When winter closes in and you’re closeted with your significant other, your relationship can turn boring, irritating or downright infuriating.  But you can turn this stuck-with-each-other situation into an opportunity—a great opportunity to have a breakthrough in your love relationship using just one of these five love tips:

1. Discover each other all over again!  Have Ten Minute Listening Sessions where one person gets to talk, free associate, and say whatever is on their minds while the other simply listens with full attention. The listener does not speak. No matter what, use a clock and honor a full ten minute session.  Then switch roles. Anything said in that time is sacred and cannot be brought up during an argument! You never will know your partner’s world until you really listen.

2. Do the Miracle Exercise. Each of you write out the answer to the following questions: What would your life be like if a miracle happened and you became fully content and happy with your life?  How would you be acting?  How would your partner be acting?
What else would be different?  Read your answers to each other.  Then, for the rest of the day, both of you commit to behaving as if the miracle has occurred.

3. Play Sexy Dress Up. Let your fantasies go wild by finding sexy lingerie and other sex play outfits.  Dress up and role play being the nurse, doctor, maid, dominatrix, vixen, or sex slave, and create a hot escapade that is entirely different from your normal sexual routine.

4. Be Dessert for Each Other. Get naked, grab the whip cream or chocolate syrup and make yourself into a sumptuous dessert for your partner.  Make sure you lather it on in the areas of your body that give you the most pleasure.

5. Play Strip Poker. The loser of the hand takes off an article of clothing, reveals a secret or describes a sexual fantasy. If you go all in and win, you can ask your partner to take off all of his/her clothes at once. But if you lose, well you get the idea. Either way, there are no losers in this game.

You can learn much more about keeping passion and love alive in your relationship for FREE just by signing up for my Dating Tips and Relationship Advice Newsletter. Click here to get started now.

Wishing you love,

Dr. Diana

Diana Kirschner, Ph.D. is a frequent guest psychologist on The Today Show & best-selling author of “Love in 90 Days” (dating advice book)” out now in paperback (at Amazon) with a new chapter on “Dating Games Men Play.” Love in 90 Days was the basis of her PBS Special on love. Connect with Dr. Diana through her FREE relationship & dating advice newsletter.

Hooking up, that is, no-strings-attached sex, can be hot, mind-blowingly hot.  And it has become the norm for many colleges students, 20-somethings and even many 30-somethings.  But there are high costs for this brief steamy pleasure.   Impulsive in-the-moment sex is often fueled by alcohol or drugs, which makes it hard to remember that it is risky sex.  Risks escalate if there is no condom, or if it sits in the back pocket instead of being put on.  Chances are your partner is having sex with lots of others, no matter what he or she says.  So the condom needs to be where it is supposed to be–protecting you from AIDS and other STDs.  Not to mention saving you from having to deal with an unwanted pregnancy. 

There are tons more reasons why old-fashioned dating rocks and hooking up may not serve you in the long term.  Casual no-strings-attached sex can be an emotional boomerang that sets you up for heartbreak and disappointment both emotionally physically.   Hooking up often leads a moth-to-a-flame burn-out: you get a giant surge of dopamine, the falling-in-love jet fuel that makes you crazy about your partner, plus oxytocin which bonds you to him or her.  But often this hotwired attachment does not go both ways.  Your partner, may simply blow you off.  Then you wind up discarded and heartbroken.  This is the Flame Out Deadly Dating pattern that ruins your chances for a love relationship.  It is the most common dead-end love pattern that I describe in my book, Love in 90 Days: The Essential Guide to Finding True Love.  

Meanwhile, this month’s Cosmo (with Kate Hudson on the cover) has a must-read article called “The Truth About Hooking Up,” by Laura Gilbert that you need to get.  Laura cites all the latest research that shows how hooking up can be a big problem for women (plus she interviews me, ahem, one of my favorite authors…)  Seriously, I really want you to check out this article for some important surprises–like who is more likely to get certain kinds of sexual pleasure out of a hook up.

Here’s to more Love,

Dr. Diana

Go for the rose in 2010!

OK.  There are now according to the US Census Bureau at least 92 million single Americans.  That is a whole lotta potential partners!  High school and college alum groups and social networking sites like Facebook are bringing singles together online  right and left.  Online dating is booming–the Pew Internet & American Life Project’s online dating survey found that the majority of actively dating Americans have tried it.

Bottom line: your 2010 dating life could make a 180° turn—into being the best it has ever been!  Truly, the chances of meeting the love of your life are better than ever!  2010 could be the year that you are happily, wildly in love.

So go on, make the affirmation.  Something like, I create an exciting love relationship that is fulfilling in every way. Here is a three-step love advice action plan based on my bestselling dating advice book, Love in 90 Days: The Essential Guide to Finding Your Own True Love. These simple steps can make your love affirmation a reality in 2010:

1. Meet New People

Find and say hello to three new guys or women every day.  Assuming you are in a safe or public place, make eye contact, smile, say ‘Hi’.  Where you ask?   Sign up for on-going classes/activities that interest you that have lots of potential partners in them—for example: finance, investing and business at your local college’s School of Continuing and Professional Studies; rock-climbing and golfing; snowboarding/skiing; hiking; and cigar tasting are great for meeting men. Women are plentiful at cooking, growth, spirituality or yoga courses.  Coed city sports teams are great and usually have an even mix of genders.  There are many other activities, classes and clubs to consider so search online on any topic plus the name of your city or town.

2.  Work Your Online Dating Program

Throw out your old photo and profile.  Have a friend who is a good photographer, make that a great photographer, take 100 headshots of you in order to get one that looks especially warm, attractive and inviting.  Write up a fresh interesting profile with the help of any writer friends you have. After you post your new photo and profile, spend at least two-three hours a week looking around the site, sending and responding to messages and connecting by phone and in person with people.  Block out time in your calendar to work the program.

3. Use Social Networking

Sign up for Facebook or any other social network and start making friends.  If you are already on the sites, gather more friends.  Make sure you indicate your relationship status is single.  Chat folks up.  Find old connections from the past.  Look up lost loves and find out what they are up to.  Lots of people are finding true love on these kinds of sites.

If you take these three dating tips to heart, chances are, by next New Year’s Eve you’ll be kissing the one you want.

And to make sure you will be, sign up for FREE ongoing support: You can learn EXACTLY how to Find,  Attract and Date terrific guys and create Lasting Love that is just right for you by subscribing to my Dating Tips & Relationship Advice Newsletter, absolutely FREE! Just Click Here to get started now!

Wishing you great love in 2010!

xo

Dr. Diana

Diana Kirschner, Ph.D. is a frequent guest psychologist on The Today Show & best-selling author of “Love in 90 Days” (dating advice book)” out now in paperback (at Amazon) with a new chapter on “Dating Games Men Play.” Love in 90 Days was the basis of her PBS Special on love. Connect with Dr. Diana through her FREE relationship & dating advice newsletter.