QuickStartRomanceGuide
Keep this one- this is the final version that is on R10x as the bonus.
Reid: Hello everybody, it is Reid Mihalko for http://Relationship10x.com and if you’re watching this video, I have to congratulate you because this is the R10x Romance Quick Start Guide and you can only be watching this if you have signed up. So not only am I excited to be showing you some of this little quick 5 tips and tricks to generate some romance fast but it also means that you’re a part of the program. So I’m super dorkily, geekily excited. Since we only have 10 minutes to get going, I’m going to jump right in and walk you through the Romance Quick Start Guide because here at Relationship 10x we’re going to give you new information in lots of different formats. So for those of you who were video geeks, who learn well visually then this is your opportunity. You can also download the Romance Quick Start Guide in PDF form and then there will also be an audio mp3 download for those of you who want to listen to this in your cars, want to throw it in your smartphones and listen to it when you’re in the bus or in the subway. I’m not going to say you can’t watch it when you’re at work but if you get caught by your boss, I never told you. So that’s it.
The Quick Start Guide, basically the idea is how can you create some romance quickly in your life. And for those of you… if for some reason you haven’t watched the first free video for Relationship 10x, the one on romance and cats and dogs, I want you to watch that now or right after you watched this video because it’s going to re-anchor some of the teachings that we cover on that video. And the basic premise is that people are oriented around romance or feeling warm and fuzzy when people think of them in 2 basic ways: one is like a cat, one is like a dog. Cats find what is romantic to be something that is thoughtful or forethought, anything that proves that you were thinking about them before you walked into the room. Dogs on the other hand, find romantic or what makes them feel warm and fuzzy is anything that basically affirms that you think they’re a good dog. And why this basic concept is really important and useful is in creating romance quickly, in creating that warm fuzzy feeling for the people around you in learning how to establish that kind of connection and have the people in your life be like, “Oh, that was nice.”
Understanding whether they are cat or dog or somewhere in that spectrum, that’s just super useful. For those of you who don’t know or when you’re in doubt or for those of you who are partnered with people that are a little bit dog, a little bit cat because you should think more like it’s a spectrum, a continuum. For those of you who are sex geeks, it’s like the Kinsey scale. You can be anywhere along that scale. It’s best if you can train yourself to be able to leverage both qualities at the same time. So that’s really useful regardless of how you living your life because when you want to make people in your life feel connected and cared for in that romantic kind or warm and fuzzy way, it doesn’t have to be romantic in a sexual way, it can just be that warm and fuzzy like, “Oh my God, you’re my friend and you’re so thoughtful” kind of way. To create that quickly, train yourself to be able to do cat and dog, speak cat and dog simultaneously. So ways to start thinking about that is getting people things or doing things for people before you show up to them in the room and then acknowledging, affirming them, basically telling them “good dog” when you’re in front of them. And then as you “leave” something behind that is a reminder that you thought of them before you had met them. So the example that we’re using in this scenario is let’s say you buy flowers for somebody. You bought them before you were there in front of them. You present them the flowers which is very “cat” forethought-ish, but while you present them the flowers or whatever that gift is, you’re telling them how much you appreciate them, what you like about them, what they’ve done right. The things that you affirm and acknowledge them and who they are as a human being. And then, that should hit your cat and dog at the same time and then what you do if you want to get bonus points is leave something behind, not just the flowers, because every time they see the flowers or the gift they’ll think of you and be like, “Oh my God, proof yet again that they were thinking of me before I walked into the room.” But you can leave usually something written works really well, a card or little note or something further affirming who they are and that they’re a good person. Why written cards work so well and notes is that it hits both languages at the same time, both orientation. You’re proving because you had to write it before they were there that you were thinking of them, you’re affirming them, telling them sweet things about themselves, things that you like about them as a human being, as a person, as a partner, as a friend, as a parent or whatever and then it’s there for them to look over again and again. Don’t underestimate the power of leaving things “behind” that are really positive and sweet that prove that you thought about them before they were in the room. That’s just huge and I like to use that a lot and you have the added bonus too like in the digital age you leave handwritten things, writing and sending snail mail is huge this days. When we live in such a, you know, just fire off an email kind of culture.
Other things that you can do to start creating romance quickly is flirt more people, get playful. Don’t take your relationships so seriously. Don’t discount the seriousness of the work that you might be doing to heal your relationships, to build them to be stronger. The course that we’re going to do here in Relationship10x certainly there’s going to be some stuff that’s going to be really like, “Wow! That’s kind of deep and I don’t know if I want to dig that stuff up.” The only way to work through that tough, heavy stuff is to balance it with something light and fun and exciting. All work in no play makes relationships a bitch. So what can you do to create more fun and play and I’m going to recommend that you flirt more. Flirt with the people that you’re in love with. Flirt with the people that are important to you and flirting in our culture it’s gotten this bad rep because it’s always about like, “Hey, Rico Suave. I’m flirting with you and I want to get in your pants.” There’s a time and place for that but flirting in a way that I think about it is more of a playful engagement where I’m inviting you to play with me, to throw the Frisbee back and forth so to speak and I’m inviting you not just to catch the Frisbee of my playfulness but to throw it back to me. So people who flirt but don’t want you to flirt back, they’re kind of a-hole or kind of dicks because what they’re doing is they’re teasing you but they’re not inviting you.
Flirting, the way that I look at it is anytime that you’re creating a playful, you’re being playful with somebody and inviting them to be playful back so I’m tossing the Frisbee and I’m telling you, “Hey, throw it back. Let’s play back and forth.” And one way to make that easy because a lot of people aren’t use to flirting anymore because it feels “dangerous” that it might get spiral out of control if I misinterpreted. Tossing that Frisbee and playing back and forth works really well if you just let people know, “Hey, I would like to flirt with you. Will you flirt back with me?” and you be direct and playing like, “Here, I’m not hiding anything. Here is what I would like to do.” And then when you announced what it is that you would like to do, what your intention is, then what you do is like, “…and I want you to play with me back. Will you flirt with me? C’mon, play back with me.” And you use your voice like the tone and your body language to basically be silly. Some people take flirting as like some, “I’m an Italian lover” or “I am Don Juan, I’m the most serious flirter in the world.” Don’t be that. I mean, if that’s really who you are then go ahead, be that but be silly, be dorky, be stupid in the way that you’re flirting because I think you get more mileage out of it because you’re doing is you’re role modeling that this doesn’t have to be “perfect”, this doesn’t have to bracingly, smoldering hot. And in that way if I was just like the way that I just said that, “bracingly, smoldering hot”, I’m already being playful. So don’t get sucked back into the seriousness part of your flirting, flirting is about play. Create more play in your life and in the download, there’s a little script that what you can do to walk you through a little bit more and it’s okay to be nervous, it’s okay to be shy. Have fun with it and don’t expect that you guys to be good at it at first. You might crash and burn a few times, have fun with that you’re crashing and burning. You can even be flirtatious and be like, “Oh my God, this is going horribly wrong. I feel like I’m doing a horrible job at flirting. What do you think?” and tease each other, invite each other, tag at each other in those playful ways and have fun with it. Don’t beat yourself up too much.
The other thing that’s really useful in creating flirting and romance and more play in your life is gifting people the experiences that they’re into. And what I mean by this is we can leverage some of the things that we already talked about. I can write down in a little note or a card for you. I would like to do something with you that you like and here are the 3 choices that I have thought of. For the next couple of hours or tomorrow morning or whatever, I would like to do either a, b or c and I’m going to pick 3 things that I know you like or that I think that I know you like that I’m good with. Just don’t leave it blank because your partner might pick something to do with you that you’re like not really into. Hedge your bets and stack the deck in your favor for doing things that you know that they like, things that “affirm” them that you’re up for. If you have a partner who’s really into sports and you don’t mind sports, be like, “Hey, I would like to go and play that game that you like to play or go watch a game. I’ve bought tickets” or “I want you to teach me how to play that video game that you really, really like.” Again, be okay with that you might get frustrated if you try to learn a new skill with them but what you’re doing is you’re creating a shared experience that affirms who they are and their likes, wants and desires. Maybe it’s not sports, maybe it’s like knitting… pick whatever and they really like to knit and you’re like, “Well, how about we sit down and I watch you knit for an hour while I may googly eyes at you and flirt with and feed you cheesecake,” whatever. You know, “If you like knitting and you like cheesecake, I want to feed you cheesecake while you knit,” or [inaudible 00:12:36] or like what you can create anything. For those of you who have partners who are super into Fifty Shades of Grey, just tell them that, “I would like you to sit down. I’m going to read Fifty Shades of Grey to you like before bed or whenever.” You kind of can’t go wrong with this one. Have an open spirit, have fun with it. What you’re doing is you’re creating connection and affirming who they are, their likes, wants and needs and desires by creating a shared experience and you might be really surprised what you get out of creating a shared experience for them and giving it to them.
The fourth thing in our 5 step quick start romance guide is and this going to sound crazy, go out and have a blind date with each other, pick each other up. I use to bartend in New York a long time ago and we had married couples married for a long time who once a year, I think it was around the anniversary, would come in and we knew them. They’ve been coming for like 10 years, 12 years that they came to this bar that I worked at called The Mad Hatter, just now defunct, on the upper side of Manhattan. They would sit at opposite ends of the bar and send drinks to each other and I would see them coming at other times and go right and have dinner and leave together and I went to the owner I’m like, “Dan, what’s going on?” and he’s like, “Oh, they come in at least once a year and they pretend that they don’t know each other.” Then they pick up each other and just watch. I was the bartender so I was like the one whose shuttling drinks back and forth to each other and eventually one of them went over and, “Hey, may I sit next to you?” “Yes, please…” and “Can I buy you drink now?” “Oh, absolutely.” And they basically had been married for however long like years and they picked each other up, they were pretending no to know each other. If you have the hutzpah to do this, do it. If you’re watching this and you’re not in a relationship, save this in your little bag of tricks for when you do have a relationship. It’s hilariously fun and can be a little edgy because you’re actually pretending you’re role playing which can be kind of exciting. Don’t beat yourself up if you’re not great at it. You don’t have to be a master thespian to pull this off. It’s more about having the fun and letting the excitement and the rediscovering of each other, flood into your relationship, give it a try. Who knows you might get lucky.
Last but not least in our quick start romance guide is sexting. Yes, I said it. Dirty little texts, [inaudible 00:15:36] little pictures. Let’s get digital, people. Couple of things to know about flirting digitally with salacious material is if you’ve never done this before, check in with your partner like ask them if it’s okay for you to send them something provocative salacious dirty. Why that’s important? You want to warn them ahead of time so that they just don’t, you know, they’re in the middle of a business meeting and “ping”, the text comes up and it’s your crotch or some dirty words strung together in a provocative way which is to say that if you’re first starting to sex and flirt digitally, do not lead with the naked crotch shot. And this goes for men and women. I think women get a little bit more leeway with this but certainly for some reason, I don’t know why, dudes tend to want to start the flirting immediately with pictures of their penises, do not do that. For a couple of different reasons it can surprise the heck out of people. One, if I’m in an important meeting or if I just have my cellphone lying around face up and you send me the picture like it shows up on my phone for all the world to see. So one, like a build up to the nude photos of body parts, regardless of your gender. Two, you want to ask permission if it’s okay to send something salacious because of two reasons: one, I’m on guard. I’m like, “Oh my goodness, my partner’s about to send me something dirty” so I can take the phone off the desk in the middle of the business meeting or make sure that I don’t lend my phone to my boss or to my mom who needs to borrow the phone for a second. Two, just texting them ahead of time that you’re going to get a little pervy can be turn on in itself. It builds anticipation. Also, if I’m in a bad place and can be like, “No, don’t send me anything.” In and of itself that you wanted to send me something provocative means that you were thinking of me. So if I’m a cat person it’s like, “Hoo, that was thoughtful| and kind of reading like is what are you going to send be? This is titillating. Your mileage may vary on that.
The other thing is you’re giving the person choice to opt in or opt out rather than just… like you’re inviting them to play with you rather than you just kind of pardon the pun, thrusting it upon them. So asking permission giving them a heads up before you start can be romantic and provocative in and out of self, whether they say yes or no. if they say yes, then I would suggest that you lead with some dirty texting first before you go right for the picture. And the picture can be just something very sexy and provocative. It can be just [inaudible 00:18:40] and a glass of wine and the candle and maybe not in that order but it doesn’t have to be full frontal nudity. If you’re nervous about sending pictures then don’t ever send pictures. What you should do is stick to text and to words because one of the reasons I think we’re nervous is individuals were afraid that the pictures will be discovered and they probably will. So if you stick to text, text is way less scandalous overall than dirty pictures and it’s harder to take dirty talk text out of context because you’re dirty talking. Whereas if you’re taking naked photos of yourself in compromising positions, that has a whole different connotation and you can always blame Fifty Shades of Grey, the book for getting you to be a sexter. So if you’re feeling nervous about sexting, take baby steps certainly but you don’t have to do this full frontal kind of iPhone photo spreads. You can keep it just to text and you don’t even have to talk dirty, you can just keep it to innuendo. You can say, “I’m thinking about you and I’m in the shower. I’m a human loofa,” you can be silly and playful about it. You don’t have to be super Rico Suave but the idea is that you’re digitally flirting with your partners and you loved once in a way that’s getting them to think, giving them permission to even think dirty naughty thoughts and that you’re getting to do that when they’re not in the room with you which again goes back to a lot of the stuff that we already talked about.
So that is your quick start romance guide. Thank you so much for watching this video. We want a little bit longer than 10 minutes because there’s a lot of fun staff to about. And we didn’t promise that the quick start guide was going to be 10 minutes.
So download the audio, check out the PDF. Share this with your partner whom you’re taking the class with and talk about these ideas and start practicing on them while we wait until the final countdown for our Relationship 10x to official start and if you happen to be getting to this video now and the courses are already started, that’s totally fine too. We want you to go at your own pace but part of the design of Relationship 10x is that we’re giving you little bite size pieces every day and in different ways so that you can integrate them and immerse yourself without throwing yourself into overwhelm and re-leveraging different learning styles for different adults in your life so that they can integrate the information as well.
Thank you so much for being a part of all this. I am so excited to be spending our 6 weeks together and geeking out about relationships. Feel free to jump into the form here on Relationship 10x and share what’s going on for you. Ask questions, I’ll be on poking around, no pun intended, answering questions but use and leverage your community as well. Thank you so much and let’s get our relationships transformed times 10 in the next 6 weeks. Bye.