Endless Honeymoon

Endless
Honeymoon
By James Bauer
Endless Honeymoon
Copyright © 2016 by Blink Publishing LLC
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Table of Contents
Introduction: The Elements of an Endless Honeymoon.............................................................................. 7
Happiness Is Other People (Changing You)............................................................................................... 8
Relationship Fun: Highs without Lows .................................................................................................. 8
Bringing Back the Honeymoon ................................................................................................................. 8
No More Damsel in Distress.................................................................................................................. 9
Section I: Make Your Wish Lists ................................................................................................................. 11
Giving Is Getting ...................................................................................................................................... 12
The Lost Man....................................................................................................................................... 12
Acknowledge What You Don’t Know ...................................................................................................... 13
How Do You Know What to Put on the List? .......................................................................................... 14
Experiences, Not Possessions ............................................................................................................. 15
Things That Help You Declutter .......................................................................................................... 16
Quality-of-Life Material Goods ........................................................................................................... 17
Reverse Engineering Happiness .......................................................................................................... 18
Make Him Work… a Little ....................................................................................................................... 18
How to Encourage Him to Surprise You .................................................................................................. 19
Play the Surprise Game ....................................................................................................................... 19
Wish Lists Are a Two-Way Street ............................................................................................................ 21
Reverse Engineer for Him ................................................................................................................... 21
Learn How to Ask the Right Questions ............................................................................................... 21
Watch His Energy Levels ..................................................................................................................... 24
Learn What You Like Together ................................................................................................................ 25
Section II: How to Get Him Addicted to Making You Happy .................................................................... 27
Always Start by Changing Your Own Internal State ................................................................................ 27
Be Honest about What You Can Actually Control ............................................................................... 28
The Importance of the Right Frame of Mind .......................................................................................... 29
“Yes Mindset” Questions .................................................................................................................... 29
Sell Him on Benefits, Not Ideas ........................................................................................................... 31
Contrast............................................................................................................................................... 32
Use Repetition..................................................................................................................................... 35
Build His Excitement ........................................................................................................................... 35

Get Him on Board by Triggering His Sense of Purpose ........................................................................... 36
The Power of Love .............................................................................................................................. 36
Making Romance Heroic ..................................................................................................................... 37
Bad Timing .......................................................................................................................................... 37
Helping Your Man Define His Sense of Purpose ................................................................................. 38
The Appetite Method: Make Him Crave What You Can Give Him ......................................................... 40
Withhold – But Entice ......................................................................................................................... 40
Build It Together ................................................................................................................................. 41
Habituation: When the Extraordinary Becomes Ordinary .................................................................. 43
Gamification: The Secret to Perpetual Motivation ................................................................................. 44
Set Goals – and Rewards..................................................................................................................... 44
Reward Him with Closure (Before Starting Again) .............................................................................. 46
Gifts for Two: What to Ask for So “Gifting You” Is Fun for Him .............................................................. 47
Sexy Gifts ............................................................................................................................................. 47
Future Adventure Gifts ....................................................................................................................... 48
Gifts that Celebrate and Enhance Your Femininity ............................................................................. 48
“Promise Gifts” You Know He Secretly Wants to Give You ................................................................ 49
Gifts of Knowledge .............................................................................................................................. 49
The Gift of More Time......................................................................................................................... 50
Gift Him Back....................................................................................................................................... 51
General Gift Guidelines ....................................................................................................................... 51
Getting Him Addicted in a Nutshell ........................................................................................................ 52
Section III: The Secrets of the Endless Honeymoon .................................................................................. 53
State Management Part Two – Understanding Honeymoon Bliss ......................................................... 53
Get Him in the Moment with a Positive Outlook................................................................................ 54
Give Each Other Permission to Splurge .............................................................................................. 56
Transform Reality by Acknowledging the Power of Words ................................................................ 58
Convince Yourselves You’re Starting a New Journey .......................................................................... 59
Find Things to Celebrate ..................................................................................................................... 60
Embrace the Idea of Not Accomplishing Anything ................................................................................. 61
Recreating Honeymoon Bliss in Soundbite Form ................................................................................... 61
Section IV: Merging Honeymoon Mentality with Reality ......................................................................... 63

It Wasn’t Supposed to Be This Way .................................................................................................... 63
We Expect Too Much .......................................................................................................................... 64
The Key to Choosing a Good “Mental Anchor”................................................................................... 65
Life Is Simpler When We Focus on What Is Essential ............................................................................. 66
Are You Willing to Pay the Price?........................................................................................................ 67
Use Energy Management, Not Time Management ............................................................................ 69
A Final Word about Expectations and Essentialism ................................................................................ 71
Section V: Shortcut Tips and Tricks to Achieve an Endless Honeymoon .................................................. 72
The Three Beliefs .................................................................................................................................... 72
1. There is no such thing as failure. ................................................................................................ 72
2. The meaning of your communication is the response that you get. .......................................... 73
3. Every behavior is motivated by a positive intention. ................................................................. 74
Shared Goals and Experiences Give Purpose to Your Relationship ........................................................ 75
Be a good “opportunity finder.” ......................................................................................................... 75
Make down time another point of connection................................................................................... 75
Get all touchy-feely. ............................................................................................................................ 76
Team up. ............................................................................................................................................. 76
Outfit each other................................................................................................................................. 76
Be restaurant critics. ........................................................................................................................... 76
Start a business together. ................................................................................................................... 77
Create a joint challenge. ..................................................................................................................... 77
Cook together. .................................................................................................................................... 78
Start a collection together. ................................................................................................................. 78
Learn to Value Fun .................................................................................................................................. 79
A Word about “Fun” Money ............................................................................................................... 79
Ask for What You Want........................................................................................................................... 80
Fail Nine Times .................................................................................................................................... 81
Overcome Blank Canvas Syndrome .................................................................................................... 81
“Just Do It” .......................................................................................................................................... 82
Cliff’s Notes for Tips and Tricks ............................................................................................................... 82
Section VI: Making it Work in The Current Phase of Your Relationship .................................................. 83
Initiating the Endless Honeymoon Concept with… ................................................................................. 83

…someone you just met...................................................................................................................... 83
…someone you’re dating but aren’t exclusive with yet. ..................................................................... 84
…in a long-term relationship in need of a spark. ................................................................................ 84
Bullet Points for an Endless Honeymoon at Any Stage of Your Relationship ......................................... 85
Conclusion .................................................................................................................................................. 86

Introduction: The Elements of an Endless Honeymoon
One of the hallmark characteristics of a couple on their honeymoon is a seeming inability to see their
partner’s faults.
Early in a relationship, the human mind appears to be literally blinded by love. Later, as the relationship
cools down into steady companionship, things that were cute and endearing about your partner start to
annoy you. You become increasingly focused on the things he does wrong and the ways he fails to be
the ideal partner you desire. Both men and women do this to each other automatically and
subconsciously.
Our short-term solution is to seek ways to correct or remediate our partner’s behavior. This leads to
conflict and long-term problems as the relationship shifts away from your enjoyment and towards
adversarial defensiveness of each person’s right to do things their own way, without being “changed” by
their partner. In other words, it’s more about “winning” and being “right” than being happy, and this
means resisting change.
Why does this happen? Because what you seek in a relationship is initially something exciting and
almost 100% good. Sadly, over time, we seek out ways to prove our partner wrong or win arguments on
entrenched points of disagreement or frustration. Our mind literally becomes oriented around problems
and resisting the other person. We accidentally focus on the things that are “wrong” with the
relationship.
Unfortunately, the more you look for something, the more you are bound to find it. Remember this
adage: whatever you seek, you shall find. Why? Because the way you think about something impacts the
way you approach it. It’s a form of self-sabotage, and we all engage in it to some degree.
If you seek the kinds of things I’m going to show you in this guide, you will find them. That means you’re
going to open yourself to a world of blissful experiences, opportunities to breathe life, love, and
goodness into your partner’s life, and exciting ways to channel his male energy and drive toward the
satisfaction of your deepest desires and simple pleasures.
In contrast, if you instead question the validity of the method and your own ability to make it work, you
will encounter problems, and ultimately, you are more likely to fail.
Because of that, it is vital that you eradicate two thought viruses before we continue.
1. It’s too good to be true.
2. I don’t have much influence or power.
Banish these fears from your mind. What I’m going to teach you is extraordinary, but it is possible, and
you can achieve it.
Are you ready? Okay, then let’s begin.

Happiness Is Other People (Changing You)
Above I wrote about how it is our natural inclination to fight against being changed by our partner once
we move out of the honeymoon phase of the relationship.
Ironically, according to carefully designed research studies by John Gottman, a psychologist who studies
relationships in depth, one of the best ways to identify couples who will experience long-term marriage
bliss is by looking to see whether or not each partner of the couple allows their partner to influence
them – to change them. In fact, allowing your partner to influence you appears to be one of those few
golden predictors of relationship happiness.
Let’s set that aside for a moment. I promise we’ll come back to it.
I want to spend some time thinking about getting high. (Weren’t expecting that, were you?)
Relationship Fun: Highs without Lows
In some areas of life, chasing after a high is a losing proposition. Take cocaine or amphetamines, for
example. As your body develops tolerance for these drugs, it takes a larger and larger dose just to get
the same high you used to get from a smaller amount. In other words, you develop tolerance for the
drug. Eventually, seeking that high feeling causes addicts to use such large doses of their drug of choice
that they kill themselves accidentally with an overdose.
The reason tolerance can develop with drugs like these is because the brain has feedback loops that
down-regulate the natural feel-good neurotransmitter these drugs act upon. In essence, your brain is
attempting to get things back to a natural equilibrium by trying to get rid of the excess feel-good
neurotransmitters.
So, on the one hand, you’ve got a drug that is artificially increasing “feel-good” chemicals in your brain.
And on the other, your brain is trying to lower these chemicals back to normal levels because it knows
something is not as it should be. As a result of this feedback loop, dependence develops. The brain turns
its own feel-good neurotransmitters down so much that you feel absolutely terrible without the drug.
And over time, your “high” becomes a mere “okay” – unless you use more and more and more.
But unlike a chemical high with a drug that causes dependence, there is no feedback loop for
relationship fun. As a result, the brain does not lower your feel-good neurotransmitters, so you are able
to repeatedly enjoy “high” moments generated by relationship interactions.
Bringing Back the Honeymoon
What does this mean? That it’s not only okay to go after highs in your relationship, it should be
required! In fact, encouraging each other to go after relationship highs is one of the most powerful keys
to making my unique “Endless Honeymoon” system so effective.

Think about the beginning of your relationship. That “honeymoon” phase I’ve been talking about. Just
being around your guy – or sometimes even thinking about him – was enough to send a jolt of happiness
and excitement through your body. And you had an intense desire to act in ways that would please him
and make him like you. You’ll just have to trust me when I say he was experiencing the same thing.
You were getting high off of each other, and it was magnificent.
But time passed, and those highs occurred more and more infrequently. Instead of your partner making
you feel great, you started to just feel normal around him – not as fun. Without those frequent euphoric
surges, the rose-colored glasses fell off both of your faces, and you each began to see problems and
create new ones.
Why does this happen? After all, as I said above, there’s no feedback loop to diminish a relationship
high. You can get the same amazing high from a fantastic night with your partner 15 years into a
relationship that you did in the first month. But most of us don’t – or don’t have those kinds of moments
very frequently. Why?
Distraction and effort.
At the outset of a relationship, your brain really wants things to work for you and your man. To help you
out, it boosts all of your “happy” chemicals that not only keep you giddy but encourage you to focus on
him – and vice versa. You barely have to try to keep each other delirious with joy.
Then those chemicals recede, and it’s like waking up from a fog. You still have all of these amazing
feelings for your mate, but you also start to remember the other things that matter to you… and you
have to try harder to do things that make each other happy.
But instead of trying harder, many of us get trapped in a self-defeating pattern of lamenting the fact that
our partner doesn’t do things to show us how much they love us. Women are particularly prone to this
kind of problem, because men are much more likely to ignore relationship problems by turning their
focus to outside pursuits.
But what if there was a simple method you could use to tie your man’s happiness and satisfaction to
your own? If finding ways to get you high – emotionally speaking, of course – also got him high?
That’s what this advanced course is about. Possibility, excitement, and guilt-free pursuit of the next
emotional high with your significant other. It’s also about channeling his desire to make you happy.
No More Damsel in Distress
In the main course, Secret Obsession, you learned how to tap into his Hero Instinct. You learned about
the unique male drive to work toward tangible accomplishments and a sense of purpose. We talked
about ways to activate his Hero Instinct by showing him your needs. Endless Honeymoon will teach you
the fun side of that equation. Rather than playing up the role of damsel in distress, it’s time to turn his

Hero Instinct toward your more frivolous and fun desires. As a reminder, the Hero Instinct has to do
with the three things that drive your man at his core:
 The need to achieve something meaningful.

 The need to provide for others.
 The need to garner respect.
When you are able to tap into this instinct, finding ways to make you happy will become a source of his
happiness and fulfillment.
Does this sound like we’re trying to make him become a bit dependent on you? If you think so, you’re
not too far off the mark. If you follow the method I’m teaching you, he will not be able to find the same
level of emotional high when he is with others compared to what he is able to experience through his
interactions with you.
If that sounds a bit nefarious, let’s put it in other terms: this method will help you to literally become the
most important thing in his life by tying his happiness and satisfaction to yours and making you a part of
his journey and goals. Your sense of life fulfillment will enhance his, and his sense of life fulfillment will
enhance yours.
Isn’t that the way it should be?

Section I: Make Your Wish Lists
When a couple is planning an actual honeymoon, they frequently sit down together and make a wish
list. That list includes all kinds of things they would love to experience or do together, places they’d like
to visit, or even things like, “I want to feel free to sleep in every day and have no agenda.”
That wish list is not necessarily something you’re demanding from your partner. It’s just a list of things
you would wish for. Then you work together to see how many of those desires you can patch together in
reality as you plan an actual honeymoon trip.
We’re going to start your training by having you create a similar wish list, but this one will be used to
feed your man’s goal-driven appetite for feeling like he has a purpose and that he can be someone’s
hero. Believe it or not, your wish list will actually help to activate his interest in doing things that
intensify your romantic intimacy.
The mistake many women make (but which you are going to avoid) is to wish and hope for all kinds of
things without ever letting those desires be known in a clear way. When you do this, you are bound to
become gradually calloused and frustrated by the reality of life.
What is that reality? That most men just don’t understand what you want. At best, they might have a
notion that is vague and unfocused, but it is nothing that they would know how to take action on.
Some women believe their man’s inability to figure out what they want is his fault. “He should just
know!” they think. Here’s the problem: men aren’t mind readers. We need something more concrete.
We need a list.
Making a wish list is a conscious process of developing clarity – and not just for your guy. Sure, it tells
your man what you want and what he can do to enhance your happiness and fun. That’s vital. But many
women discover that they learn more about their own desires by creating the list.
Everything on your wish list should be unique to you. The one thing it will have in common with
everyone else’s wish list is that you will get an emotional high from pursuing each of the things on your
list.
Still resistant and feeling like it should be his responsibility to figure out what is going to make you
happy? I have two responses for you.
First, the act of clarifying what you really want is a two-way street. While men certainly aren’t mind-
readers, neither are women. That means if your man whines about you not meeting his needs and he’s
not clearly articulating what they are, he better start putting together a list, too.
Second, ask yourself this question: how’s having your man “figure it out for himself” working for you?
Probably not very well. We’ve been fooled by fictional portrayals of romance and love to believe that
when two people are right for each other, they always know exactly what to do and say because they
know the other person so well.

Not only is this a lie, it’s a dangerous one. For partners to keep each other happy over the long term, it
takes communication, and it takes both of you working at it.
I’ll leave you with one final thought for this section. When you let your man “gift you” with the things on
your list to make you happy, remember he is also going to get an emotional high from being your hero.
This is a well-documented phenomenon, and it’s true for people of both genders.
Giving Is Getting
Research shows we experience sustained happiness from giving to others or engaging in random acts of
kindness with no expectation of reciprocation. In other words, finding ways to give other people
happiness makes us feel happy as well.
This is good news for anyone in a relationship. If it works that well with strangers, you can only imagine
how much more powerful this effect is with people we love and care about. But the key is it must feel
like we did it purely for the joy of giving, not because of guilt or a sense of obligation.
I’m sure you’ve experienced this difference yourself, so let me challenge you to verify my claim by
searching your own memories. Has there ever been a time when you felt obligated to give someone a
birthday gift, Christmas gift, or some other physical or monetary gift?
Think back and remember what it was like when you were in the process of searching for and securing
that gift. Did it fill you with glee? Probably not, and that’s because you felt controlled by some form of
social expectation.
It was not an exercise of your freedom. It was not an example of the spontaneous happiness that builds
inside us when we use our power, resources, and energy to do something we find meaningful.
Now contrast that with a memory of a time when you gave a child, parent, sibling, friend, or random
stranger a gift for no reason other than a desire to boost their happiness or quality of life (even if it
happened to coincide with a holiday). I recently heard a woman recount an experience like this.
The Lost Man
The woman was a pastor in a primarily African-American church in an impoverished part of the south
side of Chicago. She told us about a donation that allowed her to purchase a significant number of
blankets to hand out for free to people in need in her community.
This pastor literally went out to the people you see huddled under bridges, seeking shelter in a city that
gets very cold during the winter months. As she began to hand them out, a small crowd gathered
around her. Some people pushed forward to take a blanket. Some people expressed gratitude, and
some did not.

As the blankets dwindled, she noticed an elderly man near the back of the crowd who was shuffling his
way forward, but not pressing his way through the group of people. His clothing was disheveled and not
at all warm enough for the cold temperature that day.
The pastor held back one blanket and waited for the small crowd to disperse before catching the
attention of this old man. She handed him the blanket she had reserved for him and he immediately
unpackaged it and wrapped it around himself, thanking her profusely.
She noticed then that he was shivering and had no shoes on. When she asked him where his shoes
were, he said he had none. Then she asked where his family was, and he said he wasn’t sure he had any
family left. He appeared confused and did not seem to have any plan for caring for himself. So she took
him to a local hospital where he was treated for lacerations on his feet and later diagnosed with
suspected early stages of Alzheimer’s disease.
A little more work on her part revealed he had family members who had lost track of him when he
wandered off in a confused state. It had been months since he had wandered into the urban jungle, too
disoriented and confused to find his way home. With her help, they were reunited.
When she came to see him a few days later in the hospital, he thanked her again for the blanket and
asked if he could pray for her – it was the only thing he could think of that he had to give in return.
She became momentarily tearful at this point in her story, unable to finish for a few seconds while she
tried to regain her voice. This was an experience she would never forget, because it’s one of the purest
forms of joy to give selflessly to someone for no reason other than to bless their life.
I’ve been fortunate to have a few similar experiences in my life, though a far more common experience
has involved gifts to children who have less ability to get what they need or want on their own.
Maybe you’ve had a similar experience that involved a gift you knew would bring pure glee to the
person receiving it. Their need is half of what makes this equation so beautiful.
When you share your needs with a man in your life, you are giving him an opportunity to experience a
special kind of joy. With this framework in mind, present those needs as happy opportunities if he ever
has the chance to help you work toward them. Never present those needs as obligations or expectations.
Ready to start thinking about your list? Okay! Go ahead and start writing down things that will make you
happy. This should be easy, right?
Right?
For many of us, not so much. We “know” what makes us happy… until we try to get more specific about
the concept. Because of this, the first step in writing your wish list is to…
Acknowledge What You Don’t Know
Let’s explore the art of happiness. It’s a conscious decision to pursue happiness as a couple.

When you started your relationship, you probably had a vague notion of the happiness the relationship
would bring you. But if pressed to explain the exact vision of how the relationship would cause you to be
happier, you’d have to get into creative mode.
That’s because, if you’re like 99.9% of people out there, you don’t have a crystal clear image of the
things your partner needs to do in order to meet the vague goal of happiness you associate with your
relationship.
Now consider this. If you don’t know exactly how he’s supposed to make you happy, what do you think
the odds are that he knows? For that matter, what are the odds you know what would make him truly
happy?
When it comes to achieving uncommon levels of happiness, half the battle can be won simply by
realizing you don’t have a clear map of the territory. But getting clear about what you and your partner
actually need from the relationship in order to achieve maximum happiness can be a little bit scary.
We’re used to the unknown. It’s comfortable – even when it’s frustrating. And moving out of that
comfort zone isn’t easy.
Part of this is because there’s some fear that comes from the possibility you might discover ways you
are not as compatible as you had once thought. This is a normal fear, but rest assured you will become
more compatible by searching out your true needs, hopes, and desires, not less.
And keep in mind that no two people are perfectly compatible in their ability to make their partner
happy on all fronts. The key is to acknowledge the fact that your relationship is built on the shared
intention to build on each other’s happiness.
With that in mind, it’s time to start looking at the list itself.
How Do You Know What to Put on the List?
The answer is simple (sort of): think about what you would do if no one was looking.
This is how you discover what truly makes you happy. And I’m not talking about the things that make
you give a little grin.
You should be striving to find things that provide you with the kind of happiness he can see and
experience, so he’ll become addicted to bringing it out in you again and again. But for him to be able to
do that, you first have to know what truly makes you happy, not what society tells you that you should
be happy about.
In other words, don’t be phony. Be authentic. Being authentic means you let your flaws show. You admit
to being jealous or frustrated, instead of always trying to put on the perfect front.

We are emotionally impacted when we encounter someone who is truly themselves. We can sense their
genuineness and we feel drawn to that person. People who are “real” cause us to relax. These are the
people we want to have as our best friends.
To that end, ask yourself these questions:
 What would I do if I was on vacation and no one was looking?

 Would I sleep in instead of rushing around to see all the sights?
 Would I sit on the beach, or would I read a book while drinking some tea?
Answering these questions (as a start) helps you to get more in touch with your authentic self and who
you are as a unique person – not to mention what kinds of things truly make you happy. When you find
these things, you’re on the road to creating authentic happiness for yourself.
Then you just need to learn how to get your man to think the same way and participate with you in
building this kind of happiness for both of you.
Want some more concrete ideas about the types of things you should include? No problem. Here we go.
Experiences, Not Possessions
When writing out your wish list, don’t think of it as a list of gifts he can buy you at the store. Instead, the
things you want on your wish list are experiences.
Research consistently shows that people who spend their money on experiences get more happiness
per dollar spent than people who buy material things, which often just clutter their lives or demand
more money for upkeep anyway.
Dr. Thomas Gilovich, a Cornell University psychology professor who’s studied the question of money and
happiness for more than 20 years, says that initially people tend to rate their happiness over material
purchases as about equal to that for experiential purchases. Translation: right after you buy, you’ll be
just as happy with your new toaster as you would be going to a music concert.
Here’s where things get interesting though. As time passes, people’s satisfaction with material
purchases goes down, while their satisfaction with things they’ve done – with experiences – stays the
same. So, in the long run, doing things you want to do is going to bring you more happiness than getting
things you want to get.
With that in mind, here is a list of non-product “gifts” you might ask him for. (Remember, it’s exciting to
go after goals that are meaningful to you!)
 Season passes to a concert or theater series

 Visits to museums, zoos, and other attractions
 Flying in a helicopter
 Learning to scuba dive

 Sailing
 Going on a picnic
 Watching the sun rise
 Taking dance lessons
 Cruising in the Caribbean
 Whale watching
 Skiing
 white water rafting
 Learning to pilot an airplane
 Touring Europe
 Taking a class
 Trying a unique restaurant
Ideally, you want this list to be as personal to you as possible. So if you enjoy doodling, art classes may
be quite meaningful. However, if a weekend intensive self-defense class is more your thing, asking him
to sign you up (and join you) is a better choice.
Things That Help You Declutter
Most people underestimate the extent to which an untidy space diminishes their sense of well-being.
Think about what it’s like when you sit down in a brand new car that has never been used by anyone.
Every nook and cranny is clean and streamlined to serve you. I bet your car doesn’t look like that
anymore.
It’s surprising but true that one of the quickest ways to boost a person’s quality of life is to organize and
declutter some part of their world. If you were to choose one area of your life where simplicity and
elegance could replace clutter and the associated chronic feelings of being overwhelmed, what would it
be?
Let’s stick with the car idea. Most people wash the outside of their cars fairly regularly, but don’t spend
as much effort on the inside. This makes your car look nice to those who pass by on the street, but what
does it do for you?
You see the inside of your vehicle much more than the outside. So getting a car wash packs less of a
positive punch than cleaning the dust and food particles out of the tiny cracks and spaces that line the
interior of your vehicle.
You’d make more of a positive influence on your own life by having your car detailed. It’s usually
possible to do this in most parts of the United States for around $100, depending on the specifics of the
service and who’s doing it. Or, if your guy has more time than money, he might enjoy spending some of
his energy detailing the interior of your car himself as a gift.
Where else can you declutter? Do you have a basement full of junk? Maybe it’s just the space
underneath your sink in the bathroom. It could even be your living room furniture – though getting rid

of mismatching pieces and investing in a more coordinated set will cost a lot more money than detailing
a car.
Whatever part of your life would benefit the most from a bit of cleansing, consider putting this on your
wish list – you’ll be surprised by how great you’ll feel after it’s done.
Quality-of-Life Material Goods
Yes, I know. There’s an entire section above telling you why material gifts are bad and experiential ones
are good. For the most part, that’s true. You have to be careful when putting physical items on your
wish list and bringing them up with your guy. There’s a right way and a wrong way to do it.
The wrong way will make you seem like a “high maintenance” sort of person and decrease his
enjoyment of being in a relationship with you. The right way will motivate him to please you and
generate energy and interest. That energy and interest comes from a feeling of freedom (meaning no
sense of obligation) paired with numerous possibilities for spending his time and money on the
meaningful goal of succeeding at making you happy.
So how do you do it? Whenever you present these ideas to him, it should be framed within a discussion
of goals and desires you would eventually like to get to, and which you would be happy to have his help
in pursuing – if the time is right, the resources are available, and the opportunity arises. Framing it this
way lets him in on your desires while minimizing any sense of pressure or obligation.
The goal is not to get to the end of your wish list – you will never get to the end of this list. And the goal
is not to drain his financial reserves. You want the gifts to seem like the “random acts of kindness” I
wrote about earlier. You’re just giving him the power to be more effective at making you happy. And
that will rev up his sense of meaning and purpose when gifting you.
Make sense? Okay, now let’s get down to the nitty gritty. If most types of physical, material items won’t
make you as happy over the long haul, what kinds of things are okay to put on your list?
The trick is to find physical items that can increase your happiness because of the lasting, tangible
benefits they provide. Want some examples? Okay.
New mattress. This is a material gift that can improve your sleep, yielding higher energy during the day
and greater feelings of relaxing comfort at night. It can literally make you wake up happier every day.
Not a bad gift, huh?
Remote starter kit. If you live where it snows and have to leave for work on dark, cold winter mornings,
you might receive a quality of life boost if your partner wants to take on the challenge of buying and
installing a remote starter kit so your vehicle can warm up and melt the ice off the windshield before
you head outside.

Air purifier. If you live or work in an area with mold, toxins, or allergens that make you feel tired and
congested, a high quality air purifier can boost your energy and prevent energy-sucking illnesses. It’s the
gift of well-being.
Obviously, these are just a few of the possible material items that might deserve to make your wish list.
I’m sure if you take a little time to think about it, you’ll come up with plenty of physical items that seem
like they could make your life just a little bit better and easier.
Reverse Engineering Happiness
Still having trouble coming up with ideas? Use reverse engineering. What do I mean by that?
Look at Your Happiest Moments. Discovering what to put on your wish list doesn’t have to be a
stressful chore. If you look at it the right way, coming up with list items can be half the fun. One great
way to do this (and get him involved in helping you to “discover” what makes you most happy) is to sit
down and think about your happiest moments together.
What made those moments so exhilarating, so brilliant, so satisfying? Were you away from the hustle
and bustle of regular life? Enjoying the spotlight? Nestled in his arms? Learning something new
together? Putting your life in mortal danger (some people like that sort of thing)? Seek out
commonalities between those moments, and you’ll have a clearer sense of what make you truly happy.
Look at the Success of Others. You’ve probably heard that you should look at the happiest couples you
know and try to emulate them. Forget about that! You’re not going to try to model your relationship
after their relationship, because you and your man are unique individuals. What works for them won’t
necessarily work for you. At least not in a general, overall sense.
But where the relationships of others are valuable is in looking at specific blissful experiences they have
had with each other and seeing if those experiences work for you, too. In essence, all you are doing is
looking at things that have led to happiness previously (in you or others) and repeating them to see if
they work again. If they work, great. If not, you can always try something else. Even this trial and error
can be fun as you share these experiences together.
Make Him Work… a Little
With all this talk about making a list of things you desire, you might be under the impression that I’m
telling you to laminate this list, frame it, and hang it on the fridge so your man will see it every day.
I’m not. At all. Ideally, he should discover the desires on your list gradually.
Why? Because of something called gamification. I’ll explain more about what that is later, but for now,
suffice it to say you want the rewards for his hard work to be doled out over time – just like in a video
game, where there are tiny victories that keep you addicted to playing. In this instance, we want him
addicted to pleasing you.

Think of it this way. You want him to have the satisfaction of piecing together clues (even if they seem
like fairly obvious clues to you) that allow him to have the sudden feel-good dopamine neurotransmitter
boost of the “aha moment” when he suddenly discovers a way to increase your happiness.
Metaphorically speaking, you want him to discover the torn and jumbled pieces of a book that was once
titled My Secret Fantasies for Being Romanced instead of thumping down a six-inch manual on the table
in front of him and saying, “Read it by this time next week.”
Don’t get too into the detective aspect of this though. Especially at first, you want to make it fairly easy
for him to “discover” the things that make you happy, allowing him to experience that feeling of success.
In other words, don’t be mystic or evasive. Remember, you want him to succeed, so make sure your
“clues” are very clear. Your goal should be to entice him with opportunities to discover small elements
of what makes you come alive with the kind of happiness that only a great romantic partner can awaken
in your life.
How to Encourage Him to Surprise You
We’ve looked at a lot of ways to more or less directly ask for what you want in this section, but
sometimes doing that doesn’t feel very romantic. Sometimes you need to feel like your partner is acting
independently. You want to feel like he was thinking about you even when you are not around.
Those are the special characteristics that make a romantic surprise feel so special. It shows you were on
his mind, and he went above and beyond what you directly asked for, understanding your desires well
enough to independently come up with ideas to make you happy.
This is a good thing, but as I mentioned earlier in this section, men aren’t mind readers. Because of this,
it is up to you to find ways to encourage this kind of romance in your relationship.
Play the Surprise Game
Going after what makes you happy as a couple is not something to be done in secret. These are not
methods to manipulate your man into doing things for you.
In fact, you should be doing these things together in a very conscious way. Both of you should look at it
as a lifestyle choice and a relationship pattern that has been proven to bring much higher levels of
satisfaction to both partners.
Because it’s not something secret, you have the freedom to talk openly with your man about your goals,
your desires, and the feelings you want to have. This may seem counterintuitive to the goal of being
surprised, but bear with me for a bit.
One of the best things you can do is to agree to play a game where you compete (in a pleasant way) to
see who can come up with more fun ways to please the other person. Whoever wins gets to choose
where the two of you go out to dinner next.

Don’t try to do these blind though.
Instead, sit down with each other and talk about things that made you feel incredibly happy and
connected to each other. Then both ask questions that will stimulate ideas to help you reach this goal.
For example, you felt really happy and connected once when he surprised you by taking you out
dancing, and he felt really happy and connected when you played doubles tennis with him once.
Still with me? Here’s the kicker: as you talk about the things you want, you don’t have to share all of the
ideas that pop into your mind regarding ways you could surprise each other. Some of the things you talk
about will trigger ideas for ways to surprise each other. You’ll keep those ideas to yourself until the right
moment.
In fact, instead of specifically mentioning dancing, you might share with him that you want to feel
pleasantly surprised that he was thinking about you when you are not around. He might then ask you
some questions about what that would feel like and what situations would generate that kind of positive
emotion.
In the process, you could say something that sparks an idea for him. He will not share this idea with you
because it’s a part of the game the two of you agreed to play. This is an excellent example of combining
gamification with a short term deadline and a very specific goal. It gives him something solid and
tangible to sink his teeth into.
You’ll end up feeling romanced by him because he “gets” this kind of game. It’s tangible enough for him
to understand the point. The specific time frame and clear goal helps to engage your man’s interest in
being romantic. Actually, your man probably wanted to be romantic all along, but now he sees how he
can “win” at trying to be romantic. This changes everything. Believe me, as a man and dating coach, I
can tell you how relieved your man will be when he sees specific actions he can take to be romantic. It
takes something vague and mystic and turns it into something meaningful with a purpose he
understands.
Making romance a little more concrete has many benefits you will come to enjoy. It activates his
competitive side and his creativity, and it gives him something concrete and measurable to sink his teeth
into. In other words, he has an idea about the kinds of things you want and he understands there is a
deadline to meet, but there’s still enough room for him to act on his own and feel good about what he’s
doing.
This is something you don’t accomplish if you hit him with a vague complaint about wishing he would
surprise you more with flowers. Doing it that way sets him up for failure in a number of ways.
Let’s look at them for a second:
1. You’re making him feel like he’s being reprimanded for failing to be romantic.
2. You’re guilting him into doing something, which cheats him of the pleasure of doing it.
3. You’re taking away his feeling of potency/creativity by telling him exactly what to do.
4. You’re cheating yourself out of the joy of being surprised.

5. You’re setting yourself up for anger and frustration if he doesn’t “get it” and do what you want.
Of course, if you had just said “I want to feel happier,” it’s just as bad. You might think that you are
leaving it open to him to find ways to make you happy, but in this example, your desire is so vague that
he has very little control over increasing your happiness.
Any number of things could potentially make you happy – or fail. He’s fumbling around blind, and this
lack of control will cause him feelings of helplessness and lower his motivation to try anything.
The “surprise game” is a happy medium between these two extremes.
Wish Lists Are a Two-Way Street

“Power is not revealed by striking hard or often, but by striking true.” - Honore De Balzac
We’ve spent a lot of time talking about how you can develop your wish list and reveal your desires to
your man. This is an important part of activating his Hero Instinct and making him feel like he’s
succeeding at providing for you.
However, you don’t want to forget about the fact that he has needs and desires, too. But this doesn’t
mean you should just keep doing random stuff in an attempt to make him happy. As the quote above
indicates, the key to boosting the energy and excitement he feels about being with you is to develop
your ability to see right to the core of what will make him come alive and thrive.
To say that in a different way, you want to discover what makes him happy so you can do those things
for him. This will allows you to penetrate deeper into his heart and life.
Want some tips on how to succeed with that? Of course you do!
Reverse Engineer for Him
Remember our discussion earlier about reverse engineering your happiest moments? Now is the time to
use that same method on him!
Think about a time when his energy was high because he was happy and enjoying something in life. Now
reverse engineer that situation to mentally search for the active ingredients that were present.
Once you have done that, repeat the process with several other recent situations where he seemed
happy and particularly alive. Look for commonalities. This will give you insights even he may not be
aware of.
It’s like a superpower over his heart!
Learn How to Ask the Right Questions

Just like you, your man may not really understand the specifics of what makes him happy unless he has
spent time sitting down and thinking about it. But that doesn’t mean you can’t figure out his desires.
You just have to get exceptionally good at asking the right kinds of questions.
What kinds of questions should you ask? Some of these are for him directly, and some are just things
you can ask yourself. Also, keep in mind that you can share these questions with him so he can ask them
about you as well!
 Do I have permission to be your “life enhancer” today? If so, what tips can you throw my way
to get me started? You don’t have to use this specific language, though roleplaying as a
concierge whose job is to make your partner happy may allow him to open up more and ask for
things he normally wouldn’t.
 What talents do I have for bringing out the best in people? This is a question you might ask
yourself when brainstorming ways to enhance your partner’s happiness... or one you could ask
him (or others) directly. You might be surprised by the answers you get!
 What good do I see in my partner’s life that I can affirm, appreciate, respect, or praise out
loud? Sometimes a question like this stimulates the imagination in ways that lead you to
suddenly realize opportunities for celebrating your partner more deliberately.
It could be an “out of the blue” note you put in his lunch box or tape to his steering wheel where
you tell him something you enjoy about him. Or it could be something more elaborate like a
short video you create with clips of his favorite music, pictures of the two of you, and written
text or voiceover narration describing what you appreciate about him.
Just make sure he likes your creation… before you decide to post it to Facebook for all his
friends to see. Otherwise, let it be a private experience.
 What things are exceptionally important to you that I have underestimated the importance
of? Again, this question is designed to stimulate discussion of things he knows or feels on a daily
basis, but has gotten so used to it just never comes up in conversation. Sometimes we get so
accustomed to dealing with annoyances that we fail to make a plan to do something about
them.
One of the most incredible things you can do as a romantic partner is to directly invite
discussion of ways you could enhance his life more. Take care in how you phrase this particular
question and what tone of voice you use, because you don’t want it to act as a springboard for
him to launch into frustrations he has with you. This should be framed as an opportunity for you
to learn things that are even more important to him than you had realized.
 How can I better learn to see the world through your eyes today? Ask him this question and
you’ll come up with all kinds of ideas to make his life a little bit easier, as well as ways to connect
with him and understand him on a deeper level.

The Amazing Power of “What if…?”
This question is so valuable that I decided it deserved its own section.
Why is it so amazing? Because it encourages the mind to go places it otherwise wouldn’t go. The “what
if” questions trigger a process of discovery and exploration that’s nearly as automatic as the process by
which you picture a truck in your mind when I say the word “truck.”
What we’re talking about, at heart, is triggering your imagination. When we use our imaginations, it fills
in details about our true desires, often in ways we were not consciously aware of.
So while a question like, “What if we could find a way to spend more time together on weeknights?”
might not immediately reveal any great answers, if you let your imagination wander, you might discover
little nuggets of insight.
It could be something simple like picturing yourself enjoying a stroll in the woods or sipping tea at your
favorite café. If you’re already subconsciously thinking about things to do together on weeknights, this
could lead to the realization that you could start a tradition of meeting at a favorite spot on Tuesday
nights instead of sitting home and watching sitcoms.
More examples of “What ifs” you can ask include things like:
 What if we could afford to go on vacation this year? Where would we go?

 What if we went to a different restaurant every week?
 What if we took a class together?
 What if we invited friends over once a month?
 What if we started a “fun account” together to save money to do stuff?
Questions that Uncover His True (Secret) Desires
Here’s another set of questions that deserves its own section: questions that remove limits.
I once read a book about interesting conversation starters in the form of hundreds of questions. Some of
my favorites were questions about what a person would do if certain limits were removed. For example,
“If time and money were not limiting factors, where would you go and what would you do next week?”
Another example is, “If you had $100,000 in your pocket and you had to spend it on something other
than investments by the end of this year, what would you do differently?”
Now, these questions will bring up all kinds of fanciful notions. And you might think, “What’s the point if
I don’t have $100,000 to give him or the power to grant him a week of vacation?” But his specific
answers are not the point. What you are trying to do is get a sense of the direction his thoughts go when
you remove limits.

Does he start dreaming out loud about solitary places like an empty beach where he can walk with you
for hours? Or does he immediately think of going to crowded places like festivals, sporting events, or
other hotspots? Are his dreams tied to adventures, like renting a sailboat and cruising between the
islands of the Caribbean without a set plan? Or is he more interested in finding time to stay home and
binge on a TV series he’s been meaning to watch or spend a relaxing night alone with you cooking,
drinking wine, and just talking with you?
If he gives a vague answer, you can use all kinds of follow-up questions. For example, if he says he wants
to hire a limo and invite all his friends to take a ride with him, you might ask if he would prefer to end
the evening with his tried-and-true favorite (brownies and ice cream) or do something more
adventurous that involves exploration, like sampling desserts from each of the top 10 restaurants in
town.
The point is that you use these questions to uncover the hidden desires he typically does not speak of
and may not even realize he has. Some of those desires will be unrealistic, perhaps even most of them,
but by listening to them, you can learn something about the kinds of things he wants and then surprise
him with a less extravagant version of the same underlying desire.
Alternatively, you can plan together for an adventure, excursion, or stay-at-home experience that will be
something the two of you look forward to and work on bringing into fruition over the next three weeks,
three months, or however long it takes.
Questions Should Be a Part of the Bigger Conversation
Remember, all of these questions are designed to be used within the framework of an open discussion
between the two of you regarding the conscious intention to set aside a few minutes each day to
brainstorm ways of enhancing each other’s happiness. You can’t just bring these questions up randomly
in a conversation and expect to get the same result.
Watch His Energy Levels
Want to discover the things that annoy, frustrate, and generally bog down his life? All you have to do is
watch his energy levels.
A lot of people seem to literally move slower as they approach a task they are not looking forward to.
Imagine someone walking to a table to prepare their tax documents, knowing they have hours of wading
through endless forms before they will finish the task. Unless they are really into doing their taxes, you
might notice they are shuffling along instead of striding confidently. Maybe their head is down and their
shoulders are slumped. You may even hear them sigh.
Does your guy show a muted version of that same sluggishness when looking at movie listings with you,
or does the process of deciding on a movie seem to energize him? Whether he’s willing to admit it or
not, his energy level can tell you whether he looks forward to whatever he’s doing with you. That’s
valuable information.

But be careful about assuming. There are all kinds of reasons why his energy levels might be low, and
you should always double check your hunch. Let me show you the best way to do that.
Use contrast. Don’t ask, “Do you actually like going to the movies with me? You seem kind of low energy
and uninterested.” That just creates a negative vibe. He might even become defensive. And getting a
straight answer out of him? Forget about it.
But if you contrast two potential activities, you can get a sense for what he really likes without ever
directly asking. For example, you can say, “Would you rather do this, or would you rather do that?”
Obviously you would replace “this” and “that” with real activities. If you’ve ever been to an optometrist
to be fitted for glasses or contacts, you’ll recognize this helpful process. It allows the eye doctor to get
very specific information about what will bring clarity to your sight without a need for explanation.
All he does is show you two different lenses and say, “Is it clearer with this, or with this? Better with one
or two?” He does this repeatedly until you can’t even tell the difference between the two lenses, at
which point he knows he has reached a necessary level of refinement for the prescription.
It’s also like that “hot or cold” game you might have played as a child. Somebody hides something, and
then you tell them whether they are getting hotter (closer) or colder (farther away) depending on the
direction they move.
That’s the other secret to uncovering what he actually wants. With time, you will refine your insight to a
point that you have an unfair advantage compared to anyone else who is trying to discover what he
secretly wants.
Learn What You Like Together
One of the joys about being in a relationship with another person is that you get to discover new things
together. Because of this, it is vital that part of both of your wish lists should involve trying stuff that
may or may not end up becoming a favorite activity.
That means a couple of different things. The first is that you’ll need to come up with new ideas. Doing
this isn’t always easy, but the way to become good at it is pretty simple: practice. Your idea muscle gets
stronger with daily use, so make a point to write down ten new ideas every day. You can each write
them down individually or make it a fun exercise to do together.
Don’t worry if most of your ideas don’t pan out. Only a few will be good ideas. That’s okay, because
you’re basically just brainstorming.
The second thing that trying new stuff means is that you have to be willing to take risks – and also learn
to differentiate good risks from bad risks. Bad risks are the kind of risks that don’t give you a chance to
get up and try again (like not wearing a seatbelt!). Good risks are different because they have a low
downside, but an unlimited upside (like trying to start seven new businesses, none of which require any
capital investment, so even if you fail six times, you still get to succeed on your seventh try).

As you come up with new ideas, some part of you will hesitate because it feels risky to try something
new and unproven. This is normal. Just remember the sense of risk is just a fear of appearing unusual or
different. Don’t let that hold you back. It’s okay to try to have tons of fun doing something new, even if
it flops, because this is the kind of risk you can take over and over. Eventually it will pay off big time
when you stumble onto something that works exceptionally well.
What I’m talking about is persistence. This is where things begin to take off. Persistence gives you
control. Most things we try to do in life flop. We fail all the time. But people who persist gradually
discover the nuances and the little secrets that work. Persistence gives you power in the form of control.
You cannot control everything, but through persistence, you find ways to succeed you never would have
otherwise discovered.
Much of the fun you and your partner create together will come from the fact that the things you try
together will be unusual rather than “normal.” This will give your interactions a special exclusive feel,
which is a good thing. So allow yourself – and your partner – the freedom to think outside the box and
the freedom not be constrained by what everyone else is doing.
Ideas, plus good risk, plus persistence. Combine these three things together and you have a powerful
combination that will not only surprise your romantic partner but also you.

Section II: How to Get Him Addicted to Making You Happy
So now that you’ve created your wish list, how do you get him on board with the idea of making those
ideas happen? How do you tap into his desire to make you happy so that it becomes a part of his
identity as we talked about in Secret Obsession?
What if I told you that you could not only motivate him to take action – but get him so hooked on it that
he’ll be addicted to making you happy?
Sound good? Yeah, I thought so.
How do you do it? By upgrading his mental framework.
Using the methods in this section, your man will come to understand that romancing you is a significant
part of what makes you happy, and the happiness his romantic actions create will fulfill his natural Hero
Instinct. As a result, he will become addicted to your happiness – a development that’s good for both of
you!
So what does “romancing you” mean? Whatever you want it to! It’s those items on your wish list. It’s
the things that you haven’t discovered about yourself yet. It’s the ideas that he’ll make up on his own as
you embark on this Endless Honeymoon together.
All of the techniques you have already learned in Secret Obsession for using gradual behavioral
reinforcement will still work, but now you’re going to learn the secret to perpetual motivation, how to
make him crave you, and how to completely change how he views gift giving.
Always Start by Changing Your Own Internal State
Okay, first thing’s first. You need to get him on board with trying something new.
Not always such an easy task, right? Most people resist change, so it can often feel like an uphill battle
to get someone excited about a new idea or experience.
Maybe you suggest something like going to a hot new restaurant that just opened and his immediate
reaction is a negative one – “It’s so expensive,” “The crowds are going to be crazy,” or even “I’ve heard
it’s impossible to get in there.”
After a while, you come to expect this resistance and may begin talking yourself out of an idea before
you even ask. Is the food as good as people are saying? Will you spend half the night waiting to get in? Is
the idea even really a good one at all?
We do this kind of thing all the time, and it’s self-defeating. Why? Get ready for this, because it’s going
to be eye-opening: in any situation, the person who feels most certain will have the greatest influence
on the other person.

That’s right. One of the most powerful tools you have in your arsenal to convince your man to do
something is to first be convinced yourself. In other words, if you want to invite him to try some new
ideas, you need to be fully on board first.
You can achieve that by using state management. What’s state management? It’s when you change
both your physiology and focus to increase your feeling of certainty about your goal or what you know
you must accomplish.
To understand what this means, let’s look at the difference between state management and
affirmations. When using affirmations, you repeat a positive statement in an effort to convince yourself
it is true.
Imagine yourself about to go on a first date and terrified that you’re going to blow it. You stand in front
of a mirror, sweating and shaking, and repeat these words to yourself: “He’s going to like you. He’s going
to like you.”
It’s a nice sentiment, but when your date encounters you in this panicked state, what impression do you
think he’ll walk away with? You don’t seem very sure of yourself, do you? Most likely, he’ll either be
uncomfortable or feel sorry for you – possibly both.
Now imagine using state management instead. You’re still scared about going on this first date, but you
know you have the power to shift your mind into a more empowered state. Instead of simply saying the
words and hoping they are true, you think of a time when you actually felt your best. You vividly recall
the internal sensations of a day when you felt happy and super confident.
Now you let that memory guide your physiology as you adopt an outward appearance that reflects the
memory of that state of pure confidence. You’ve got a great big smile on your face, and you’re rocking a
sexy new dress. “He’s going to like you.” You see, the trick is, imagination always wins. Use your
imagination to vividly recall a certain mental and physical state and you are automatically influenced by
that memory. It works better than trying to go directly for the desired end-goal by using affirmations
alone.
So affirmations are where you’re saying something in an attempt to convince yourself it is true. State
management is where you embody that truth.
When you want someone to think you’re sexy, you have to know you’re sexy. Trying to convince your
man to book tickets on a cruise to Tahiti? Know why it’s a great idea, and let that be reflected in your
body language.
It really is true. If your guy is in a state of uncertainty or wishy-washy hesitation and you have changed
your mental state and physiology in order to build up that sensation of certainty, he will be more
influenced by you.
Be Honest about What You Can Actually Control

But even if you think you’re displaying complete certainty and utilize all of the other tools in this section,
sometimes you’re just not going to achieve the goal you set – and that’s okay.
Far too many people make the mistake of trying to control things they actually have very little control
over, and that can be debilitating. When you are feeling frustrated or facing failure, refocus on your
circle of influence. That is, focus on the things you can realistically control in your life.
For example, you can choose the focus of your attention, choose to adopt an empowering attitude, or
choose to go back to the drawing board for new ideas. But you cannot choose a different attitude for
your boyfriend or husband. You cannot choose to make his boss give him a raise or more time off from
work.
By focusing on your circle of influence, you will see more opportunities for taking action. This will lead to
a feeling of being empowered, which automatically changes your state toward a more positive – and
more certain – one.
So if you’re feeling stuck, take a look at what you have control over and make sure all of your recent
actions (and upcoming plans) fall within your circle of influence.
Once you’ve got yourself ready, you can start thinking about how to influence your man and encourage
him to go on this journey with you.
The Importance of the Right Frame of Mind
Remember that earlier story about your guy acting resistant when you present new ideas to him? Well,
there’s a reason that happens, and it’s a simple one: he’s human.
Most people are naturally resistant to new, unexpected ideas. We’re guarded and wary, and we suspect
that we’re being duped into something or that we’re better off just sticking with what we know.
Because of this, it’s best to start by influencing his frame of mind. Your goal is to get him into the frame
of mind where romancing you is a good thing. Then you keep him there by making it a rewarding
experience.
How do you get him in the right frame of mind? There are several different methods.
“Yes Mindset” Questions
What’s the “yes mindset”? At its heart, it’s a way of building agreement with another person by finding
common ground, so that when you finally get around to asking the question you really want to ask, they
are primed to say yes.

It probably sounds kind of sneaky, but it’s not. Most of us tend to receive new ideas with caution and a
skeptical mindset. When someone comes up to us with a request, it triggers a mental scan to see if there
are any reasons to say no – an instinct we can flip off with the right technique.
The “yes mindset” is a way to offset this natural tendency by closing the door to the “no room” and
opening the door to the “yes room.”
Think of it this way. If you wanted to ask a favor from someone, would you do it when they’re smiling
and whistling a happy tune, or when they are stomping around and grumbling under their breath? I
think the answer is pretty obvious – the first one, right?
Why? Because you know they are in a more receptive frame of mind. Well, all the “yes mindset” does is
help you to consciously put them in this frame of mind.
Still following? Let me give you an example.
Couples’ Tennis
Denise and Oliver’s friends recently joined a couples’ tennis league and asked Denise if she and Oliver
would join, too. Denise really wants to do it, so she decides to put Oliver in the right frame of mind
before asking the question.
Since he loves dancing video games, Denise starts her interaction by suggesting they put on a two-player
game that allows them to dance together. A song comes on that she knows he loves.
DENISE: Great song.

OLIVER: Yeah, I love this one.
DENISE: I wish the game was better at recognizing our moves. Still, it’s a lot better than last
year’s version.
OLIVER: It sure is.
DENISE: When we play together like this, it’s like we’re totally in sync.
OLIVER: Yeah. I like that feeling.
DENISE: It makes me think of that party where we kicked Tom and Jane’s butts in charades.
OLIVER: We were on fire that night.
DENISE: Wasn’t it fun to beat them, too?
OLIVER: It was pretty satisfying. Especially Tom’s look of disbelief.
DENISE: I don’t get that same “in sync” feeling when I’m playing tennis by myself, do you?
OLIVER: Nope. Tennis would be more fun as a team sport.
DENISE: You think so?
OLIVER: Definitely.
DENISE: Well, you know, Jane did tell me the other day that she and Tom were joining a couples’
tennis league. You up for kicking their butts again?
OLIVER: Let’s do it!

See what Denise did there? First off, she asked a series of questions that she knew he would say yes to.
That got him in the habit of agreeing. Even the question he answered “nope” was really a disguised
“yes” because it was an agreement response.
But she did more than that. Denise also triggered feelings of positive emotion in Oliver by talking about
being in sync with him and then referencing a time when they worked together so well that they beat
their friends.
This is useful because it is the same friends involved in couples’ tennis, so it creates an easy connection
when she brings them up later. She’s able to frame her request about joining couples tennis as one that
involves reliving a fun moment when they defeated their friends.
This is a great technique to use when you want your partner to engage in some adventurous, outside-of-
the-box thinking about ways he can add some romance to your relationship. You can remind him of
some wonderful things he’s done in the past and get him feeling good about himself before suggesting a
new idea. Then transform your idea into a “romance contest” and try to outdo each other (which I’ll
explain more about later!).
Just make sure you present the challenge in such at way that he knows it’s all in good fun with no
pressure involved .
Sell Him on Benefits, Not Ideas
Okay, once you have him in the “yes mindset,” what’s a good way to finally present the idea you’ve
been leading up to?
If you simply start with ideas, he will resist. If you start with benefits, you’ll get him nodding yes. His
motivation will come from the benefits you show him.
Then you can allow that to flow into a discussion of possibilities for making those benefits a reality,
which will make him feel like it is something you are exploring together. This will cause him to take
ownership over making it happen. This is more fun than trying to convince him that your new ideas
would lead to happiness.
Let me give you an experience to show you how powerful the difference can be. Here are a few made-
up product advertisements that illustrate this point so you can see what I’m talking about. See if you
can feel the difference as you read these messages:
New Diet Pill
Selling the idea: Dr. Weight Loss has come up with a revolutionary new diet pill, and we really
think that you should take it. It has been extensively tested in laboratories and case studies to
prove its effectiveness. The FDA has approved it. You will not regret trying this new drug. The
tests show that you can lose up to 10 pounds a month in a way that is completely safe. You
don’t need to change anything about your diet, just take a single pill once a week.

Selling the benefits: Want to lose 10 pounds a month? Want to do it in a way that has been
scientifically proven to work – and work safely? What if you could do this and not change your
diet at all? In fact, the only change is that you need to take a single pill once a week. Would you
do it? It may sound too good to be true, but that’s exactly what Dr. Weight Loss’s new pill does.
Try it today!
Better Smart Phone
Selling the idea: Cool Phones Corporation is offering a revolutionary new smartphone for only
$599 when you sign up for a two-year data plan. When you purchase our new model, you’ll be
getting a first-of-its-kind holographic screen that projects an image bigger than most tablets.
There’s even a holographic keyboard feature. The device also features a first-in-its-class
processor, and a battery that lasts three times that of other smartphones. All in a phone that’s
as small as the original iPhone.
Selling the benefits: Do you wish you didn’t have to choose between a giant phone that barely
fits in your purse and a small phone you can barely read webpages on? Now you no longer have
to choose. Get a giant screen experience from a tiny phone by using a holographic screen that
will amaze your friends. Pull up that video to share with your buddies before their phones can
even open the web browsing app. All thanks to processing speeds that rival gaming computers
and a battery life that will let your phone stay awake longer than you can. Cool Phones
Corporation uses a state-of-the-art holographic screen to project an image twice as big as the
largest competitor – it can even project a keyboard! But the phone itself is smaller than an
original iPhone, so it’s easy to slip in your pocket or purse. The best part? The price! Get it first
for just $599 plus a two-year data plan.
Most of us make the mistakes of cutting right to the boring facts: “There’s this new art class I heard
about.” Or worse, we start by mentioning the negatives: “I know you’ll think this is too expensive but…”
Not a good idea!
We all want to know what’s in it for us, so put those benefits up front when offering up a new idea:
“Wouldn’t it be fun to get a little tipsy, cut loose, and learn something new?” You’ll get him nodding,
“Yes, all the things you mention sound great. Now how can I get them?”
After you’ve got him in the right frame of mind you can get down to the nitty gritty details. The details
are less important anyway.
Contrast
I’ll let you in on a little marketing secret you can use to your advantage that can help to highlight those
benefits even more: contrast.
Imagine someone offers you a single smoking cessation hypnotherapy session for a whopping $500.
Pretty big price tag for maybe an hour or so, right?

But what if that person pointed out that you will spend more than that on cigarettes in the next two
months alone? Suddenly that price seems pretty reasonable. Through this contrast you have defined the
price in a way that changes its perceived value.
So try this trick with your guy! When you present ideas, use contrast to automatically frame them in a
way that make the ideas seem far more fun than the alternative of ignoring or rejecting them.
Instead of, “Do you want to go to the movies tonight?” You should ask, “Would you rather prepare a
meal and watch some TV after we wash the dishes, or skip that and just have some buttery popcorn for
dinner and catch that new movie that came out tonight?”
Instead of just suggesting an idea, first find something less desirable to contrast it with.
If you’re not currently in a relationship, you might be thinking this idea of contrast doesn’t apply to you
– but you’re wrong. In fact, it may be even more valuable to a woman who has her sights set on a new
guy but isn’t sure how to pull the trigger. Want some examples?
Megan and Rick
Megan works with Rick and they’re friendly, but she’s not quite sure how to take the leap and ask him
out. Then, at a boring after-hours work celebration, she gets an idea.
MEGAN: (referring to speaker) Man, he’s really still talking, isn’t he?
RICK: I know. It feels like hours, and I’m still not sure what the heck he’s talking about.
MEGAN: In that case, I have a question for you.
RICK: I’m all ears.
MEGAN: Would you rather stay here and try really hard not to fall asleep and drown in your
drink? Or would you rather sneak out the back with me and head to a great bar around the
corner with some nice ambiance?
RICK: Um, option two, please.
MEGAN: That’s what I thought. I’m going to “go to the bathroom.” Wait one minute, then you
“go to the bathroom,” too.
RICK: Very Mission Impossible. I like it. See you soon.
By using contrast, Megan was able to get some alone time with Rick and make herself seem like
someone fun and adventurous. Now, though her playful spirit at the end of the exchange helps set a
more flirtatious tone to their outing, she didn’t actually make it clear to Rick that it was a date, but that’s
not all bad. There’s plenty of time at the bar to do that, and if it seems like he’s not into her
romantically, she can still bail out and save face.
Aria and Matthew
Let’s look at another potential couple. In this situation, Aria and Matthew are meeting for the first time.
Both are out with friends at a club and clearly serving as “wing-people.” They spot each other across the

club and smile when it becomes obvious that they are both helping their friends in the same way. As
soon as his friend seems to be doing well, Matthew breaks away and approaches her at the bar.
MATTHEW: Second time this week. You?

ARIA: Third. She’s getting over a bad break up by really putting herself out there.
MATTHEW: And you, apparently.
ARIA: What are friends for?
MATTHEW: I’ll drink to that. What are you having?
ARIA: Rum and coke.
He orders her another drink and brings it over.
ARIA: Thanks.
MATTHEW: It’s the first time all night I’ve actually bought a drink for someone I’m interested in.
Matthew looks embarrassed. He’s said too much. Aria disagrees.
ARIA: (smiling at the compliment) Well, it’s the first time I’ve accepted a drink from someone
I’m interested in, so I guess we’re even.
He relaxes and looks over at his friend, who seems to have struck out. Matthew’s shoulders
slump.
MATTHEW: Oy. I may be called back to active duty soon.
Aria looks to her friend, who is having similar luck.
ARIA: (sigh) Me, too. Does our disappointment make us bad friends?
MATTHEW: Didn’t you say this was your third night out with her this week? “Bad friend”
shouldn’t be part of your vocabulary.
Aria looks at her friend again and comes to a decision.
ARIA: Yours either. Stay here for a minute, will you?
MATTHEW: Sure.
She goes and talks to her friend briefly. They hug, and Aria returns.
MATTHEW: What was that about?
ARIA: I asked her if she might feel more relaxed just talking to your friend tonight and swapping
insights about dating the opposite sex.
MATTHEW: And she declined?
ARIA: No, I told her I’d ask you to check with your friend.
MATTHEW: (intrigued) Interesting.
ARIA: You could stay here and be a good friend by continuing to play wingman and buy drinks
for girls you don’t care about in the hopes that your buddy finds Ms. Right.
MATTHEW: There’s an “or,” right?
ARIA: Or we can get out of here and grab dessert at an all-night diner.
MATTHEW: I do think some rest would help James feel refreshed. Give me five minutes?
She nods.
Now, both of these scenarios include situations where the decision to join the woman in question is
clearly preferable to what the man is doing already, but the contrast offered helps to sway them,

encouraging them to take the leap – even if it’s only reiterating something they already know. It also
makes it harder to say no, an additional benefit of this method.
Another way someone who isn’t in a relationship could use contrast is by injecting some humor into the
situation. Maybe you “accidentally” bought an extra ticket to an event and joked to the guy you like that
you could either go with your annoying brother who always mooches off of you or ask him if he is
interested instead. Whatever your situation, contrast can be a way to more clearly define what you’re
offering while making it more enticing for the guy you like.
Use Repetition
Repetition is a technique good speech writers use to hone in on the point they’re trying to make in a
speech and influence their listeners. In fact, when used for evil, it can even make something start to
seem true… even when the audience knows it isn’t! That’s how powerful repeating an idea can be on
the motivation and perception of someone else.
You’ll be putting this to use for good purposes, creating that Endless Honeymoon effect for both of you!
If you invite him in and make some suggestions for a more thrilling life, don’t panic if it doesn’t stick at
first. Simply use repetition. This is a natural part of human communication and influence.
Just be sure to follow one rule. Only repeat an idea after having first tapped into an existing desire or
motivation he has that supports that idea.
In other words, you want the request to be heard by a receptive mind so it is not perceived as pestering
or nagging. Instead, it will feel like a cool drink of water offered to a person who has built up a significant
thirst.
Remember it this way. Thirst always comes first. Only offer something to quench his thirst after you
have tempted his desire for it.
Build His Excitement
“I really want you to take me out to a nice meal.”
If this is how you approach your man with your desires, what do you think his reaction is going to be? I
mean, ultimately he’ll probably end up taking you out to the meal you asked for if he’s not a total
schlub, but is he going to feel good and excited about it? Or is he going to feel like he’s checking
something off his to-do list?
If it’s the latter, you’re not accomplishing your real goal of getting him invested in (and addicted to!)
wanting to romance you. To do this, you’ve got to get him thinking about your desire in the right way.
That means “selling” him on your ideas.
Yes, that’s right – you’re making a sales pitch. Do you think Coke would sell a lot of soda if their tagline
was something like, “Buy our drink because we want to make money”? Probably not.

Instead, their marketing department works hard to come up with interesting ways to make buying Coke
seem like something that’s fun and exciting. Sales pitches.
So how do you know if your ideas work well as “sales pitches”? One of the best ways is to put your ideas
through the five filters to discover what’s possible. Here they are:
1. Is this an idea he can picture in his mind and envision feeling the emotional benefits from
participating in it? In other words, make sure it is tangible rather than vague. “Whenever we go
dancing, I just feel so alive and sexy that I can’t keep my hands off you” is much better than “I love
it when we go out dancing together.”
2. Is there a timeframe that activates a sense of accomplishment, or is your request so general that
he will never know when he has succeeded in making you happy? “I like it when we travel” is
nowhere near as helpful as “Last year’s summer vacation was the best one yet. It made me so
happy to get away from it all and relax.”
3. Are there ways you can track his efforts to participate? If so, this allows you to give him rewarding
feedback. Building reward ideas into the structure of your requests can serve as a strong
motivator.
4. Is your idea an opportunity or a prescribed duty? Expansive opportunities are better.

A competition to see who can surprise each other more within the next five days lets his mind and
imagination expand through infinite layers of creativity. Simply asking for flowers delivered to work
at least twice per month is prescribed, boring, and feels like a duty rather than an opportunity.
5. Does it build on your shared history? Whenever possible, you want your ideas to yield benefits for
the long run, not just the short term. The best ideas will be experiences or interactions that were
interesting enough that you will reflect on them together in the future, looking back at the fun and
interesting life you are building together.
Get Him on Board by Triggering His Sense of Purpose
Let’s talk about another important frame of mind for your man: the heroic mindset.
No one ever reaches their true potential in any area of life without some kind of driving purpose – it may
be trite, but it’s true.
For men, that driving purpose is to be a hero. The most pure example of romantic heroism I can think of
comes from a story I heard a few years back about a man whose love drove him to save his partner from
a Nazi death camp.
The Power of Love

They met in Auschwitz during World War II. The man was a Polish Catholic who had gotten caught while
trying to escape Nazi-occupied Poland. He was traveling to fight with Polish forces in France, but instead
ended up a prisoner at Auschwitz. The woman was a fellow prisoner – a Polish Jew who caught his eye
one day. They were assigned to the same forced labor building.
They shared their tales of woe and somehow forged a bond and drew strength from each other, even as
the stench of death hung about them. The two of them were deeply in love. Unfortunately, the man
knew that the only way his love was going to escape the gas chamber was to do just that – escape. He
never would have risked his life to escape if it was just him. But the desire to protect and rescue the
person he loved was enough to push him beyond fear. It became his purpose and reason for being.
He convinced a friend who worked in the laundry to steal a Nazi uniform and badge. His idea was to
pose as an SS Officer and pretend that his love was his prisoner. They would simply walk out of the gates
together. It was incredibly audacious, but both of them believed the alternative was to wait for death.
At the appointed time, he put on the uniform, demanded that his love’s overseer hand her over to him,
and walked right up to the gate with her. After looking at his ID, the guard on duty waived them through
and they were free – or so they thought.
Word quickly got out that two prisoners had escaped Auschwitz, and the two of them had to travel on
foot for nine days before they reached relative safety. He even had to carry her at several points along
the journey. She begged him to go on without her when she was too tired to continue. He refused.
Eventually they both made it to safety.
It’s hard to imagine a more clear-cut situation of love driving someone to become a hero.
Making Romance Heroic
Now, most likely your man is not going to have that kind of pure, heroic “opportunity” in his relationship
with you. This is a good thing, because obviously neither one of you wants to be put in mortal danger
just to allow him to be a hero.
Unfortunately, that means you’re going to need to find ways to take his generic desire to be viewed in
heroic terms and focus it so he can achieve his goal by being your hero in everyday life. Namely, by
being romantic.
So how do you get him to embrace the otherwise abstract and seemingly feminine concept of romance?
By getting your list of desires to trigger his sense of purpose in more concrete ways.
Let me show you what I mean with a brief story that will serve as an analogy regarding this important
point.
Bad Timing

Barbara couldn’t imagine how things could get worse. Her day had started off bad when her 6-year-old
threw a tantrum that caused him to be late for school and her to be late for work. Barbara’s boss was
understanding… until she discovered that Barbara had left the presentation she was supposed to give
that morning at home. Chagrined, Barbara had to beg everyone to reschedule for the afternoon and
miss more work to race home to get the presentation.
But it was on the way back to the office that things got really bad. Her SUV started smoking and then
died, and she had to have it towed to the dealership and get them to drive her back to work. Because of
this, she was 15 minutes late to her rescheduled meeting, angering all of the higher-ups.
To make up for her missed time, she worked through lunch and ended up eating fast food that gave her
heartburn. Then, to top it all off, the dealership waited until the end of the day to tell her that her SUV
wouldn’t be ready until the next evening. The lone bright spot was that Jeff, her husband, always picked
their son up from school, so at least she didn’t have to worry about that. She did, however, have to rush
around the office and beg coworkers until she found someone willing to give her a ride home.
When she walked in the door, all she wanted was for the day to be over, but Jeff had other plans.
Without even knowing what had happened to her (she’d been too distressed and focused on what was
going on to tell him), he’d cooked dinner, gotten their son ready for bed, and drawn her a relaxing
bubble bath complete with wine, music, and sweets. He simply had extra time and decided to treat her.
On top of her already-crazy day, it was all too much, and she started bawling. Jeff froze like a deer in
headlights, clearly wondering what he’d done wrong, and for some reason, this made Barbara start to
laugh through her tears.
She went to Jeff and hugged him tightly, covering him with kisses. “You are amazing,” she said and
proceeded to tell him about her day. He was aghast, and told her she didn’t need to take the bath or do
anything she didn’t want to do. The last thing he wanted was to put any more pressure on her.
Barbara put her fingers on his lips to stop him. “You couldn’t convince me to skip the bath if the house
was on fire. Seriously, this is the best thing anyone has ever done for me. I can’t imagine a better end to
this day. You rescued me from awfulness.”
Jeff swelled with pride. “It was nothing, really.”
“Trust me,” said Barbara, “it’s everything.”
Now let me show you the subtle but powerful secret Barbara used to good effect in this situation.
Helping Your Man Define His Sense of Purpose
In the story above, Barbara rewarded Jeff’s thoughtfulness not just by thanking him, but by literally
telling him that he rescued her. Pretty powerful stuff when you factor in the Hero Instinct.

By caring for her and doing something romantic, Jeff got to feel like he was accomplishing something
truly important. His actions turned her day around, wiping away the awful feelings and replacing them
with sensations of joy, love, and relaxation.
Now, when he thinks about doing something nice and romantic for her, his mind will probably naturally
return to this moment and how happy he felt. It will encourage him to purposefully strive to find things
that will achieve this end result again – for her and for him.
Speaking of purpose, here’s an important caveat to keep in mind: some people naturally have a sense of
purpose. Think of politicians who seem driven to pursue a given cause, or sports stars who knew what
they were going to do from the time they were 12 years old.
But a lot of the rest of us have a less defined sense of purpose. Because of this, we go searching for it.
There are a lot of ways people try to figure out their purpose, but I think the best way to find purpose in
your life is to adopt the mission of being the best person you can possibly be.
Granted, that leaves a lot of room for interpretation, but that’s part of the point. Looking at your own
desires and your own beliefs about what being “your best” really means will still give you a lot of
guidance.
When it comes to your man, you don’t want his sole purpose in life to be pleasing you. He would quickly
become the kind of man you no longer admire if you were his sole purpose in life.
Instead, what we’re going for is a refinement of how he sees his purpose as it relates to you. If he is
trying to be the best person he can be, you can show him how being romantic will help him to
accomplish this in your relationship. Moreover, you can teach him how to refine his romantic efforts in a
way that directly triggers the end result he actually wants: to be appreciated for his efforts.
We all want to matter. Even menial factory jobs that require little more than pulling a lever over and
over again are more interesting if you have a boss that shows you the purpose behind your work. This
has been demonstrated conclusively in research studies. People feel happier when they have a driving
sense of purpose.
In corporations, the more employees are included in discussions about company goals and the ways
their individual efforts contribute to those goals, the greater their life satisfaction. Additionally, these
employees have better output and stay with the company longer.
In fact, research shows that one of the best ways a boss or manager can improve an employee’s quality
of life is to give them autonomy and choices about how they will accomplish a goal. In other words,
employees are happier when you include them in the process of trying to decide how their efforts will
lead to desired outcomes.
Let’s translate this information to your relationship. You want to tell your man how he can boost your
happiness by being romantic. That means providing him with specific strategies. But you also want to

give him some room to be creative and explore his own ideas and unique ways of trying to show you
how much you mean to him.
This will tie in nicely as you work toward connecting “being romantic” with his sense of purpose.
Remember, men are energized and fascinated by opportunities where they can prove their worth by
being someone’s hero. It gives them purpose.
The Appetite Method: Make Him Crave What You Can Give Him
Now let’s talk about how we can use that Hero Instinct and take it up a notch. We don’t just want him to
be driven to be your hero; we want him “hungry” for it.
To do this, we’ll use the appetite method. It’s all about delayed gratification – doing things to build up a
desire, but holding off on quenching that desire until it reaches a high point. You will use it to make your
man hunger for the things you can provide him in a relationship.
In short, he’ll “crave” you.
The first part of accomplishing this is to learn about his desires so you can give them to him. But it’s
more than that. You also have to offer a diversity of things so he doesn’t get bored. And you need to
stoke his fires while delaying his gratification.
Withhold – But Entice
As you’ve likely already guessed, part of keeping your guy from getting bored with, say, having sex with
you is not to have sex with him all the time. But that doesn’t mean you should refrain from having sex
except for once every six months.
Instead, you want to engage in activities, such as flirting, touching, and kissing (or whatever you and he
find arousing), without actually going all the way. This builds anticipation and makes it much more
satisfying when you finally do make love.
This applies to other kinds of desires, too, and you can increase the pleasure for both of you by coming
up with rituals that allow you to build your anticipation.
Not sure how this can work? Think about your favorite holiday. Chances are good there is a specific
ritual or meal tied to that holiday. Rationally speaking, it’s probably quite possible for you to engage in
that ritual or eat that food at any point in the year – or at least more frequently than just on the holiday
itself.
Looking forward to pumpkin pie on Thanksgiving, or the thrill of giving a gift on Christmas is all the more
exciting because of the anticipation that builds as these holidays approach. You can use the power of
anticipation to build his appetite for all kinds of things. Here’s the key. By building up your anticipation
(your appetite) for a fun, shared experience, the two of you enter into a special kind of linked mental

state where planning things together becomes part of the emotional high. Obviously, that’s good for
your relationship.
Here are a few examples to get your creative juices flowing:
 Movie lovers. When there’s a movie you really want to see, put it on the calendar well in
advance of the release date. Don’t go to any other movies for several weeks leading up to its
release. Send each other trailers, clips, and reviews as they become available.
Before the movie, head out to a nice meal and talk about what you hope to see (alternatively, if
theater food is part of the experience, skip a meal so you’re really hungry for the sweet and
salty goods available.) Afterward, go to a coffee shop you both love where you can idle and talk
about the movie.
 Dessert lovers. Plan a day to make a dessert you both love. On the day of, get up in the morning
and go for a nice long hike together. Head to the store to get the ingredients – splurge on higher
quality or specialty ones. Then go home and make the dessert together.
Eat it when it’s fresh and delicious – and before you’ve assuaged your appetite by eating
anything else. It’s guaranteed to taste amazing!
 Surprise lovers. I’ve already written about the power of surprises and how you can encourage
your guy to embrace them, but let me point out how surprises relate to the appetite method.
The great thing about surprises is that they are innately new and exciting since you’re not
expecting them. Because of this, you might be wondering how you can build anticipation for a
surprise. Answer: tell your man about it.
Huh? Doesn’t that defeat the point? No, silly. Obviously you’re not going to tell him you’ve
purchased tickets to see his favorite band or that you’ve found a bakery that sells a kind of
pastry that’s hard to find and you know he’s been missing. But what you can do is let him know
that he has a surprise coming. You can tell him when if you want – or not. It’s up to you. But the
fact that he knows something good is coming his way will cause his excitement and curiosity to
build.
Take a moment to think about a few of the specific activities you already enjoy doing together, even
relatively mundane ones, like watching TV or cooking dinner, and then write down ways you can
purposefully build your “appetite” for them as a couple.
Build It Together
Some sources of happiness will be unique to one or the other of you, but the real magic happens when
you go the extra mile to discover goals and lifestyle changes – the appetites – that you both get excited
about.

The reason this is so powerful is because it builds the connection between you and your partner. Your
happiness literally becomes more connected to that of your partner and the shared mission you are
embarking on.
A key feature of the actual honeymoon state of mind: “It’s just the two of us heading out on this
adventure.” This creates an amazing sense of belonging and excitement, and helps to reverse the
tendency for these feelings to fade the longer couples stay together.
How do you do this using the appetite method? Easy!
 Figure out what each of your appetites are. Let’s say you absolutely love a good coffee, running
in the rain, shopping at garage sales, road trips, and curling up by the fire. And he’s super into
camping, hiking, golfing, thrifting, watching his favorite TV shows, and reading books. Those are
the things that truly motivate you and bring you both satisfaction.
How do you figure out these appetites? By taking the time to literally write up a list. Ideally, you
can convince him to work with you to create his own list at the same time and then trade off
afterwards to compare the two. Why would you want to do this? Because you should...
 Look for places where your appetites overlap. If you’re really lucky, maybe both of you love
bowling or dancing or eating chocolate-covered strawberries, but that doesn’t always happen.
For many couples, it may not always be obvious at first where you overlap. In that case, get
creative. A love of camping may mesh nicely with someone who loves curling up by the fire and
even a desire to take road trips (while in search of the best camping experiences).
 Find ways to combine desires. Like the above example, having a road trip on the way to going
camping, you can start by finding things that seem to go together in a relatively natural way. But
how about putting together two desires that don’t appear to mesh at all?
For example, you could head out for a hike on a rainy day, then stop by your favorite coffee
shop on the way home and watch your favorite TV show together while you curl up by the fire.
That’s probably a bit too busy for a single day, but you get the idea. One of the best parts of
combining desires in this way is that you can engender a love of what the other person likes in
both partners while creating a new ritual completely unique to your relationship.
An alternative method to sharing your appetites involves activation of simple desires, like hunger. If
you’ve ever been on a diet, you know even plain bread can taste delicious after a few days of calorie
restriction. What if you could use that to your advantage?
The idea is simple. You do things together that work up your appetite. Then you splurge and really enjoy
satisfying your appetite. For example, you could go for a two-hour hike in the woods, burning off
enough calories to make you both really enjoy a picnic lunch to be shared when you reach a lookout

point. Alternatively, you could head home, get changed, and eat out at a nice restaurant. Eating out at
that restaurant would not be as fun if you’d spent all day sitting on a couch.
If you and your partner use this strategy purposefully to enjoy your time together, you’ll be surprised
how much of a boost it can give your interactions. Revving up your appetites becomes a challenge you
both start to really enjoy.One of the secrets behind the appetite method is that it prevents you from
getting bored with your usual ways of seeking pleasure as a couple. That’s because revving your appetite
builds your lust for whatever form of pleasure you later indulge in. It prevents something called
habituation. You must avoid habituation if you really want to keep the Endless Honeymoon effect alive
in your relationship. So let’s talk in more detail about what habituation is and how you can avoid it.
Habituation: When the Extraordinary Becomes Ordinary
To understand habituation, you have to think about something that you really like. Let’s say it’s sushi.
When you eat good sushi, it’s like an explosion of goodness on your taste buds. Because of this, you
consider it a treat and a delicacy.
Most likely, even if sushi is your favorite thing in the world, you only eat it every once in a while. But
we’re going to imagine that the best sushi restaurant ever opens right next door to you and costs
practically nothing.
Holy moley! Now you can eat sushi and get that amazing feeling every day – heck, every meal. So that’s
exactly what you do: you start eating sushi all the time.
At first it’s great. Those amazing tastes and feelings are coursing through you on a regular basis. But
after a week (or maybe even just a few days), you notice that sushi just isn’t as enjoyable as it once was.
Why? What’s happening?
Answer: you’ve become accustomed to the sensation of eating sushi, and it just doesn’t feel special any
more.
It’s a little like the drug example I mentioned in the previous section (minus the addiction!). The more
we experience something, the more commonplace it becomes to us. Or, put another way, when you do
something all the time, it stops giving you a “high” and just becomes part of your routine.
That’s habituation, and it doesn’t matter what the experience in question is. Maybe it’s having a
Snickers bar. Or scuba diving. Or having sex. When it becomes part of your routine, that’s what it starts
to feel like – routine. In other words, “ho-hum.”
Not exactly how you want your guy to feel about spending time with you, is it?
Luckily, so long as you follow the other methods described above, you should be able to prevent
habituation from occurring.

Gamification: The Secret to Perpetual Motivation
Is it hard to imagine these feelings of desire lasting for the long haul? Once you get him on board, how
do you ensure that he (or for that matter both of you!) stay motivated to keeping this Endless
Honeymoon going?
The secret is gamification.
Gamification is the process of applying the typical elements of playing a game, such as scoring points,
setting goals, and unlocking achievements, to something that’s not usually a game.
I once heard a veteran of the public school system (a principal who later became an ultra-marathoner)
describe the reasons for his conclusion that gamification is the ultimate key to learning. He said it’s also
the key to making it possible to learn anything more quickly and with less mental effort.
I agree. Transforming something into a game makes it feel effortless. Here’s why. The brain gets a steady
flow of feedback. Your mind naturally opens up energy to pursue something you perceive as fun and
interesting – the game mentality.
Think about why a child with severe ADHD is unable to focus on a worksheet at school, but he or she can
focus for hours when playing a video game at home. The game stimulates the dopamine neural
receptors in his brain, activating the reward pathway that makes him feel good as he strives for one
miniature goal after another in the videogame.
If his video game character dies, he gets rapid negative feedback, followed by another opportunity to
start again. He then gets rapid positive feedback each time he bypasses a hurdle or obstacle to progress
forward in his game. This continuous feedback makes the challenge endlessly fun.
This is the same quality of gamification you will activate as you transfer the power of his drive for
purpose (the Hero Instinct) toward micro goals with rapid, positive feedback as he attempts to “win” at
the game of romance.
So how do you do that?
Set Goals – and Rewards
Going after what makes you happy as a couple is something you are going to do consciously and on
purpose as a couple. So the methods I’m teaching you are not to be done in secret. These are not
methods to manipulate him into doing things for you. Rather, this is a lifestyle choice and a relationship
pattern that has been proven to bring much higher levels of relationship satisfaction for those who
embrace it. Because it’s not something secret, you have the freedom to talk openly with your man about
your goals, your desires, and the feelings you want to have.
One of the ways to do that is to start with an end goal and then ask each other questions that will
stimulate ideas for reaching the desired outcomes both of you have shared. For example, you might

share with him that you want to feel pleasantly surprised that he was thinking about you when you are
apart. He might ask what situations would generate that kind of positive emotion. In the process, you
might say something that sparks an idea for him, an idea that he will not share with you because it’s a
part of the game the two of you agreed to play. That game might be a competition to see who can
surprise the other person the most (in a pleasant way). Whoever wins gets to choose where the two of
you go out to dinner this coming Friday night.
This is an excellent example of combining gamification with a short term deadline and a very specific
goal. It gives his male mind something solid and tangible to sink his teeth into. You’ll end up feeling
romanced by him because he “gets” this kind of game. It activates his his creativity in ways you would
never see if you gave him a vague complaint about wishing he would surprise you more with “flowers or
something.”
Do you earn points for buying things with your credit cards? Are you part of a “loyalty” program with a
particular company where you get discounts and possibly even gift certificates when you purchase
products?
If so, you’re already engaging in a form of gamification in your life by getting rewarded when you meet
goals. Parents understand this process completely, using it to get their kids to do things like learn how to
use the bathroom (a sticker every time you do it right!), finish chores (get paid for finishing each task!),
or learn to walk (get instant attention, smiles, and cheers from everyone around with each effort you
make!).
Setting goals and rewards in a relationship isn’t quite so simple, but it does follow this basic pattern. The
types of goals and rewards that you and your partner set will be unique to your individual desires and
personalities, but here are some ideas for applying gamification to your romance.
The Romance Contest
Maintain an ongoing contest in your relationship where each of you surprises the other with a romantic
gesture. Alternate every other day, week, or month – whatever works best for you.
It’s key that you both acknowledge and reward one another for your “work.” Even if your man doesn’t
quite get it right, focus on the fact that he tried (not what he did wrong). And when he does hit the nail
on the head, make it clear that this one was a real winner!
Betting
This is where you challenge your man that you will be more successful at doing something romantic than
he will. It could be coming up with a surprise, planning a better date, engaging in more “acts of love”
towards the other person, or something else entirely.

Just make sure that it’s clear there are no “losers” and that both of you enjoy whatever the ultimate
prize is. For example, the winner could get to decide where both of you go for your next dining
experience.
The Ticking Clock
Deadlines are great for gamification because your man will want to see if he can beat the clock, achieve
the goal, or win the reward while he still has a chance to do so. His thoughts will naturally and
repeatedly snap back to that ticking clock and boost his adrenaline, adding to the fun and excitement.
Even if this doesn’t seem like an amazing idea to you, remember that much of the purpose of this is to
tap into his drive to accomplish things that feel tangible and real. This is how we connect his drive for
purpose with your desire for more intimacy and romance in the relationship.
Using this method, you’ll need to plan a consolation prize or a Plan B. Why? Because when you build in a
deadline, it can create stress and feelings of frustration or failure – especially if you end up missing it for
some reason.
Creating a Plan B alleviates those negative feelings and instead transfers them to a new goal or reward
that is still fun, relaxing, and interesting even though Plan A did not work out within the timeframe you
had hoped. It should feel like you both still got something out of the attempt to achieve Plan A so that
you will be encouraged to try again rather than discouraged from continuing.
Reward Him with Closure (Before Starting Again)
His frame of mind after fulfilling your desire is – if anything – even more important than how he feels
before embarking on your request. What you don’t want is for your man to feel like you’re presenting
him with a never-ending stream of increasing requests. In other words, it’s a big no-no to start talking
about what he can do next the second he does something nice.
If you’ve ever been on the receiving end of this kind of interaction, you know what I’m talking about.
These are the kinds of people for whom the phrase, “give an inch, take a mile” seems to have been
invented. You do something nice for them, and their response is something in the neighborhood of, “I
also really like...”
Seriously? You just went out of your way for them, and their response is simply to ask for more? How
ungrateful!
Now, this doesn’t mean that you can’t ask for more (you should ask for more, in fact), but first you have
to verbally recognize and show appreciation for the fact that he has successfully completed the original
task. By celebrating each “closed circuit” where your need has been satisfied, you give him a continuous
feed of positive reinforcement.

This reinforcement is very important. It is a core element of the Endless Honeymoon strategy. Not only
does it differentiate one request from another, it allows him to experience frequent reward sensations
for having succeeded in a task. This reinforces his desire to do it again.
Don’t leave it up to him to recognize when he has succeeded either. Point it out. Make a big deal of it.
Contrast the negative feelings that you would have experienced if he did not go out of his way to do
something sweet for you with the positive ones his effort caused you to feel. In other words, show him
how much you appreciate what he’s done.
Celebrating moments of success validates the special kind of interaction you are building with him. It
frames his experiences with you in his mind as, “This is amazing. This is good. I am succeeding and
having fun.”
One of the biggest secrets to keeping the momentum going for your partner is to give frequent
encouragement. Encouraging your partner is a positive choice that makes your efforts feel like a game
with fun rewards.
Gifts for Two: What to Ask for So “Gifting You” Is Fun for Him
Every woman has a unique idea about what “romancing” means to her, but for many, it includes gift
giving – and there’s a reason for that.
A study from New Mexico University analyzed the behavior of 60 undergraduates, and they found that
people are more willing to buy gifts for partners if they are in, or desire to be in, a long-term
commitment. Even more interesting, this was particularly true for men.
So the fact that your man is giving you a gift can be a sign that he’s committed to you, or is interested in
committing to you. It’s no wonder that women enjoy being on the receiving end of such exchanges – but
how do you ensure that your man enjoys the “giving” side of things?
Remember, if his own desires are fulfilled by the behavior, then he’ll be motivated to continue engaging
in gift giving. He’ll want to do it – and not just because you tell him to or he thinks you want him to.
That’s what makes it more powerful.
So what’s the secret to making gift giving something he enjoys? Ask for the right things. Let’s look at a
few important categories.
Sexy Gifts
If you and your man are already enjoying a healthy sex life, these kinds of gifts can be fun for both of
you. And I’m not just talking about sex toys – although those can certainly be fun and add spice to your
encounters if you’re into that sort of thing.
But intimacy-oriented gifts can also be (slightly) more practical. For example, you can ask for nice new
lingerie or high thread count sheets that feel especially silky.

The point is that these are gifts he’ll get to “play with,” too.
Future Adventure Gifts
There’s something about knowing a fun trip is coming up that boosts morale during the months and
weeks leading up to the trip. Even if all he does is work with you on cutting coupons and trying to save
on grocery costs to afford your extravagant trip, knowing you set a date can be really fun.
Here’s a tip I learned from some psychologists who research happiness. They said we actually enjoy our
vacations more when we pay for them a few months in advance. The hypothesized reason is that, by the
time the vacation arrives, we have already paid for it. The sting of spending the money has faded into
the background, which causes the vacation to seem like something worry-free that does not involve any
stress about money.
So plan ahead and enjoy the anticipation together –it’s a great way to make use of the appetite method!
Gifts that Celebrate and Enhance Your Femininity
A lot of guys hate buying flowers because they seem like a literal waste of money. They view the flowers
as merely a plant with an inflated price tag, and feel it’s designed to take advantage of people who don’t
know better than to waste their money on useless decorations that will die in a week. This is a result of
the utilitarian instincts men develop because of their focus on accomplishing goals, providing, and being
“logical.”
The trick to making him feel good about buying things like flowers is to get him to mentally connect the
idea with his drive for purpose (his Hero Instinct). You can accomplish this by connecting the dots for
him. Show him the actual value of the gesture.
A great way to do this is to leave a handwritten love note on his pillow. You can write about how good it
makes you feel toward him – and about life in general – when he shows up with a bouquet of flowers.
He won’t think about it as buying flowers anymore, but as buying you a bit of happiness while earning
himself some “points.”
If you think about it this way, it’s actually a form of gamification. Explaining the beneficial effect the
flowers have on your mood is like the dopamine-boosting reward sound in a video game, accompanied
by some sort of “you just achieved master status,” or “you’ve just passed level III!”
You are essentially translating your internal experience in a way that causes him to feel some of the fun
that he would otherwise be oblivious to. When you just smile and say, “Oh, thank you” and then maybe
mention the flowers one more time before they die, he just doesn’t get it.
But when you translate the positive experiences in a way that says, “You did this good thing for me!” He
will naturally want to do that kind of thing more often. And that’s your cue. That’s your cue to give him
ideas for other similar actions that could yield the same sort of effect.

In essence, the message you’re sending is, “If you like the feeling you got from that random act of
kindness, here are several other methods you can use to get more of that good feeling.”
This stuff may seem like common sense, but 99% of the people I consult with skip over these basic
methods for getting more of what they want in their relationship. They do this because no one thinks of
digging for buried treasure in their own backyard.
Sometimes the simplest ideas hold the greatest power. That’s the case in this situation.
“Promise Gifts” You Know He Secretly Wants to Give You
Asking for a trip to Hawaii is extravagant in terms of expense and the time involved. But if you know he
secretly wants to learn how to surf, he will love the idea of plotting ways to pull it off.
That’s especially true if you present it like this: “I would love to spend five days in Hawaii, relaxing on the
beach while I watch you take private surfing lessons. We could have romantic evenings together with all
the distractions of our normal life hundreds of miles away. I know it’s unlikely right now, but promise me
we will try to do it someday.”
A few extravagant-promise type gifts are good for your relationship. It causes both of you to envision
yourselves together in the future, having fun and building memories. Even if you choose something far
less extravagant, the same effect can work to your advantage. It decreases the chance of the
relationship gradually beginning to feel stale.
For example, “Do you think it’s possible that one day you would be allowed to give me a tour where you
work?” Or, better yet, “Do you think one day you might be able to convince your boss to let us use the
rooftop of your building to watch the fireworks privately – without all the crowds?” This is far less
extravagant than a trip to Hawaii, but might be something he could pull off.
Gifts of Knowledge
Something fun happens when you ask somebody for a list of desires – they resist. Why? Because they
feel self-conscious about it. They might smile ear-to-ear, but they’ll hesitate to offer the inside
information. This is especially true early in the relationship.
But here’s a trick that everyone should know: you can ask for the information as a gift.
Doing so has a remarkably positive effect on a relationship. If he complies, you have essentially received
a set of cheat codes that allows you access to the buttons that will generate positive emotions for him.
At the same time, you have stated your desire to have that information as one of the things you desire
most. In other words, if that’s what you want for your birthday (to be able to delight him and fill his life
with more happiness by getting him something he really wants), he can’t deny you.

People don’t always know what to say or what information to give you, but asking is a start. Also, when
you ask him for this as a gift, it will also get him thinking about ways he can directly solicit the same
information from you.
The Gift of More Time
Work together to create systems that reduce the time demands of chores and other “administrative”
tasks. Your pay off will be getting extra time to have fun together.
The benefit you are showing him here is not just more time together, but more fun in general. So you
need to be careful to check for any objections he might have stemming from a desire for freedom.
People thrive when they feel free. It’s the reason so many people are opting for work-at-home jobs
these days even though the benefits are nonexistent and the pay can be much lower. There’s just
something about knowing you can get up and walk to a coffee shop anytime you want. It’s freedom. It
feels good.
And as much as he might like you, if he gets into a mindset that puts you into the role of someone
reducing his sense of freedom, that will work against you. So when you apply the idea in this section,
frame your discussion in a way that suggests the benefit is more freedom, which he can use for anything
he wants, not just on spending more time with you.
Essentially, the two of you will look for ways to “hack” the habits and routines of your lives to free up
some extra time. Some things might only free up a small amount of time, while other ideas could have a
very significant impact.
Here’s an example of something that would free up only a small amount of time. Say he spends 15 to 20
minutes every morning getting his lunch ready for work. What if, instead, he could spend those 15
minutes relaxing and sipping coffee while watching the birds outside his window?
He could accomplish that goal by creating a set of five meals all at once on Sunday nights, reducing his
clean-up time and prep time. Or the two of you could join a local group that creates meals in bulk once
per month. Everyone goes home with a variety of meals created economically and with high time
efficiency.
For those with jobs that pay well enough, it might even make more sense for him to have a meal
delivered to his office each day (paid weekly all at once) and completely remove lunch preparation from
the list of things he has to think about and plan for.
What about you? What time could you reclaim?
Here’s an example from one of my clients who was in a long-term romantic relationship. She was
spending a lot of time apart from her boyfriend who lived in Canada, several hundred miles away from
her home in the U.S.

Because of financial constraints, she typically drove there when she had a weekend opportunity to go
see him (or vice versa). With some brainstorming, we realized she was spending so much time away
from home that she rarely used her house for entertaining and socializing like she had envisioned she
would when she bought it.
She realized it made more sense for her to sell her house and downsize to an efficiency condo, which
freed up enough money for her to regularly fly into her boyfriend’s hometown in Canada rather than
spend the majority of a day driving there and back. She essentially regained two to four days each
month once her decision went into effect!
There are few things a man would love to sink his teeth into more than an opportunity to be helpful to
you in brainstorming or implementing ideas like these. If you see an idea he could help you with, frame
it as a benefit and then ask him to help you pull it off.
Gift Him Back
Gifting him back is one of the secrets to gamification, so make use of it! You don’t want to establish a
sense of obligation through a one-to-one exchange of relatively equal gifts. But you do want to give him
the sense that you’re trying to thrill him in some way as a response to the thrill his gifts evoked in you.
Your gifts can come at random times and in many forms (e.g. a picnic with his favorite foods prepared
ahead of time as a surprise, or picking him up from work with tickets to his favorite professional sports
event).
When he thanks you profusely for the gift, say something like, “Well, you really delighted me when you
gave me X last month. I wanted to at least try to make you feel as good as you made me feel.”
General Gift Guidelines
 Narrow his focus. Two of the most useful ways you can do this are to create a timeframe for the
gift (you want it for a specific occasion, or you are challenging each other to see who can think
up the best romantic experience within the next seven days) and to ask for something of a
specific type (i.e., something that saves you time, makes your sex life more fun, or helps you to
relax).
 Enhance his vision. You should talk to him about gift-giving in such a way that he is able to
visualize the effect his actions will have on you. This will encourage him to seek out ways to gift
you for the “reward” of it and, as in the flower example above, help him to rationalize
“frivolous” gifts.
 Let him feel the rewards. Remember to always make sure he feels like a success (even if it’s not
a perfect gift or gesture) and that he has accomplished something meaningful before you
present him with the next challenge.

 Explore new worlds of possibility together. Work together to think outside the box about the
kinds of gifts both of you really want by removing the limits to how you think and plan and by
refusing to be blinded by the mental traps society binds us with.
Getting Him Addicted in a Nutshell
If you remember nothing else from this section, commit the four questions below to memory, because
they will help to guide your approach to getting your man addicted to making you happy:
6. What would make me happy? Before trying to get him to engage in activities that will make you
happy (and, by proxy, increase his own happiness), you first have to know what kinds of things
truly bring you joy. You have to be honest with yourself when asking this question, too, because
only things that bring you true, genuine happiness will work as “rocket fuel” for your relationship.
Figure out what you really want and you will discover your energy lights up. He will be attracted to
that response and motivated by his ability to engender that feeling in you.
7. How can he participate in planning ways to bring you genuine happiness? Maybe you know that
you light up when he surprises you by bringing your favorite food home to you as a treat. That’s
great knowledge to have! But if you just tell him this straight out, listing the restaurant, the type of
food you want, and when you want it, that removes any agency he has. Rather than doing
something nice for you, he’s checking a requirement off of a list – doing his duty. Think about how
you can provide him with clues and open-ended suggestions that encourage him to figure it out for
himself.
8. What is it that makes him genuinely happy? Reciprocation (that doesn’t feel like completing a
duty) is the emotional rocket fuel that makes everything work. You not only need to know what
brings about your own happiness, but also his – and make it clear to him that you want to find a
way to make him feel as good as he made you feel. In doing this, you are giving him two things that
he desires by providing a wish list item as well as reminding him that he did something that made
your life better.
9. How can you help him to pursue those things that make him genuinely happy? Think about
actions that you can take to help him get the things he really wants. For example, if he’s always
wanted to take a trip around the world, brainstorm ways to save up enough money together to go
in a year. This ties his biggest desires to his relationship with you.
Notice that these four questions are equally focused on the two of you. To truly get your man on board
and wanting to consciously work to build your relationship happiness as we discussed in Secret
Obsession, you need to show him both that you’re willing to fulfill his desires and that he will experience
a sense of purpose when he makes an effort to fulfill even your most feminine, flowery, and frilly
desires.
Link his happiness to the rewarding game of delighting you every chance he gets.

Section III: The Secrets of the Endless Honeymoon
Your ultimate goal in creating an Endless Honeymoon is to influence each other’s mental, emotional,
and physical states toward peak happiness, recurring waves of high-energy, and gratitude for the mind-
blowing joy you get to share as you build your unique story as a couple.
Once you achieve this, your man won’t just become addicted to you – you’ll become addicted to each
other and the ecstasy that comes from being part of something that just gets better with time.
Sounds pretty good, right? No, it sounds great! Who wouldn’t want that?
So how do you do it? What do you need to do to influence your man towards wanting this kind of
relationship with you?
As mentioned in Section II, the best way to influence someone else’s state is to start by managing your
own state, so let’s go more in-depth on that here.
State Management Part Two – Understanding Honeymoon Bliss
In the last section, I focused on the idea that when two people interact, the person who is more certain
about what they want will be more likely to convince the other one. In this section, I want to expand on
that notion and introduce you to several more powerful techniques for changing the way he mentally
frames his relationship with you.
The main emphasis of Section III is that the bliss experienced on a honeymoon is mostly caused by the
perspective that emerges automatically from beliefs about what’s going on between the two of you.
There’s a lot to unpack in that sentence, so let’s take our time to delve a little deeper into this idea.
When most people are on their honeymoon, they believe their relationship is invincible and the most
important thing in their lives. The real world recedes for a time as they completely and utterly live in the
moment, basking in each other’s company, desires, and love. Everything becomes about finding
enjoyment, and that’s accomplished both by doing what they want individually and by actively bringing
happiness and satisfaction to their partner.
This is true regardless of the type of honeymoon you have and what you do on it.
Maybe you could care less about surfing on your trip to Hawaii – you just want to see the volcanoes and
lay on the beach! But if learning to surf is something important to your man, you’ll actively seek out
ways to help him achieve this goal and feel a glow of accomplishment and satisfaction because you
know it’s making him happy. (And hey, you can lay on the beach while he does it and watch as the
waves lap against him enticingly – bonus!)
Or perhaps your pockets aren’t quite as deep and your honeymoon essentially involves both of you
taking a week off of work and staying home. His idea of a good time is lying on the coach and burning

through seasons of TV shows that you’ve been meaning to watch, with frequent pleasant interruptions
for sex. Yours is to sleep in, go on hikes around the neighborhood, and take long, luxurious baths
together. Because both of you have the unspoken goal of trying to make each other as happy as
possible, you take time to engage in things that each of you want to do in order to fill both of you with
more joy.
Honeymooners subconsciously see themselves as “us against the world,” embarking on a grand
adventure where only the happiness of themselves as a couple matters. The fact that they have this
perspective means that it’s exactly what they achieve – the unfettered romantic joy that comes not just
from making each other happy, but wanting to make each other happy and seeking out ways to do so.
So here’s your mission, if you choose to accept it: reverse engineer those honeymoon beliefs. If you are
able to do this, you can discover ways to apply those same beliefs to any phase of your relationship –
from the earliest flirting efforts to your 50th anniversary celebration.
This, of course, brings us back to Section II. Other people can read our mental state, and it influences
them. It’s something that works in the opposite direction too, and you need to be aware of it to keep
from falling into a proverbial rabbit hole: other people’s mental states and belief systems can sort of
hypnotize you into accepting their beliefs and states of mind as well.
So if you are with a partner who seems to be moving toward a “blah” and mundane way of looking at
your interactions, beware of the influence. Don’t let him mesmerize you into accepting a less than
optimal perspective on what the two of you are doing together.
Instead, I want you to work so your state of mind comes to influence him automatically in the way you
want to influence him. You already know that being certain about something is a strong influencer, but
that’s just part of the equation. Let’s take a look at the Honeymoon State of Mind you want to build into
the nature of your interactions with your significant other.
Get Him in the Moment with a Positive Outlook
Let’s see if this scene sounds familiar to you.
It’s a crowded, high-end restaurant, and there’s a couple canoodling in the corner. Not doing anything
too risqué, mind you, but totally engrossed in one another. They’ve pulled their chairs together to make
it easier to snuggle close and even feed each other. Every few seconds they stop to share a lingering kiss,
and when one manages to briefly look away from the other to get a bite of his or her own food, the
other stares at them longingly, eyes full of love and joy.
You’re there with your boyfriend, sharing looks of amusement over their behavior while also secretly
being a little bit jealous. You turn to your boyfriend, who has just pulled out his smartphone to check a
text.
“Newlyweds?” you guess.

He opens his mouth to answer, but a loud crash interrupts the peace of the evening before he can. A
busser has dropped a crate of glasses next to the newlyweds, and they’re in a million pieces all over the
floor.
But what are they doing? Still feeding each other and giving loving looks. You can’t even tell if they
actually noticed the shattered glassware that’s practically at their feet.
Your boyfriend turns to you. “Uh, yeah. Definitely newlyweds.”
He chuckles and turns back to his phone, but as much as it’s funny, you can’t stop glancing back over at
the couple and thinking, “Why can’t I have that?”
Was the couple on their honeymoon? Maybe, maybe not. But they certainly were showing a typical
characteristic of people who have just gotten married: they were totally engrossed in their own little
world because they were full of the belief that what was happening to them right there and now was
more interesting than anything else going on.
In other words, part of the Honeymoon State of Mind is being present.
When we’re on our honeymoon, we bring our attention more fully to the experience of the present
moment, just like you would if you knew it was going to be the last kiss you shared before your partner
of 50 years passed away. Your attention is on the experience unfolding because you are filled with the
belief that this interaction is highly meaningful and highly significant.
So the question becomes how do you engender that feeling in your partner? How can you imbue your
interactions with importance and meaning?
The answer is simple, but not necessarily easy. You can help your partner adopt that mindset by talking
about the things you do together in a certain way. The trick is to convey the following perspective, “We
are on an adventure together. It’s an exclusive club of two people.”
This perspective causes the social nature of our human mind to zero in on the interaction that’s right in
front of us – between the two of you. It will cause him to be less distracted by other people, other
opportunities, or the feeling that he is missing out on the party that’s going on somewhere else.
This is, unfortunately, something that all of us do all the time, especially in the age of social media and
smartphones. Scholarly papers (and many, many web articles and comedy bits) have been written about
how people in the modern world are reluctant to make plans and commit to anything because they’re
terrified something better will come along and they’ll miss out on it.
Your job is to use the “adventure perspective” to figuratively slap this thought right out of his head. Of
course there’s nothing more interesting going on! You and he are the most exciting people in the
universe, and no one else is going to experience what the two of you experience together.
You convey this to him and incite the feeling of being present in him by doing a couple of things:

 Displaying your excitement both about what you want to do with him and about him in general.
 Highlighting what makes your idea unique, fun, or otherwise worth his time.
 Talking about how wonderful it will make you feel (another way to show him why it’s worth his
time and attention).
 Focusing on the benefits of whatever idea you’re “selling.”
If you do these things, you’ll be sure to draw his attention to you – and keep it there.
Give Each Other Permission to Splurge
On your honeymoon, it’s understood that you’re going to spend more money than you normally would.
In other words, you’re going to splurge. But this doesn’t only apply to money.
You’re going to take time off from things that are productive in order to just enjoy life. You will
deliberately make time to sleep in and then enjoy physical intimacy when your energy levels peak during
the day or night. You’re going to allow yourself to put your fears, worries, and responsibilities aside and
leave them there.
Splurging on purpose is one of the secrets to the Honeymoon State of Mind and achieving an Endless
Honeymoon. This is incredibly important, so let me say it again: allowing yourself and your partner to
“splurge” or “indulge” is key to having a relationship where both of you are actively working to achieve
each other’s happiness.
Now, naturally, this is not something that you can do all the time. People who splurge all the time
without worrying about consequences will end up getting fired from their jobs and owing tens of
thousands in credit debt. That does not make for a happy, positive relationship.
So what exactly do you do? How do you use indulgence to strengthen your partnership?
Do it in cycles. Research shows that people who take vacations have fewer heart attacks. It’s probably
because they’re always looking forward to the next vacation, which causes them to feel happy,
experience lower stress, and have reduced feelings of being trapped by a lifestyle that involves a lot of
work and possibly a significant amount of stress.
Want some examples of cycling through time to splurge beyond vacationing?
The gamer. Let’s say your guy loves video games. To get closer to him, you’ve adopted this love as your
own. But you don’t just want to spend hours every night playing video games with him because you’ll
never do anything else.
Instead, find an upcoming game you’re both excited about and hold off on playing any video game until
it comes out. That way, you can plan to immerse yourself in the experience together and turn off the
rest of the world for a time. He’ll see it as a gift for himself that is made even more rewarding because
he gets to share it with you.

Even better, you’ll get to enjoy the anticipation that comes with knowing this fun experience is right
around the corner awaiting the both of you. Plus, you won’t burn out on constant game-playing or lose
contact with the rest of your life.
The dessert lover. The downside of always getting dessert is pretty obvious. Our bodies aren’t meant to
ingest sweets all the time. But here’s what a lot of people miss. When you eat your favorite dessert
every day, it becomes gradually less enjoyable. It’s better to save it as a cyclical splurge so that you can
have peak experiences to look forward to.
So, instead of making dessert part of your regular eating plans, have your relationship take ownership
over it and plan special desserts together. This could mean giving each other permission to go out to the
restaurant that serves your favorite pie every two weeks, or it might mean making plans to bake
something special together. But otherwise avoid sweets.
The gadget aficionado. If your man enjoys being an early adopter of technology, this is another area
where you can encourage a splurge cycle.
Find the next big "toy" that's set to come on the market. There's always something in the works. Maybe
it's a brand new video game system or a new version of the iPhone. Whatever it is, avoid purchasing
other tech toys to save up for the big purchase, and also follow the rumors and excitement leading up to
the special item’s release. When it's time, take the day off of work to wait in those long, early morning
lines to ensure you get one right away so you can spend the day exploring its features together.
The idea here is that you are linking pleasurable things to your relationship. Planning these things with
you causes him to mentally link those experiences to you. That makes your relationship stronger.
The neat freak. In order to keep the household in order, you've both decided that every Tuesday night is
time for cleaning. When you get home from work, you each start on the scrubbing, dusting, and
washing, and you continue until the house looks pristine.
But one Tuesday night, you come home and say to your partner, "It’s been a tough week. How about we
hire a cleaning service to come tomorrow instead? Then we can do nothing tonight – just order in and
sit in front of the tube?" Normally, that may not be an exciting plan for a weeknight, but because you're
vegging on a day that’s typically dedicated to being productive, it will feel all the more satisfying to
“splurge” with your time.
Why this works
Are you seeing what’s happening here? The mental state, belief, and perspective you want to take on as
your own (and encourage in your partner) is that when it comes to the two of you, it’s okay to splurge.
It’s not just that you’re indulging in the things you like, but that you’re bringing them into the fold of
your relationship. He will sense this perspective and feel enticed by the possibilities it suggests for your
interactions together.

What’s even better is when you connect this idea with the deeper sense of meaning and purpose you
learned to tap into in Secret Obsession. It becomes possible to talk openly about your desire to have his
full and conscious participation in this exact mindset. In other words, it’s okay to talk about it out loud
with your partner so he sees the fun of taking on this perspective himself.
That’s true of all of the belief systems we will be covering in this section.
Transform Reality by Acknowledging the Power of Words
Consider the differences between the following two sentences:
“If you can get off work in time, we could meet for a picnic at the park near your office.”
“When you get off work, we should meet for a picnic at the park near your office.”
The only two differences you really need to pay attention to are “when” versus “if” and “could” versus
“should.” I’m going to repeat the sentences again with those words highlighted so that you can see them
in context:
“If you can get off work in time, we could meet for a picnic at the park near your office.”
“When you get off work, we should meet for a picnic at the park near your office.”
Generally speaking, both sentences communicate the same idea. But as far as the emotional impact
goes, they really don’t. How so?
The first version is more likely to appeal to his subconscious mind and elicit a positive response. Why?
Because the words “if you can,” speak of freedom and a potential option. Additionally, the first version
uses the word “could” in place of “should”, which speaks of a chance for obtaining something desirable.
The other sentence, in contrast, just tells him he should meet you at a park which sends the message
that he is expected to do it. The difference is a very subtle one, but the effect can be quite profound for
the person receiving your request. Rather than something fun he wants to do, it can end up feeling like
an obligation.
Obviously, this is not what you want in the slightest, because the second you become an obligation is
the second he starts to drift away.
The reasons words have their power is because of the way they directly speak to our subconscious
evaluations of the world and even to our present experience. In short, they affect the mental frame
through which we perceive the world around us.
So how do you use the power of words in your favor?
Don’t worry about memorizing specific word orders. All you have to do is get yourself into the right state
of mind, and your words will naturally and automatically line themselves up to say things that sound like
opportunities rather than demands.

Here are some possible ways to create opportunities with the language you use:
 “We might even be able to go on vacation this year if we start saving up now!”
 “Going out to dinner tonight could be a lot of fun if we have the time.”
 “If we joined the gym, we could work out together – and maybe not worry so much about
skipping dessert!”
These are just a few examples. Remember, the key is to imply freedom and options, even when you’re
really suggesting something specific.
Just be careful not to suggest blame. Notice that I said “if we start saving up now” rather than “if you
start saving up now.” If your man thinks you’re blaming him for not doing something you want, it’s likely
to raise his defenses – and his hackles.
Convince Yourselves You’re Starting a New Journey
During an actual honeymoon, there’s a belief system that the sky is the limit for the two of you and any
level of bliss is within reach. It’s the idea that anything is possible.
Where does this feeling come from? It’s due to a mental frame that says, “This is just the beginning.”
You’re in the “first chapter” of your life together, and there are countless chapters still waiting to be
written. These chapters could include all kinds of adventures that cause life to feel exciting and
meaningful, and they are all ahead of you – something to look forward to.
You may not expect everything to be perfect in the chapters to come, but the sensation that you are at
the beginning of a new story gives the honeymoon phase of a relationship much of its special character.
This is something that you can recreate throughout your relationship whenever you try something new
together. The “journeys” that you embark upon can be large or small.
On the large side, maybe you both decide to quit your steady jobs and start a new business together.
There are so many things that could happen, and so many ways that your life could be better. Fears
come with something like this, too, but often the positive aspect of the feeling that ‘anything is possible’
will outweigh this.
Of course, I’m not necessarily talking about doing something that drastic. There are many, many smaller
ways to accomplish the same goal of “starting a new adventure” together:
 Learn a new language in anticipation of your trip to a foreign country.

 Decide to write a book together or create a blog together about a mutual hobby.
 Go on a spur-of-the-moment day trip – with no hotel reservations or advanced planning.
 Agree to change your diet (short or long-term).

 Make a list of the best restaurants in the city and go to one each month.
 Take a class on painting, dancing, or whatever you’re interested in.
 Start on a goal to ride your bikes for 100 miles this year.
 Read through a top 100 books list together.
 Join a club together.
The only prerequisite is that the idea feels like you’re at the beginning of something new and exciting –
with lots of things to look forward to.
Find Things to Celebrate
An actual honeymoon is a celebration. It’s a celebration of your new commitment and union. An
important part of maintaining the Endless Honeymoon experience is celebrating frequently and
deliberately. And also literally.
What do I mean by that? Well, making celebration a part of your relationship is more than just a mental
frame that causes you to appreciate what you have. It also literally pushes you into a sort of planning
mode where you carve out time in your schedule to celebrate as a couple.
Build it into your calendar once per month to sit down together and think of something (anything at all)
worth celebrating. Then plan something enjoyable to do together to celebrate it.
It can be the tiniest celebration lasting only 30 minutes if you want. It doesn’t need to be big or
extravagant. The key is the mindset and the fact that you actually sit down to plan and then go through
with it.
In particular, seek to combine celebration with the idea of embarking on a new adventure. This doesn’t
mean that you necessarily need to sign up for a class as suggested above and throw a party for the
occasion, but rather that you should celebrate new beginnings rather than just endings. In this way,
you’ll be celebrating what’s to come and focusing on things that you’re looking forward to with your
partner.
For example, your one year anniversary should be a celebration of the endless possibilities of the year to
come instead of a celebration of having made it through another year together. It may seem like a
subtle difference in the way you frame it, but the effect can be extraordinary on the psyche.
Celebrations can also be effective if you pair them with mental state changes in your relationship, such
as deciding to compliment each other every day, try new things, or actively pursue goals that are
important to you.
Having trouble coming up with “unique” ideas? Forget them!
While personal celebrations are better, any kind of celebration together is valuable. Take a look at a
calendar or Google “holidays this month”, and I can almost guarantee you that you’ll learn there’s some

kind of holiday going on somewhere. It can even be fun to try to celebrate things that seem silly, such as
Bad Poetry Day or Felt Hat Day.
Embrace the Idea of Not Accomplishing Anything
The compound effect of trying to improve your life by just 1% every day leads to dramatic changes in
how you approach the world. Over time, your efforts at improving just a little bit will lead to things you
never would have believed possible when you first started.
But a relationship is different.
In a relationship, constantly striving for improvement can actually be damaging. It not only speaks to the
idea of trying to change or “fix” each other, it’s just downright stressful. We need downtime. We need
relaxation. We need permission to get nothing done sometimes.
If you can be the person who offers this to your partner – at least at times – he will love you for it.
Have you ever wondered why couples don’t seem to get into fights on their honeymoon? One of the
biggest reasons is both people tend to subconsciously share the belief system that, “We don’t have to
accomplish anything right now. We’re just here to relax.”
That’s a fairly empowering belief in a relationship. It sounds strange to say giving up on positive change
is empowering, but it is. Let me explain why.
When a person feels fully accepted, they relax into a special kind of rhythm that allows intimacy to
develop on a much deeper level than would be possible if they felt there was a risk of being judged,
criticized, or found wanting in some way. This special rhythm of relaxation and deeper intimacy actually
solves most of the problems that would otherwise come up.
Will you have some problems that need to be addressed deliberately? Yes. Will there be times when you
must address something and demand accountability for change? Yes. But 1% improvement each day is
not a model that will work in your relationship.
Instead, try to spend 99% of the time in a mindset that says, “We don’t have to accomplish anything
right now” in terms of working on the relationship. This is especially important if you have been feeling
frustrated or stuck in your relationship.
Try it out for a few days. You might be surprised how wonderful it can feel and how it can actually cause
many problems to start solving themselves.
Recreating Honeymoon Bliss in Soundbite Form
Secret Obsession taught you that getting your man consciously engaged in doing things to make both of
you happier in your relationship is no easy task. Recreating a Honeymoon State of Mind, however, is a
way to get him on board while making life more pleasant for both of you.

In this chapter, I touched on six ways that you can do just that.
Getting Him in the Moment. You need to use everything at your disposal to remove distractions and get
him focused on you and what’s happening right now, right in front of him.
Setting Splurge Cycles. Let him know that your relationship is one place where it is okay to splurge and
find ways to create cycles of splurging, where you refrain for a while and then allow yourself to indulge.
Using Words that Suggest Choice. How you phrase your requests (and demands) will go a long way
towards determining how he takes them. You want to make him think that you’re giving him choice and
options rather than telling him what to do or what you expect.
Starting a New Journey. When we embark on something new, we’re excited about possibilities –
recreate this feeling in your relationship by finding journeys big and small to take together.
Finding Things to Celebrate. Celebrating with your significant other puts you in a positive frame of mind
that accentuates the good and minimizes the bad. The more you celebrate in general, the more you’ll be
inclined to celebrate each other.
Giving Permission to Accomplish Nothing. We’re all expected to accomplish more and be better all the
time. If you can remove those expectations from your relationship (at least in the vast majority of
instances), your man will feel more accepted by you, and a deeper intimacy will develop.

Section IV: Merging Honeymoon Mentality with Reality
There’s nothing that sets you up for romantic disappointment as much as Valentine’s Day. Seriously
– it does!
Valentine’s Day is supposed to represent the pinnacle of romantic experience, but unless everything
goes perfectly and the date ends up being a new, magical, exciting experience, it will fail to live up to
those expectations.
In other words… it will fail to live up to those expectations.
Why? Because reality isn’t perfect. You end up facing crowded restaurants with long waits to be
seated. This extra (wasted) time causes you to miss your movie, which ends up being lousy anyway
– a romantic comedy hastily thrown together by greedy studios hoping to capitalize on Valentine’s
moviegoers desperate for something fun to do together.
In contrast, on a regular Friday night, that same date might have been quite enjoyable. The crowded
restaurant would have given us a feeling of being “where the action’s at,” or “hip and young.” (If you
don’t understand that feeling, you will when you’re no longer hip and young!) And we would have
appreciated what was good in the movie instead of expecting it to meet the highest possible
standard for a romantic comedy.
Heading home, my date and I would have talked about the funny parts of the movie that caught us
off-guard and struck our funny-bones. We would say something like, “That was fun. We should do
this again sometime,” as we part ways.
But on Valentine’s Day, the evening ends with a slight feeling of discontent, as if we have been
robbed of what we were due. It’s anticlimactic and frustrating.
It Wasn’t Supposed to Be This Way
There are a few other similar days that can also set us up to feel sorry for ourselves: New Year’s
Day, Christmas, and even events like marriage proposals and the wedding day itself.
Just like on Valentine’s Day, it’s because of the expectations we unconsciously hold about the event.
It’s not that we are entitled or think we deserve everyone’s constant attention, but if the slightest
thing goes wrong during our day, we feel as if life is somehow punishing us.
Speaking of “our day,” have you ever gotten a traffic ticket on your birthday? How did it feel? I
mean, it never feels good to get a traffic ticket, but I’m willing to bet that your “birthday traffic
ticket” felt about three times as bad.
It’s not limited to “special days,” either. A negative review at work feels like a personal attack rather
than constructive feedback. And when a romantic partner reminds us to put our dirty dishes in the
dishwasher or park on the other side of the driveway, it feels like they decided their goal for the day
was to make us as miserable as humanly possible!

Why? Again, it’s all expectations. We expect big days to be magical. We expect to be praised when
we work hard at our job. We expect our partner to be nice to us and point out how amazing we are,
not the other way around.
But when we raise our expectations to such a high point, they can’t possibly be met.
I’m sure you’ve experienced this before in some way or another. You hear about something and get
excited, and as time passes, your excitement only increases. You’re looking forward to the
experience so much… and then it happens and it’s kind of, you know, meh.
Going back to movies for a second, this is something I frequently encounter when it comes to film
recommendations.
I really enjoy getting lost in a good movie at the theater, so I often ask my friends to tell me what
they’ve seen and loved recently. And I’ve noticed a pattern. The more someone convinces me that
I’m going to absolutely love a given movie, the less likely I am to be blown away by it. In contrast,
the lower my expectations for a movie, the more likely it is I will walk out of the theater feeling like
I got my money’s worth.
Why does this happen? Because of the power of expectations. My expectation creates an anchor, or
a set point, by which I judge the actual experience. In this way, an interesting movie that involved
thousands of hours of work and all kinds of creative genius can end up feeling like a disappointment
because I went into it expecting to be utterly transported and it failed to do this.
Having this experience is never fun, but it’s truly awful when it comes in response to something
your man does for you in your relationship. You feel let down not just by the experience, but by him.
And he ends up feeling both like a failure (“How could I have messed that up?”) and maybe even a
little bit frustrated at you for being so darn picky.
What’s the lesson? That there’s nothing so poisonous for romance as high expectations.
We Expect Too Much
This is a vitally important concept to convey to your partner.
Much of the power of the method I’m teaching you comes from expectations of experiencing
happiness and having exciting adventures in the future. So it’s easy to get caught up in that and
expect every experience to be a new peak-life experience, something that sets a new “high score”
for fun or romantic bliss.
That’s not how it works.
What should happen is that, over time, the average of your interactions as a couple will build
toward greater happiness and greater feelings of intimacy and purpose, something you can’t find
with the same intensity outside your shared relationship. But that progress will not be represented
by a straight line going only in the upward direction. Rather, it will be a trend you experience across
weeks or months – but not necessarily from one romantic activity to the next.

So what should you do? Start expecting the worst so you can be pleasantly surprised when things
aren’t horrible?
No. If you do that, people might start confusing you with Winnie-the-Pooh’s friend Eeyore. It’s not
necessary to walk around on sunny days telling people it’s probably not going to last or decide not
to put yourself up for a promotion because, “What’s the point?”
To overcome the negative impact of having lofty expectations, you simply need to become aware of
them. When you are able to do this, you can consciously choose a better anchor or mental set point
by which to judge the experience.
In other words, if you catch yourself starting to expect something amazing, take a deep breath, pull
back, and set a more realistic mental anchor for yourself.
How exactly do you do this?
The Key to Choosing a Good “Mental Anchor”
Our mind naturally judges the quality of experiences based on the easiest points of comparison.
Very often, that’s your most recent experience of a similar nature. Unfortunately, we also have a
tendency to judge the direction of our relationship based on whether our current experience is
better or worse than the last one.
For example, when you went out to a new Mexican cantina last night, how did it compare to the
fancy Indian place you tried the week before? If it wasn’t as exciting, does this mean your
relationship bliss is on the wane?
Not even a little bit. All kinds of things could have happened to influence your opinion, which have
nothing to do with your relationship. Maybe the cantina had a new waiter who screwed up your
order. Or you spent a half hour trying to find a parking space because the place was so busy. Of
course you’re not going to end up feeling as good about that night as you did when you went to the
Indian place where musicians serenading you while you ate.
The problem, as you can probably see, is your point of comparison. Instead of letting your mind
subconsciously choose this point, your job is to decide on it for yourself. You do this by talking
about and planning your next activity in comparison to other things you could be doing or
experiencing during that same time frame.
That’s an important point, so let’s explore it a bit. If I asked my girlfriend if she would like to pack a
picnic lunch and take a bike ride to a scenic lookout point, I should make sure our comparison
points, or set points, are realistic. I wouldn’t want them to be based on our last adventure, which
involved taking a hot air balloon ride as the sun rose on a beautiful Saturday morning. Is this little
picnic going to beat that experience? Not so much.
Here’s how that would go:
ME: Hey, remember that hot air balloon ride we took last week?

HER: Are you kidding? That was amazing!
ME: Well, I’ve got another idea.
HER: Tell me, tell me, tell me!
ME: Let’s take a bike ride and have a picnic!
HER: (long pause) Sure… that sounds okay, I guess.
Obviously I’m using exaggeration, but hopefully, you see what I mean.
So how can I prevent both of us from subconsciously thinking about this experience and using it to
judge the current one? By commenting on the various things we could otherwise spend our time on.
Things like doing chores, spending the day apart, or cleaning out the garage.
I mean this pretty literally, too. When discussing my idea, I would say something like this:
ME: You know how we were going to clean out the garage today?
HER: Yeah. Every time I go in there I cringe. It’s so messy.
ME: I know. It really needs to be done… but the day’s so nice, I was thinking it might be
more fun to bike to a scenic lookout point and have a picnic. What do you think?
HER: Done. That’s sounds perfect! What should we pack to eat?
See how that works? When the idea of scrapping all those exhausting chores in favor of a picnic
lunch and some exercise comes up, the contrast feels like an exciting escape. And when we are
enjoying our peanut butter sandwiches from the lookout point, we’ll say things like, “I’m so glad
we’re out here instead of inhaling the dust as we sweep out the garage.”
Much of what we experience in this life is determined by perspective. The most important
perspectives you should be mindful of are the ones by which you judge whether an experience is
good or bad. By more consistently using an anchor that represents a neutral experience to reset
your expectations, you allow your mind to experience the full potential of happiness available in
your present interaction.
Life Is Simpler When We Focus on What Is Essential
The truth is, you won’t always have time to pursue everything that makes one or both of you happy.
And if you ever find yourself getting stressed because you’ve taken on too much, you’re doing
something wrong. You need to back off and focus on just the few things that are truly essential.
You’ve probably heard of the principle that says, in most areas of life and business, we can achieve
80% of the desired results by focusing on just 20% of the things we spend our time and energy on.
You may be less familiar with a new movement that I believe will increasingly sweep the globe as
stress and feelings of being overwhelmed become more and more common. What’s the movement?
Essentialism.
To understand essentialism, you need to remember there was a time when we needed to overcome
the mundane routines of daily life by seeking out stimulation, change, or novelty. Those times are
long gone. Now it’s all we can do to keep stimulation at bay.

Think about how people have to make themselves put down their smartphones to hold actual
conversations with humans who are right in front of them. Or the filters we have to use on our web
browsers to limit the ads we see. Or, simply, junk mail from your mailbox you have to look through
to make sure none of it legitimately requires your attention.
What it boils down to is this: stimulation has turned into clutter, and many of us are tired of it.
Essentialism is a mental tool to reduce clutter in our lives and allow ourselves to focus only on the
things that actually matter.
For our purposes, that means learning the all-important skill of focusing your time and energy only
on those things essential to the application of Endless Honeymoon principles.
In other words, what makes you and your guy happy and gives you more relationship satisfaction?
Focus on those things and try to do them as much as possible, while removing other things from
your routine.
Some relationships, for example, may thrive on physical activity – hikes, sports, dancing, cuddling,
sex, and so on. Embrace this and understand that you’re probably not going to get the same kind of
positive interaction out of going to the movies together or playing a game of Scrabble. Other
couples, however, may have the opposite experience because they’re just built differently.
Generally speaking, though, the kinds of things that are going to best produce an Endless
Honeymoon experience are those that allow you to focus on each other directly and connect on an
intimate level.
It’s okay to start with lofty goals and lots of trial and error as you seek the best ways to embrace
these concepts in your relationship. But to be sustainable, you’ll need to gradually sort out what’s
essential and what’s not when it comes to getting the biggest bang for your buck.
Naturally, though, there will be things that aren’t “essential” to creating an Endless Honeymoon but
still need to be done, even after you’ve “decluttered.” It’s up to you to determine what these things
are though, and it comes down to a single question…
Are You Willing to Pay the Price?
People who are trying to get wealthy, win triathalons, involve themselves in the community, spend
time meditating, be the best parent, run for mayor, and generally be perceived as a “success”
sometimes achieve that success. It’s true and pretty impressive.
But here’s their terrible secret: many of them are miserable. Why? Because they feel the constant
strain and pressure of stretching their time in too many directions. They are unable to slow down
and smell the roses. Any success achieved flies by so quickly they have no time to slow down and
appreciate what they have accomplished.
Don’t be like that.

And don’t think you can cheat time either. There are lots of ways you can improve your time
management, including “life hacks” that will reduce the amount of time you spend on mundane
tasks, such as exercising, paying your bills, and doing your chores.
Ultimately, though, you will not be able to “have it all.” Trying to accomplish everything, do
everything, and be everything will lead to nothing but stress and misery. Instead, I encourage you to
focus on what genuinely matters to you.
How do you do that? Consciously evaluate your priorities and ask yourself if you are willing to pay
the price.
There have been studies where people were asked to do just that, and invariably something
interesting happens. The mere process of getting clear about true life priorities caused these people
to cut back on the number of things they were trying to accomplish. They reduced their drive for
status, power, and the attempt to “have it all.”
And in the process, they reported greater enjoyment of life and more time for relaxing and doing
things they found enjoyable. The secret is simple: they looked close at the way they were spending
their time and didn’t like what they saw, so they cut back.
I want to encourage you to consider carefully where the quality of your relationships stands on
your hierarchy of important life focuses.
I once heard speaker and author Brian Tracy say that he believes relationships account for 85% of
all the success we will achieve in this life. Now I have no idea if the number that Mr. Tracy came up
with is based on some kind of study or if he simply made it up on the spot, but I don’t think it
matters. His intent, I believe, was simply to remind business-minded CEOs and entrepreneurs in his
audience not to pursue financial success at the expense of success in family, friendships, and those
personal aspects of what makes life meaningful.
That’s the aspect of his wisdom I want to echo.
In my own personal life, I experienced a turning point after listening to a life coach talk about
something that irritated me when I first heard it. He said, “The people who get what they want in
this life are the people who figure out what success is going to cost and then become fully willing to
pay that price.”
I didn’t like it because it ran against my desire to believe I could “have it all.” I wanted a life hack
that would allow me to cheat and experience success without paying the price for achieving it.
Admittedly, I have experienced some success as a result of finding shortcuts. I’m sure you have, too,
and those tricks are valuable. But most of my success has come from my gradual, grudging
realization that he was right. Becoming willing to “pay the price” really is the biggest secret to
success.
Imagine you set out on the goal to lose weight. You want to succeed, but you also want to minimize
the discomfort you know you will face in this process. So you search for all kinds of crazy diet ideas
that promise to make it “effortless and easy.”

In so doing, you fail to focus on the elements of weight loss that are well-known, scientifically
proven, and certain to work if you just become willing to pay the price. Typically, that price is
discomfort that you must endure over a sustained period of time.
Now imagine what would happen if you start your weight loss journey by first becoming fully
willing to pay the price. In other words, you resolve any hesitation about doing what it takes
because you decide it is absolutely worth it.
You decide your quality of life and happiness will increase if you are willing to endure sustained
discomfort for a period of several months, because it will help you to achieve the physique and
health status you desire. Under these conditions, you have psychologically primed yourself for
success.
What’s the price you have to pay to make romance come alive – and stay alive on a perpetual basis –
in your relationship?
It’s going to be different for every person, but I want you to be aware of this concept. That way, you
can consciously evaluate what you might have to give up in order to have the time necessary to feed
the areas of your life that are most essential to your happiness and sense of purpose.
Use Energy Management, Not Time Management
Ideally, you want your relationship encounters to occur during times when you are physiologically
capable of entering a state of high energy. Why? Because when you are in this state, you can really
enjoy each other.
The reality is whatever gets our best energy in this life will thrive. And whatever gets the leftovers
of our energy will gradually wilt over time. Don’t let your relationship wilt; manage your energy.
What’s energy management? It’s a paradigm shift away from time management. It asks people to
stop thinking about the number of minutes or hours spent in each other’s presence. Instead, you
need to start thinking about the quality of your interactions.
This means spending time together when you have the energy and focus to do so – something that’s
far more important.
Think about it this way. Would you rather experience five minutes of blissful happiness during a
make-out session with the soldier you get to see for only 12 romantic minutes before he gets on his
next flight? Or would you rather spend 12 exhausting hours with each other during an all-night
layover in an airport where all the coffee shops are closed for the night and neither of you has a
blanket or pillow to get even as much as a nap on the hard seats of the airport lounge?
In the first scenario, both of you are going to be intently focused on each other and well aware of
how much the moment matters. In the second scenario, you’re more likely to be focused on how
tired and sore you are – or how grumpy your partner is acting.

At the heart of this point is the simple fact that time matters less than your state of mind. But it’s
also important to remember the concept of essentialism. Even if your calendar isn’t overflowing
with commitments, your interactions with your partner won’t be improved if those few activities
you do engage in leave you utterly drained.
What you need is a cheat sheet for enhancing your physical and mental energy. As luck would have
it, I happen to have one!
Rely on habits, not willpower. Willpower will ultimately fail you. It’s a finite resource that can
literally be used up and worn down according to the latest neuroscientific research on the matter.
Instead, use the power of habits. Habits cause you to do the right thing automatically and typically
work without any conscious thought or planning. The right kinds of habits can prevent the many
demands of life from crowding out your intentions to create an Endless Honeymoon.
Oscillate. Energy naturally comes through your mind and body in an ebb and flow pattern. When
you honor this, and listen to your body, you will rest when you feel tired rather than trying to push
on as if you’re in a marathon.
You will also push yourself to reach new peaks of energy expenditure at the opposite end of this
continuum. When you know you’ll return to a rest state later, your mind and body release the
energy you need to stretch beyond your typical comfort zone. This gradually expands your capacity
for energy expenditure.
By oscillating back-and-forth between peak energy expenditure and deep relaxation, you train your
mind and body to rejuvenate completely. You also train your mind and body to be less stressed by
high-output energy activities. It's a true win-win scenario.
Stamp out jealousy. Much of the happiness you and your partner will help each other pursue will
come from activities you do not do together as a couple. For example, you may recognize that
camping in the woods is one of his favorite things, but also realize the thing he likes most about it is
the opportunity to roam alone. Sending him off into the woods should still be a part of the planning
process you work on together as a couple. That’s true even though the activity itself is solitary.
But here’s something you have to know: you can’t get jealous when you send him off to have fun by
himself. That is a critical aspect of making this plan work. You can’t afford to get jealous, because it
will hamper your desire to help him pursue the highest levels of happiness. Moreover, it will make
both of you waste energy while he’s gone, so when he returns, you’re unable to focus on the joy of
being back together and the happiness you’ve brought him.
However, if you can stamp out your jealous feelings, he will repeatedly return to you with a strong
desire to make you the center of his world. Plus, you can use the time he’s away to mentally (and
physically) rest and recharge so you’re prepared to give him all of yourself when you see him again.
Making it a goal to achieve peak energy will take your relationship toward some interesting places.
But even if your partner does not actively join with you on a particular venture, your life together
will be significantly enhanced.

Why? Because your mental energy largely comes from a mind and body operating in peak
condition. And that peak condition naturally yields higher levels of happiness.
A Final Word about Expectations and Essentialism
In order to truly merge your Endless Honeymoon mentality with reality, you need to take a good
long look at yourself, the way you see the world, and the way you live your life. I dug deeply into
those issues in this section by covering Expectations and Essentialism.
Hopefully, you learned that…
…you need to temper your expectations. When expectations are too high, it tends to lead to
disappointment. This is especially damaging in romantic relationships where we can blame a
negative experience on our partner or on the relationship’s (imagined) deterioration.
The way to combat this is by resetting our comparison points to something neutral so every
interaction will be given the best possible chance to succeed.
…you can’t do everything. We all have a million things we want to do with our lives, but if you try
to do all of them, you’ll have trouble succeeding at any of them. And even if you do, you’ll likely be
under so much stress that you can’t really enjoy them.
Instead, really think about what’s important in your life and work on “decluttering” so you can
focus on just those things that matter most. Time management, and especially energy management,
can help.

Section V: Shortcut Tips and Tricks to Achieve an Endless Honeymoon
Starting to worry that obtaining your own Endless Honeymoon is going to be a lot of work? Afraid that
you just won’t be able to pull it off? Just not sure what to do or where to begin?
Take a deep breath… and now let it out. Feeling better?
What you’re trying to achieve can start today, but the full potential of the Endless Honeymoon methods
won’t be realized overnight. Achieving the kind of joy you learned about in Secret Obsession takes
dedication and commitment. But think about what you’re committing yourself to – the perpetual
happiness of you and your partner!
And now that I’ve had my soapbox moment, I’m going to try to make things a bit easier for you. This
section is completely devoted to teaching you specific ideas, tips, and tricks that can foster an
environment that makes your Endless Honeymoon easier to obtain.
Ready to learn them? Let’s begin.
The Three Beliefs
You’ve heard of the placebo effect, right?
That’s where medical patients in a study are divided into two groups, unbeknownst to them. One group
gets the actual medication being studied. The other group gets a sugar pill – basically nothing at all. It’s
called a placebo.
Now, most often what happens is that the group given the “real” medication will show some kind of
change, which will be compared to the placebo group to see how much difference the drug makes. But
surprisingly, the placebo group almost always shows a positive change as well. Why is that? It’s because
of the power of belief.
I'm about to share three ideas with you that become powerful when you act as if they are true. In other
words, these are three beliefs that bring a rapid and profound change when you adopt them as your
own. As you'll see in a moment, the beliefs I'm going to share with you are not 100% true in the strictest
sense. But adopting these beliefs as if they really are 100% true does something remarkable. Try them
out for yourself to see what happens when you act as if they are 100% true.
If you believe in them, they will become powerful self-fulfilling prophecies that help you and your man
to persevere in your attempts to consciously create an Endless Honeymoon. Adopt them as your own,
and you will be amazed at the results.
Luckily, each of these beliefs has at least a grain of truth behind its powerful effect, making it easier for
you to adopt.
1. There is no such thing as failure.

I’m sure you’ve heard this before, and I wouldn’t be surprised if you dismissed it. But here’s what you
need to know: when you pretend like this is true, remarkable things happen.
You become far less vulnerable to the ups and downs of life when trying to accomplish something
worthwhile. If you face hardship, you reject the idea that you have failed and instead embrace the
experience as feedback you can learn from.
Everything other people would consider “failure” becomes labeled in your mind as a new advantage in
the form of insights about what doesn’t work. This way, you can focus more on methods that do work.
When you use this belief system in the context of trying to apply the lessons in this course, you will
become immune to the danger of giving up if you encounter resistance from your partner. Instead, you
will look at everything that happens as interesting feedback you can use to your advantage. And you will
feel less frustrated and become less likely to get pulled into a pessimistic belief system that would weigh
on your mood and relationship.
In practice, this means being okay when you try to wow your man with your ideas for investing in each
other’s happines and he’s apathetic, or when his attempt to do something nice for you leaves a lot to be
desired.
You thought he would get a kick out of getting a jersey from his favorite professional sports player, but
maybe he’s just not interested in displaying his fandom that way. Next time, ask him for more
information… or simply file away his reaction and try again with something else.
And don’t get depressed or angry because you were hinting about a romantic evening out on the town,
and he instead made dinner and got your favorite movie for a night in. Obviously something got lost in
the translation, so next time you’ll have to figure out a way to be clearer.
2. The meaning of your communication is the response that you get.
This belief is used by some of the masters of rapid change, including hypnotherapists, counselors, and
NLP (neuro-linguistic programming) practitioners. In essence what it means is that you adopt the belief
that the impact your communication has on someone is what you actually communicated.
This prevents us from getting caught up in arguments about who said what and if you meant what you
said. It causes us to rapidly adjust to the feedback we perceive from the people we are trying to
communicate with.
Here’s an example to show you what this means. I realize it’s a somewhat counterintuitive concept, but
you’ll understand once you see the implication.
If my partner comes up to me and tells me she has a job interview and she is very nervous, and I tell her
to “relax,” it’s because I expect she will be pleased with me for reminding her to relax since she probably
didn’t realize the extent to which she was getting herself all riled up, which really won’t help.

But in reality, the effect on her emotion is just the opposite of what I intended. She gets a look of mild
irritation on her face and scolds me for telling her to relax when she has a legitimate reason to feel
nervous. She tells me I’m focused on trying to fix her rather than just accepting that she needs to vent
about the emotional impact of her current life circumstances.
Here’s the point: what I attempted to communicate doesn’t matter. What matters is the effect my
communication brought about in the person I communicated to. Now I know that when I try that kind of
communication, I make her mad. So I update my internal mental model to account for this discrepancy.
As a result, my next effort at communicating something comforting sounds very different: “I can
understand why you’re nervous. I would be, too.”
When I decide to believe the meaning of my communication is the effect it has, it prevents me from
getting into an argument with my partner. Instead of telling her she had no right to scold me because I
was “just trying to help,” I update my perception in a way that makes me more effective the next time I
attempt to communicate.
Adopting this belief will save you from a lot of heartache and frustration. If you can get your partner to
understand this concept as well, you’ll have twice the benefits.
3. Every behavior is motivated by a positive intention.
The purpose behind this belief is simple. It forces us to look for positive intentions when we are feeling
frustrated by someone else. It prevents us from jumping to conclusions, and it keeps us searching for
the underlying need that motivates the other person’s actions. And that search is extremely important.
Let me show you why.
When you keep searching like this, you eventually discover the motivation for the behavior, which is
driven by a need for something. Even terrible things people do, like stealing or punishing a child too
harshly, can be linked back to some kind of need.
It may be a need for control that causes a parent to react with excessive force. That doesn’t make the
behavior right, but that’s not what this belief is about. The term “positive intention” does not mean the
behavior was positive, but rather that the motivation comes from the drive to go towards something.
And if you can figure out what the other person is going toward, it gives you the power to interact with
them in a way that will bring about cooperation.
If your partner does not initially respond to your attempts to gain cooperation for an opportunity or
idea, do not immediately assume they are trying to thwart you. Instead, adopt the belief that there is a
positive intention behind the resistance.
With that belief, you will become curious about what it is. That curiosity will drive you toward
productive communication that reveals the needs or perspectives that cause a person to feel they need
to take a different direction than the one you were suggesting. And by understanding these underling

motivations, you may be able to address their concerns, or you may learn how to better frame your next
idea.
Shared Goals and Experiences Give Purpose to Your Relationship
Both in this book and in Secret Obsession, I’ve written extensively about the need to connect
yourself to your man’s purpose by finding ways to let him be your hero. Doing this is absolutely
vital. But there’s something else you can do, too: share your purpose.
Make your goals his goals, and do your best to experience as many things as you can together. Now
this doesn’t mean that you need to become a doctor because he’s a doctor, or that you can’t hang
out separately with your family members or friends. Allowing each other to have individual lives is
just as important as sharing.
But what it does mean is that you should actively seek out ways to engage in activities together and
find goals that you both want to achieve. Why? Because the more you share in this way, the more
closely intertwined your lives will become, and the more you’ll matter to each other.
When you break it down to its essence, it’s about finding as many ways as possible to connect. To
that end, I’ve created a list of tips and tricks that can help you do this.
Be a good “opportunity finder.”
I’m challenging you to take on the identity of a finder. I’m talking become someone who’s good at
finding opportunities.
What kind of opportunities? Opportunities to affirm and celebrate the relationship you share using
the various strategies in this guide. Maybe that means reminiscing about a happy or amusing time
you spent together. Perhaps it’s going out together to a restaurant you discovered as a couple and
both love. Or it could be using gamification to get your guy excited about coming up with a better
gift for you than you can find for him.
Always keep your mind open to new opportunities and embrace the ones you find!
Make down time another point of connection.
Instead of just flipping channels, decide on a TV series you never got around to watching and rent
the whole season. Watch it in bits together in the evenings when you’re tired and just need to relax.
This creates a shared world of exploration as you discuss the unfolding drama of the TV show and
sort of “live it” together. You’ll appreciate having more points of reference when talking, because it
takes away the heavy lifting of having to think of things to say all the time.
As a nice little bonus, this is something that practically anyone can do, because it costs very little
and takes almost no energy.

Get all touchy-feely.
Honeymoon-style touching is about more than sex.
If you want people to respond more warmly to you in general, pay attention to the way charismatic
people use their hands while communicating. It’s not just gestures I’m talking about either. It’s the
frequency with which their hands rest on someone’s shoulder or hold someone’s hand longer
during a handshake. Other common forms of touch charismatic people tend to engage in include
brief hugs and even putting their arm around someone’s shoulder when greeting them.
Consider the ways touch influences your daily interactions with your partner. Do you hold hands?
Brush against each other? Kiss? Rest your hand on his thigh when sitting together? Nuzzle up
against each other? Offer each other a massage?
Part of the reason we feel close to another person is related to their physical proximity.
Team up.
Competing together as a team can do wonders for making you feel close. Maybe you help each other
organize a game night with his friends, your friends, or (better yet) both. Or you decide to enter a
local dancing competition. Or play a team sport together. You could even enter a local chili cook-off
together.
All that matters is that you work as a team toward an identifiable, short-term goal that will be fun.
Outfit each other.
For those of you who are already in a fairly stable relationship, it can be fun to hand a portion of
your clothing budget over to your partner. They will be in charge of dressing you in the way they
find most appealing.
It’s a fun activity that can be done in a single Sunday afternoon or across a multiple-day trip
through a major city that has fashions unavailable in your local area. As you might imagine, a lot of
the fun associated with this kind of activity is in the adventure and discovery of it. You might find
yourself embarrassed at some of your partner’s selections for you, but you’ll also learn about his
tastes in the process.
Be restaurant critics.
Restaurant critics travel around to the best restaurants to sample the food. Why can’t you?
The idea here is simple. Make it your shared mission to try every restaurant within a 15 mile radius
of your home at least once. Take a notebook with you to rate the restaurant on five different
dimensions or share your thoughts through a joint Yelp account. It’s a fun way to explore your area
and try new things together.

I learned this method from a couple who were dating while attending graduate school in a small
town they didn’t like. They felt they were being too negative about the area, and decided to find the
best the town had to offer instead of just criticizing it all the time.
Interestingly, this also serves as a valuable way to look at your partner and your relationship as
well. Instead of criticizing everything you don’t like, seek out the good and embrace it. Over time,
this attitude should lead to more and more “good” in your relationship. Not surprisingly, the couple
I got this idea from is married now.
Start a business together.
Don’t go out and quit your 9-to-5 based on this advice, but do open yourself up to the idea of starting a
side business or weekend gig that you can work on with your partner. A good place to start looking for
ideas is your (or his) hobbies. Also, consider ways that your unique skillsets can complement one
another. Let me share one true story on how this can work.
A stay-at-home mom found that she suddenly had more free time now that both of her children were in
school full-time. She didn’t want to stop being there for her kids when they came home from school
every day, but she did want to use her newfound freedom to do something productive and earn some
money for the family.
When she discussed this with her husband, a full-time engineering manager, he suggested that she look
to her cooking, which was renowned in not just the family but also the community. What about starting
a catering company that handles events on the weekends? As a numbers guy, he offered to help
manage the backend, everything from setting up the LLC to creating budgets and setting pricing.
What started as a side business took off over time! Eventually, the husband did leave his full-time job to
support the endeavor, and the whole family got involved when it came time to put together a big event.
The kids helped chop up veggies and put together decorations. The husband, who wasn’t much of a
cook, served as bartender during some events, bantering with the guests.
The business didn’t just bring the couple together – it got the whole family closer! The catering company
was something they all built together, contributing to their feelings of togetherness.
Of course, you and your man may love your current jobs, so this doesn’t have to be your ultimate goal.
But it can be very rewarding to create a successful business endeavor together, even if it’s only covering
the cost of your time and supplies.
If you make crafts, you could sell them at local fairs occasionally, with your man handling set-up and
manning the booth. Or maybe he enjoys playing soccer and offers private lessons to kids in the
neighborhood, while you spread the word, register the kids for classes, and handle scheduling. It doesn’t
have to be elaborate or unique. The key is that you work together toward shared goals. Then, the fruits
of your labor can be used to celebrate with fun vacations and splurging on each other.
Create a joint challenge.

Employers who want to motivate their employees to lose weight (and therefore lower insurance costs)
sometimes set up company-wide challenges with incentives for those who achieve their goals. This
trend is effective for more than just improving the health of employees; it also encourages team-
building and morale. Those who participate encourage each other to stick with it.
Setting a challenge for you and your man can have a similar effect, and weight loss is just one way to go.
Here are just a few ideas for challenges you can take on:
 Watch every movie on AFI’s top 100 movies list

 Read a certain number of books this year (which you can track using the GoodReads app’s
Reading Challenge)
 Do one random act of kindness every day and record it
 Exercise for 20 minutes every day – without fail!
 Give up sugar for a month
 Limit your calories to a certain amount per day (which you can track with a Calorie Counting
app)
You may have noticed that these ideas also put gamification to work for you both, especially if you go
about it right. Track your progress, reward yourself for small goals along the way, and, most of all, have
fun with it!
Cook together.
You have to eat, so why not make the process of cooking that food a way to bond? You can do so
every night, weekly, or monthly – whatever fits your lifestyle.
Again, the key is to be involved with it as a team. You can trade off certain tasks, such as who selects
the recipes, plans out the week’s meals, or goes shopping, but ensure that you both get hands on
with the cooking part of the process. The more steps you are able to take together, the better. After
all, selecting the right ingredients for the meal together can help ensure that both of you appreciate
all the effort that went into producing the food.
Another idea is to occasionally invite others to partake in the results of your teamwork. Invite over
family members, friends, or co-workers to enjoy a special feast you both plan for weeks ahead of
time.
Start a collection together.
Okay, this may seem to go against the idea of essentialism, but the key is finding the right collection
– one that excites both of you, and is (or becomes) an essential part of your relationship.
Together, you can celebrate the excitement over having found a rare edition, located a “deal” on
something invaluable to you, or agonize together over the exact right object to bring home. These
joint discoveries will help bond you and contribute to your sense of a shared story.

Here are a few ideas for things you could collect together:
 Stamps
 State quarters
 Beanie babies
 Action figures
 Comic books
 Dolls
 Antiques
 Keychains
 Shot glasses
 Playing cards
 Postcards
 Snow globes
 Seashells
 PEZ dispensers
 Salt and pepper shakers
Once you decide on what to collect, set up a place to store them, preferably in a way that makes
them easy to display or at least show off when others inquire.
Learn to Value Fun
One of the best shortcut methods for adopting the behaviors and attitudes embodied in this course
is to simply invest in your “fun side.” After all, what’s a honeymoon without fun?
So what does that mean? That you should make a conscious decision to value having fun as much as
you value accomplishing serious goals.
So how do you do it? Investing in your fun side can be as simple as looking through the most
popular funny YouTube videos of the day as you sip your coffee and breakfast. This saturates your
mind with something funny, which puts you in a better mood and gives you something humorous to
mention when hanging out with your partner later in the day.
Or it could mean adding a soundtrack to your normal hum-drum routine. Dancing, singing, and
generally acting silly around the house as you dust, fold laundry, or wash the dishes.
Of course, investing in your fun side can also literally involve money. Set aside cash devoted to
spending on things that you find fun. I’m a big advocate for living on 80% of what you earn, so you
can save 10% and give away 10%.
A Word about “Fun” Money

I’m well aware of the fact that money doesn’t grow on trees, and that the idea of spending more
may be frustrating to some of you.
So don’t.
Far too many of us get into the habit of spending money on things because “everyone else is doing
it.” A great example of this is getting a new car every other year and making sure it has enough
horsepower to go 140 mph just because everyone else thinks you have to drive a nice car.
Or spending $60 every month on cable television channels you never watch because you’re too
busy working overtime to pay for it. Or always getting the latest smartphone so you’re on the
bleeding-edge of technology.
Think about what you currently spend money on and see if there’s anything that does not actually
boost your quality of life. If you’re paying for things that you don’t really use, ask yourself why?
What joy are you getting out of doing that? If the answer is “not much,” consider cutting out those
costs so you can free up funds to invest in your fun side.
Maybe you’ll discover that you actually do have the money to pursue a hobby you’ve always wanted
to learn but thought was too expensive, like golf or downhill skiing. Or it could mean working less
overtime, since you need less now to live on, allowing you and your man to spend more time hiking
in the woods together.
Think about what will bring the biggest boost in your quality of life for the amount you’re spending.
Ask for What You Want
If you never ask for something, it’s never going to be given to you.
This is quite possibly the most important lesson everyone in a relationship should learn. Why? So
many reasons that I’m going to put them in list form. When we don’t ask for the things we want in a
relationship…
 …we become disappointed because our partner doesn’t just know.

 …we get angry that our desires are not being met.
 …we take out those frustrations on our very confused partner.
 …we pull away from our partner (or complain when they pull away from us).
 …we look elsewhere to have our needs met.
But I need you to remember two things:
1. You’ll be denied 100% of what you never ask for.

2. If you ask more often, both of you will actually be happier.
So why do we refuse to ask? Because we feel awkward about it. Maybe it’s embarrassment, maybe
it’s not wanting to seem needy or greedy, or maybe we’re afraid our partner is going to say no.

Knowing why you don’t ask isn’t really helpful though – you need tools that can help you to ask. So
without further ado…
Fail Nine Times
The idea behind this technique is simple. Go into any situation knowing that you are going to fail
nine times. You can even tell yourself that’s what happens to everyone if it helps. The point is to put
yourself in a mindset where failing doesn’t leave you feeling discouraged or beat down, but instead
is simply the expectation.
When you are able to do this, you won’t mind when asking for what you want doesn’t work the first
time. Instead, you’ll be able to tell yourself, “Well, only eight more failures to go,” and hopefully
you’ll learn from what didn’t work the first time.
A nice side effect of this mentality is that on those occasions where you succeed faster, you’ll feel
incredibly accomplished – you didn’t even have to use up your nine tries!
Overcome Blank Canvas Syndrome
“But I don’t really want anything.” Yes, you do.
“But I can’t think of anything.” Ah. That’s closer to the truth – but I still think you’re wrong. You just
don’t know how to try. That’s what I’m here for.
Grab some paper and a pen. Then come back to this book. I’ll wait.
Okay, now start writing as many ideas as you can for solving a problem or overcoming a setback.
Your ideas should flow for about five or ten minutes. When you’re done, you should have a page full
of (let’s be honest) mostly pretty bad ideas.
But that’s great! That’s where you start.
Now sift through the ideas you wrote down. Circle the ones that are good and pull out the ones that
are bad or seem like they have something missing. Don’t get rid of them, though – set them aside for
later and try to improve them. You’ll probably discover you’re overflowing with bad ideas and your
good ideas are few and far between. Welcome to the club.
The point of this process is not to come up with a bunch of amazing ideas on the spot. I want you to
become comfortable looking at your ideas and discovering what’s good and what has problems.
Then I want you to think about why certain ideas are good or bad. Maybe some are just completely
outlandish. Others sounded better in your head, but when you wrote them down, something was
lost in translation. And many are simply out of the realm of financial possibility.
Pay special attention to the ones that sounded better in your head and see if you can’t rework them
a bit. By doing this, you’ll not only get a sense of what works and what doesn’t, you’ll learn how to
frame your ideas so they sound better when you’re making your actual request.

This is a process that is surprisingly effective. You’ll discover a wisdom emerging from the exercise
that gives you a distinct advantage for overcoming problems and seeing new opportunities when
they arise.
“Just Do It”
Nike’s slogan is popular for a reason. Sometimes the best way to do something is simply to make
yourself start. Stop waiting. Stop making excuses. Stop being afraid. And just, you know, do it.
Pushing yourself in this way makes a couple of things happen. It reduces your fear of putting
yourself out there because you’ve already taken that step. It allows your mind to “wake up” and
recognize what you are trying to accomplish, which often helps to clarify what you should do next
or how you can find more success. And when you succeed at getting something that you want, it
boosts your confidence, makes you feel accomplished, and raises your levels of happiness.
Cliff’s Notes for Tips and Tricks
A huge part of the Secret Obsession idea of consciously working with your man to bring more
romantic joy is teaching yourself to be okay with wanting that and then going for it.
Here I’ve offered several different tips and tricks that can encourage you along this path to bring
about your Endless Honeymoon.
 Embrace the Three Beliefs. Invest yourself in these not completely true but very powerful
and helpful ideas:
o There is no failure – only lessons on what to do better next time.

o How someone interprets what you say is the only thing that matters.
o There's a positive intent behind every behavior.
 Sharing goals and experiences ties your relationship to his sense of purpose. Some
ways to share include teaming up, planning together, and setting joint goals.
 Find ways to increase the fun in your life. Work together (instead of separately) to
remove everything you feasibly can that isn’t fun and actively seek things that bring
enjoyment and laughter.
 Learn how to ask for the things you want. You won’t get what you want from your
relationship until you learn how to speak up. Doing so will boost your man’s sense of
purpose, which activates his Hero Instinct and makes him more satisfied with the
relationship. It makes “providing for you” something tangible he can sink his teeth into.

Section VI: Making it Work in The Current Phase of Your Relationship
You’re probably not going to sit down with the guy you just started dating and try to plan an exciting
vacation together. And it may feel awkward to have a conversation with your husband of 30 years about
the various things you like.
In other words, while both of these ideas can be quite helpful, they have their place. So what kinds of
Endless Honeymoon and Secret Obsession principles are best for the phase of the relationship you’re in
now?
That’s what this section is about.
Initiating the Endless Honeymoon Concept with…

…someone you just met.
How do you approach Endless Honeymoon ideas if you shared a little spark of interest with a guy but
don’t know him much beyond that? Easy!
Step 1: Find out what interests him in life. This should be a primary focus at first because it provides a
foothold for having good conversations and the possibility of invitations to share in some of those
activities he finds interesting. It also provides you with the opportunity to show you care by offering gifts
or making plans that incorporate what he is interested in.
Step 2: Ask good questions. I know, I know – easier said than done, right? So what do I mean by this? As
soon as you have an opportunity for another interaction with him, ask the kinds of high-quality
questions that get a person “unstuck.” This means you want to cause him to think, “Why not? I could
pursue a more invigorating life if I made it a priority!”
In other words, you want to ask questions that encourage him to pursue things he’s already interested
in and challenge any thinking that holds him back from pursuing new ones. And hopefully this goes
without saying, but you want to try to be a part of it the moment that happens.
Step 3: Share yourself. Now is the time to open up about your own passionate pursuits and interests.
Not only will this light you up with energy because of the way it taps into what you find interesting, but
it will also reveal potential overlaps between your interests and his.
Step 4: Be bold. If the opportunity arises, ask him to help you learn about one of his interests. It could
just be a question like, “Do you know any good ski instructors in this area?” Or it could be something
that signals you would be receptive if he decided to pursue something with you, such as “I wish I could
hire you as my personal tour guide. It seems like you already know all the great spots for kayaking in this
region.” As a nice little bonus, this step also taps into his Hero Instinct.
Step 5: Find an excuse for ongoing contact. All you have to do is ask him something like, “You wouldn’t
mind if I texted you a question or two while I’m out shopping for a mountain bike in the next few weeks,

would you?” (Assuming, in this instance, that he’s into mountain biking.) The key is to simply open a
channel for further communication. Once that channel is open, go back through steps 1-4 until he takes
the lead to pursue spending time with you.
…someone you’re dating but aren’t exclusive with yet.
What about after you’ve gotten to know your man a bit more but haven’t quite entered the girlfriend
zone yet? Here’s how to use the Endless Honeymoon mindset to make that happen.
Step 1: Encourage “us against the world.” Focus on the techniques you learned in this course that
inspire the feeling of being a part of an exclusive club. Use things such as inside jokes, dares or
challenges, and creating miniature traditions, like meeting at a certain place and time each week for
coffee, a game of chess, or whatever you’re both into. The point is to push the idea that “this is
something special that only the two of us get to share.”
Step 2: Give him something to work on. In other words, use some of the challenge methods and
gamification ideas in this course so he becomes preoccupied with trying to “win” in his relationship with
you. This not only feeds his “addiction” to you, but also decreases the amount of mental space he has to
think about any other women in his life.
Step 3: Back away and give him space periodically. You want to activate his chase instinct frequently
during this period of relationship development. Never act cold or aloof, but you should give him enough
space that he feels the need to pursue you so you don’t slip away. In other words, back away just
enough so he’ll feel a need to come after you.
Step 4: Focus on being fascinating. People always freak out when I mention this one, but it’s not as
scary as it sounds. Simply focus on living your life full steam ahead so he sees you engaged in what you
care about and learns that other people appreciate you, too. One of the best things about this is that
merely by doing it, you’ll discover new ways to involve him in your life by “borrowing” his skills, talents,
advice, perspective, or time – things that will definitely work to your advantage if you present them in a
way that activates his Hero Instinct.
Step 5: Be in the moment. Instead of worrying about where things are going, focus more on enjoying
the here and now of the relationship. Doing so will imbue your interactions with more life and meaning
and help you to connect better with him. In contrast, if you spend time fretting over the future of your
relationship (what could be), you’re likely to unintentionally push him away.
Step 6: Put him in charge of when the relationship will move forward. This can be communicated in
subtle ways so you essentially relinquish any responsibility for moving the relationship forward. By doing
this, you cause him to think about where the relationship is going. Feeling responsible for the pace and
direction of the relationship will cause him to consider the issue more carefully than he otherwise
would. Not only does this give him a feeling of freedom and control, but it also serves as a way to show
that you trust him.
…in a long-term relationship in need of a spark.

After you’ve been together for a while, it’s natural to experience a bit of separation and drifting – but
that doesn’t mean you have to accept it. Even if you and your man have been together for decades
without using Endless Honeymoon principles, that doesn’t mean you can’t introduce them now. Here’s
how!
Step 1: Start small. Literally. Do this by making very small requests that are almost impossible to deny.
Step 2: Keep building. Take those small requests up a level by using the “yes mindset” and the principle
of providing rewarding feedback. This will serve to wake up the part of his mind interested in finding
meaning and purpose through his relationship with you.
Step 3: Get him talking about his dreams. Over time, many of us lose sight of our hopes, desires, and
even smaller life pleasures because we’re too focused on time pressures, responsibilities, and the
mundane routines of everyday living. But that doesn’t mean those dreams have died. You can
reinvigorate his sense of purpose and desire by getting him thinking about them again.
Step 4: Look for ways to appreciate life together again. Open small windows for enjoying things as a
couple again. It can be especially helpful and meaningful to use ideas that hold emotional significance
because of the role those activities played when you first fell in love. In other words, if you proposed at
a particular restaurant, revisit that spot. If you had a particularly spectacular vacation together early on,
take a trip to the same place. If you used to dance or go to the movies or whatever, do that again.
Step 5: Make it a game. When you sense the time is ripe, open a direct conversation with him about
initiating a challenge for yourself as a couple. The goal: to go after some fun way of putting your
happiness first on purpose. Before you have this conversation, manipulate your own state so you feel
excited by the prospect. This will help to draw him in.
Bullet Points for an Endless Honeymoon at Any Stage of Your Relationship
By picking and choosing the concepts that fit where you are in your life and with your significant other,
anyone can become the Secret Obsession of their man and have an Endless Honeymoon together.
 If you’re just starting out, use Endless Honeymoon techniques that awaken the part of his mind
that wants to seek pleasure and live an extraordinary life, shaking off the mundane. Find an
excuse to open a line of communication and give him reasons to keep thinking about you.
 When you’re trying to define exactly what your relationship is and move to the next level,
actively work to create shared experiences, encourage him to chase you, live your life to the
fullest, and focus on the moment while letting him lead.
 And after you’ve been together for years and need to reinvigorate your relationship, start small
and work to rekindle his dreams and desires by revisiting positive experience in the past and
engaging him in the fun of gamification.

Conclusion
If I could boil down the Endless Honeymoon concept to a single sentence, it would be this: It’s about
each of you tying your individual happiness to each other’s happiness.
Everything in this course comes back to that one big idea. Because when you discover that it makes you
happy to make your man happy – and vice versa – you get into a self-sustaining feedback loop where
the most rewarding and significant challenge in your life is purposefully building a world of pleasure
together.
As you’ve learned by coming along with me on this journey, the easiest way for you to tie your man’s
happiness to yours is to tap into his Hero Instinct by showing him that being romantic and giving you the
things you desire is meaningful (because it makes you happy) and is an amazing way for him to provide
for you (because he’s giving you things you want and need).
Perhaps the best part of this, though, is the third pillar that makes up the Hero Instinct: the need to
garner respect. Once you’ve followed the various tips and tricks that I’ve laid out in this course to
encourage your man to engage in romantic acts, your only real job is to show him how much what he’s
doing means to you – how much you respect him for his actions.
In other words, buying flowers by itself will never be an accomplishment for a man. It just won’t. But
watching your eyes well up with joyful tears and hearing you offer him thanks and appreciation over the
next few days for his kind act will be an accomplishment – he will have accomplished bringing you joy,
and will feel proud of himself (and, yes, a little bit heroic) for having done so.
Plus, with the mental frame of the Endless Honeymoon, you both know this is just the beginning! The
game is just getting started and it’s going to be so much fun!
While creating an Endless Honeymoon effect in your relationship, there’s something I want to make sure
you remember. Momentum will only build if you celebrate each other’s efforts, not just each other’s
success.
Why?
Because you’re going to try new things that will sometimes flop. You will go out on dates that end up
being less than you expected. And your man will sometimes misinterpret your desires and do something
unexpected that you did not want.
But here’s the point: he’s engaged. He’s actively trying to bring you joy. Instead of punishing him for
“messing up,” find ways to celebrate the fact that he’s making an effort. This doesn’t mean you have to
pretend you love bowling or that sweater with a weird cat hanging upside down (“Because you love
cats!”), but by showing him how much you appreciate his thoughtfulness, he’ll be encouraged to try
again.

If you want to increase his likelihood of doing something that brings you real joy, think about what you
can do and say (how you can better guide him – without taking away his autonomy) to make the gesture
more successful next time.
Keep doing these things and I promise you that relationship happiness and satisfaction will increase for
both of you as your “addiction” to each other increases and you continue to experience relationship
“highs” of the sort most people think are only possible on a real honeymoon.

Endless Honeymoon

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Warning and Disclaimer

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1. It’s too good to be true.

2. I don’t have much influence or power.

Are you ready? Okay, then let’s begin.

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Relationship Fun: Highs without Lows

Bringing Back the Honeymoon

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Distraction and effort.

No More Damsel in Distress

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 The need to achieve something meaningful.

Isn’t that the way it should be?

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The Lost Man

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Acknowledge What You Don’t Know

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How Do You Know What to Put on the List?

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To that end, ask yourself these questions:

 What would I do if I was on vacation and no one was looking?

Experiences, Not Possessions

 Season passes to a concert or theater series

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Things That Help You Declutter

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Quality-of-Life Material Goods

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Reverse Engineering Happiness

Make Him Work… a Little

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How to Encourage Him to Surprise You

Play the Surprise Game

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Let’s look at them for a second:

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The “surprise game” is a happy medium between these two extremes.

Wish Lists Are a Two-Way Street

Reverse Engineer for Him

It’s like a superpower over his heart!

Learn How to Ask the Right Questions

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This question is so valuable that I decided it deserved its own section.

 What if we could afford to go on vacation this year? Where would we go?

Questions that Uncover His True (Secret) Desires

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Questions Should Be a Part of the Bigger Conversation

Watch His Energy Levels

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Learn What You Like Together

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Sound good? Yeah, I thought so.

How do you do it? By upgrading his mental framework.