your woman in the romantic ways. Do this and your stock will rise dramatically in her heart. You do this first by changing your attitudes on this subject, learning to "think romantic."

2. Learn what is romantic to your woman. Romance can be hard to define. If you look up the word in an unabridged dictionary you'll find that "romance" can include a lot of things from being naive and having sex to the study of certain languages. So you must come up with your own definition for learning how to please the one you love.

Romance is what makes us excited about the opposite sex. When someone does something romantic for us they touch us. We become intrigued, interested -- even aroused. You don't have to understand romance to be affected by it. The term probably means something a little different to each of us, because we all have our own opinions as to what attracts us. So study what your lover loves.

Let me be more specific about things which have been seen as romantic: Romance is often seen as fragrant smells; flowers; surprises; gentle touches; beautiful art; gifts; touching; appreciative comments; impractical gestures; poetry; love notes, letters and romantic cards; beautiful language that rolls of the tongue; sexy clothing; great photography; beautiful music; good tasting food at the right moment.

But it is possible to give candy or flowers or to write love notes and have the gestures seen as unromantic and pushy. This is especially true if the object of our affection has shown no interest in us. Wisdom dictates that the romantic person go slowly, taking the temperature of the water.

To understand romance it is also good to understand what it is NOT: bad odors (especially B.O.); poor hygiene; rudeness; being crude; discordant music; dirty clothes; anger; roughness; taking someone for granted; gifts that are "too practical"; fast food (unless it is an unexpected surprise); and going "Dutch."

3. Learn the art of giving. There are right and wrong ways to give. The best giving is done without "strings." You give because you care; because you love the recipient or even because you love the gift so much that you enjoy sharing it with someone you're fond of. Giving should not be seen as or give as "compensation" for gifts received. Give because you enjoy giving and you will undoubtedly receive gifts in return. Then learn to be gracious and thankful recipient.

4. Learn the art of the surprise. Some people hate surprises. But most of us like pleasant surprises. Nice presents or opportunities that are unexpected. But good surprises are dependent upon timing.

A few years ago I had a friend came to me for advice. His girlfriend loved surprises, but he acknowledged to me that he had such a methodical personality type, that he simply couldn't do things on impulse, at the last moment. My suggestion was that he make his plans but not tell her until the last moment. As it turned out, this was the perfect compromise. She received her surprises and he could plan then in advance.

5. Learn how to give flowers. I remember the first time I gave a girl a flower. It was a long-stem, red rose which I gave to her in my car after I picked her up from the girl's dorm at our college. I paid next to nothing for that rose and was very surprised by the girl's response. It was the first flower she had ever received from a boy. She kissed and hugged me. Then she pinned it to the car visor so she could look at it on our date.

That was when, for the first time, that I realized flowers were a "good investment." You see, most men have a natural tendency to consider flowers as a "bad investment" because they the gift will quickly wither up and die. Men would often rather give something of lasting value, like a silk flowers or a potted plant. But those flowers are usually not seen as being very "romantic" precisely because they are more durable and "practical."

But I believe that it is the very fact that the flowers will fade away, that makes them so special. When a man spends his money on something so frivolous. They are a fragile bit of color, fragrance and natural beauty that make a soft statement about how precious she is to your heart.

6. Learn how to write love notes. I know this may seen hard to many, but the investment in time and energy to write a love note will be more than rewarded in kind by a woman's response. There is something so special to a woman when a man takes the time to pen his thoughts on paper. It says volumes to her about his feelings. It proclaims that he's thinking about her and how he feels about her so much that he has taken the time out of his busy schedule to write down a few words.

You don't have to write a book. Just a few heart-felt lines are usually enough. Just put on paper with pen and ink (which is usually the best way to write it out) your thoughts about her. You can believe that this will touch her in a much stronger way than she would have been touched by similar spoken words.

Try to use "uncommon words." By that I mean, put your words into thought provoking patterns. For example, instead of saying simple: "I love you", you might phrase your feelings as uniquely as possible. "I remember when I first knew that I loved you, that day when we sat in my car for the first time. And even after all of these years, nothing had changed in my heart to lessen the impact of my feelings for you. Even after all this time, I'm amazed that you still make me weak in the knees." You get the idea. Just put words to your own particular situation and feelings -- and she'll love you all the more for it.

When my wife and I celebrated our twentieth anniversary, I gave her a different love note for twenty days. On each day's note, I reminded her a different year of our relationship, and gave her a little gift with each. She really loved those romantic touches and it certainly made our relationship stronger.

7. Share something together that you wouldn't normally share. We all have lovers who like things that don't mean a whole lot to us. Perhaps she likes romance novels and you find them boring. Go to the bookstore and browse through the romance novels and find one that you think is "a cut above" and give it to her with a little piece of chocolate. In other words, share something with her that she values; take an interest in what interests her.

About the Author:

John Souter is a licensed minister and President of Maui Me, Inc., a full-service Maui wedding company. He founded several churches in Oregon and Northern California (two of which are running into the thousands of attendees each week). He is also the author of 50 books and multitudes of articles, scripts and papers. His books have been translated into 8 languages.