Love in the 21st Century: The 7 Keys to Romance
Jay Bildstein*

Seven Keys to Romantic Love

1) Be honest with yourself about your current state of happiness. If you are hoping to meet someone to save yourself from your current life, think again. Do not posit hopes of changing who you are on meeting someone to fall in love with. If your problem is you, fix you. No one else can do it for you.

2) Being honest with other people is not only sexy it is empowering. Confidence is appealing. Lying shows a lack of self-belief. Have enough confidence not to lie when beginning a romantic encounter. Love based on lies will often transform to hate.

3) There are many different ways to communicate. Bad hygiene communicates that you just don’t care about the object of your affections. Take friends with soap and mouthwash. It is hard to be romantic while giving off an odor most foul.

4) If you are a guy and you spend your time reading men’s magazines or if you are a gal and you spend your time reading women’s magazines kick the habit. To communicate with the opposite sex you have to get inside their heads and you won’t do it reading articles focused on you and your fellow men or women. See how the other half lives, start reading their magazines.

5) Feminism holds that men and women are equal as human beings. We must make the distinction though, between equal and different. Being a gentleman and holding out a chair or opening a door for a woman is simply good manners. Women may have been liberated but good manners will always be fashionable. At the same time ladies, a little lingerie can go a long way. Men are a visual reactor, that’s simply biology.

6) Women fall in love and then have sex as an expression of that love. Men seek sex as validation, and then feel more open to express love. The woman wants to know she is loved before having sex; the man wants to have sex before proclaiming his love. Understanding this polemic goes a long way to alleviating the challenges it causes.

7) Creativity is romantic whether it comes from a man or a woman. The world can be a boring place what with the routine of school or work. Take your would be lover to different places, do new and exciting things and avoid being predictable. Avoid the line “What do you want to do?” it reeks of indecisiveness and a lack of originality. Instead provide alternatives of interesting
things to do.

* Nacido en Nueva York, Jay Bildstein llegó a Xalapa hace dos años, para aprender español en la Escuela para Estudiantes Extranjeros de la UV, y cursa ahora otros estudios en nuestra universidad. Es reconocido como orador público y empresario en los Estados Unidos. Ha ofrecido conferencias a un sinnúmero de compañías y organizaciones sobre persuasión, motivación, técnicas de ventas y mercadotecnia. Como comentarista, ha tenido una participación destacada en varios programas de radio y televisión y fue el invitado más prominente en News Talk Televisión, durante la existencia de ese canal estadounidense. Ahora, como colaborador de Universo, publicará artículos escritos en inglés, que abarcarán diversos temas.