The Magic of a 5 to 10 Second Kiss

One of the biggest frustrations I hear from couples who are struggling or unsatisfied in their marriage or relationship, is the lack of “touch” that has seemed to be lacking or has all-together disappeared from the relationship. Surprisingly, this is the number one complaint I hear from men; that their partners don’t touch them at all during the day, and they are not talking about sexual touching. These individuals are complaining about missing the little touches, like the stroke of the hand, a soft hug or lean in to their partner, and other types of physical acknowledgement that their partners notices them and likes them.

What I know for sure is that there are specific, habitual ways of thinking, feeling and behaving that couples engage it at the beginning of their relationship that promote connection and intimacy. These habits happen naturally in the early stages of a relationship because of the literally altered state our bodies are in when we first begin an intimate relationship with someone.

As the “newness” of the relationship shifts into the next stages, couples now have to make sure they are intentional with those habits, because they no longer happen on auto-pilot. A happy, connected, passionate couple makes sure they continue the habit of “touch” in their relationship, or they make sure and intentionally build up that habit to maintain that connectedness and intimacy.

If you are in a relationship where the “touch” factor seems to be gone or almost gone, there is a very simple exercise I picked up from Dr. Laura Berman, called the 5 to 10 Second Kiss, that will start to put that intimacy back into your relationship. This is an exercise that Dr. Berman uses with her clients as well to help couples either get back or maintain that spark, connection, intimacy and passion in the relationship that they feel they once had, but has gone away over a period of time.

The way this exercise works is, for one week, every day, you and your partner will share a 5 to 10 second kiss. The important part about this kiss is that it is not to be followed immediately by sex. The reason for this, is because, for many couples, especially those that have been in a long-term relationship, that’s when we would typically get our 5 to 10 second kiss; either during or right before we have sex with our partners. The goal is to get away from routines we have created in our relationship that take away from more intimacy, more passion and connection, so, it’s important to break up the routine rather than promote it.

In order to break up this routine, you want to make sure you have that 5 to 10 second kiss any other time during the day (first thing in the morning, before you leave for work, right when you get home, etc.). What you are doing with this exercise is creating touch, connection and intimacy as an every-day interaction, rather than a once-in-a-great-while prelude to sex.

So, try that 5 to 10 Second Kiss, every day, for at least one week, and you’ll be surprised at the magic it creates.