This is why I insisted in Act Like a Lady, Think Like a Man that women adopt the Ninety-Day Rule—a probationary period of sorts where you forgo having sex with the new guy until you figure out whether he is really into you or is just trying to hit it and quit it. I tell you, this was the chapter that women across the land gave me the hardest time about; all too many refused to even hear me out on this one. I had women calling into my radio show saying, “I don’t know, Steve—ninety days just seems so arbitrary!” At my book signings and lectures from Brooklyn to Los Angeles, from Detroit to Topeka, and everywhere in between, women kept protesting that ninety days seemed “too long” and insisted that it’s okay to do “what feels right” and “hope” that they wouldn’t get hurt in the process. My personal favorite was a proclamation by one woman that she wasn’t going to be bothered with the Ninety-Day Rule because she tried it with a guy and “he ended up dumping me because I wouldn’t put out.” As if that guy would have stuck around if she would have just given him some cookie up front.
I said it before and I’ll say it again: the man who refuses to give you time to investigate whether he’s worthy of intimacy with you is not your man. He’s taking off because he doesn’t have what it takes to meet your standards and requirements, isn’t demonstrating that he’s interested in what it would take to make you happy in a relationship. He’s not looking to get emotionally invested in you; he’s not even considering it as an option. So why would you want this guy to stick around?
Treat sex as if it’s something special and let the man you’re interested in know that it’s special, and guess what? He’ll either leave—which is what you want this guy to do if you’re in the market for a serious relationship—or he’ll see something special in you and do what it takes to meet your standards and requirements. When you require something of a man, he will have no problem giving it to you if he truly wants to invest in a relationship with you. Your prize is only special if you make us treat it as if it’s special—if we are forced to say to ourselves, “Oh, wait—I can’t just run up in here and get the cookie like I can everywhere else because this is more than just a hit-it-and-quit-it kind of girl.” Men don’t mind having to prove themselves, and you are worthy of the effort and the attention.
If, however, you’re treating sex as if it’s just a box of Chiclets, we’ll run through the relationship with you as if it’s a box of Chiclets. You know you don’t chew Chiclets too long. You pop one in your mouth and you chew it for a little while and then you spit it out and get you another piece until the box is empty—until there’s nothing left. You don’t want to be the used-up, empty Chiclets box.
You want to be the one he feels emotionally connected to, because when a man loves you and he’s committed solely to you, sex means something wholly different; now it becomes the pot of gold at the end of that rainbow. That ideal woman we’ve had in our mind since we became sexually active is now an actual person—our ideal woman personified—and when we have sex with that woman, our physical, emotional, and mental desires synchronize and work together to give a pleasure trip that is exponentially better than any other sexual experience we could ever conjure up in our mind, let alone ever have had. When we’re making love to a woman we love, we don’t ever want it to be over; we want to keep touching her and smelling her and drinking her in because every inch of her arouses us in ways that no other person can—drives us crazy, damn near. Sex with that woman rejuvenates us—gives us the strength to carry on, the comfort we need to continue, the feel-good we have to have to make it through the hard times. And we actually care deeply that our lady feels the same way about us and will aim to do whatever it takes to bring her that immense pleasure, because we love her and want her to feel what we feel. We want her to be happy.
Now men—and only men—can determine whether they love you and that your pot of gold is special to them. You can’t decide it for a man—you can’t say, “I’m going to get my sexy on so much so that he’ll be too strung out to leave,” and expect that it’ll work. Trust me when I tell you, no man on this planet will make that determination without first being shown how you want to be loved, how you expect to be treated, and whether or not it’s worth pursuing you beyond a casual romantic fling.
Ask any man living if I’m telling the truth and he’ll tell you the same.
COMMITTED SEX VERSUS FLINGS
Of course, even if a man is in a committed relationship with a woman he loves, sex is going to wane. That’s just human nature. You’re going to get comfortable with each other. I’ve yet to meet a parent of a toddler who doesn’t find the king-size bed that was so immense during the honeymoon feels cramped when Junior starts walking in during the middle of the night (how romantic can that be?). Bill time is going to come around too often and with it the kind of stress that can play a number on your sexual energy. And somewhere along the line, there will be days when you’re just going to be tired of looking at each other, even though you know good and well you can’t live without each other. But even with all those changes, the one thing that I guarantee will remain constant is your man’s desire for sex. Again, unless there is something physically precluding him from achieving intimacy, a man is going to want to have sex regularly, especially if he’s committed to you.
Now I’m not saying he has to have it every night. That’s for the young boys who don’t have anything else to do but prowl for the next conquest. And I’m not suggesting either that a guy won’t make allowances for natural occurrences that throw you off from giving us good loving, like illnesses and pregnancy and the like. Men are not heartless—we’re not the dogs you make us out to be. But the release we get from sex is essential to our existence. As I’ve written elsewhere, it recharges our batteries, feeds our ego, releases a bit of the pressure cooker tension we feel. So if we’re not getting the attention we need in the bedroom on a fairly regular basis, there’s going to be problems. I’m not saying he’s going to cheat. I’m certainly not suggesting that he has the right to cheat. But the temptation will certainly be there, and trust me when I tell you, it will cross his mind.
Of course, not every man is going to act on this. But those who do stray from a committed relationship to have a one-night stand are telling the truth when they say “she didn’t mean anything.” In most cases, she probably doesn’t. What does matter to a man who chooses to have a fling outside of his committed relationship is that someone out there is willing to engage him in the thrill of the “chase and capture” men crave, and someone will give him sex with no strings attached. He’s having sex with someone he doesn’t have to argue with, someone with whom he has no responsibilities—they’re not divvying up bills and raising kids and plotting out social calendars and building a life together—and someone who represents a nice little escape from all of the stress he’s dealing with day in and day out. She dresses up for the occasion, makes the sex downright erotic, and fulfills whatever fantasy a man has worked out in his mind—the fantasy he can’t get at home.
Once he’s done with her, he’ll be on his merry way—satisfied that he’s recharged and can go on back to his real life with the woman he loves. Sex with that other woman is just that—sex. The other woman may not recognize or want to acknowledge this, but in most cases, it’s the truth; and deep down, she knows it too.
Is a man wrong for doing this, knowing that even though sex with another woman means nothing to him, it’s everything to you? Absolutely! Though every man who steps out on his committed relationship may have a pocketful of excuses for cheating, he knows really, there is no logical, acceptable, spiritual, or reasonable explanation for his actions, and that getting caught could mean the end of something beautiful. Every man eventually comes to a point in his life where he realizes nothing is worth losing his family—that the beauty of loving a woman, building a life with her and their children, being responsible for their care and well-being, and working with her to realize their dreams is more important than any orgasm he can have with another woman. A
moment of pleasure for your life—that’s a pretty high price to pay. The sad part is that there are a lot of cheaters who need to make the mistake, get caught, and pay that price before they realize the worth of what they could end up losing.
And that’s the real shame of it all.
I’m not saying that in order to get your man to keep it at home, you have to drop and give him twenty whenever he taps you on the shoulder. A woman has every right to expect her man to be faithful—to expect that he won’t end up in someone else’s bed just because things aren’t perfect at home. It is not your job to coddle and coax a man into being faithful; you can’t change him if that’s who he is. But like I said in Act Like a Lady, Think Like a Man, you can bring out the best in him. The two of you need to sit down and figure out together how you’re going to make this thing right—how the two of you are going to work out how to get back to happy—and satisfaction—again.
I fully admit that when a man gets comfortable, he can forget what it took for him to have the honor of being your lover. He can slack off on living up to your standards and requirements—forget to buy you flowers just because, or neglect to compliment you on how beautiful and sexy you are, or think it’s okay to lean on the quickie instead of putting in the work it takes to get you excited about sex. Men certainly don’t teach one another that in order for a woman to be everything a man needs, he has to fulfill a substantial amount of her needs. He doesn’t necessarily realize or remember that she likes to talk about her dreams and ambitions, or that she really liked it when they went out for dinner. He doesn’t know she’s sitting in her cubicle, listening to her girlfriend cooing into the phone, “I love you, too, baby,” when Valentine’s Day comes up and that while her girlfriend is getting a lot of things from her man, his girlfriend or spouse is upset that she’s gotten a whole lot of nothing from hers. He doesn’t know that everybody in the office is starting to question if she’s even got a man, because he’s never come in to take his lady to lunch or sent her a text message that made her giggle out loud or done something for her that’s made her brag about him to her coworkers. Indeed, we men sometimes create the distance without even knowing it because we’re so busy going about the business of manhood. How do you remind him? Talk. Most times it’s that simple.
We men really are simple creatures and are almost robotic in our habits. As I explain in Chapter 12, “The Art of the Deal,” if you tell us what you want, we’ll do it, especially if it means we’re going to benefit from it. If you tell a man he would get more sex from you, the woman he adores, if he made room for a once-a-week date night without the kids, or sent flowers just because, or chipped in more with the evening routine so you have more time to relax and get ready for him, guess what your man is going to do for you?
Similarly, if you’re reluctant to have sex with your man because, well, he’s not giving you something you can feel, then you’re going to have to speak up. I promise you, he won’t know you’re not satisfied if you don’t say it. Of course, each man is different, but we’re all the same in one regard: we have tremendous egos when it comes to sex. No matter how good or bad we are, we all think we’re bringing it—think we are doing the most to make you climb the walls. We think we’re doing more than an adequate job because the work we’re putting in, we’ve got nothing to compare it to. (No, porn doesn’t count because we are not watching the guy—we’re focusing on the woman and her reactions to what’s being done.) You all have had lovers in your life and you can talk to your girlfriends about them and give them details—“girl, he kissed me this way and he rubbed me that way and ooh, he just wore me out!” But we men? We don’t share that with each other. Ever. We can’t turn to our fathers and ask them for advice because anything they tell us is going to automatically make us summon up images of them with our mothers and that’s not an image a man wants to conjure up. Ever. And we don’t talk to our boys about it at any great length because admitting we’re low on techniques makes us weak in our boys’ eyes and plus, none of us want our boys getting even a remote picture in their mind of our private parts or what it must be like to have sex with our women. So we’re not learning from other men, either. Ever.
We learn from trial and error how to please a woman. We keep a mental Rolodex of what worked with each partner we’ve been with—“When I was doing that right there, it brought on a tremor . . . let me mark that one down,” and “When I touched her there, she got excited . . . let me mark that one down.” Once we’ve taken notes on the little spots, areas, and tremors that got our partners sexually aroused, we call ourselves experienced.
Nobody else we’ve been with told us we suck, and you’re not saying anything, and we’re always reaching our moment (whether you really reach your moment or not), so hey, we’re killing! Every muscle on us is tight, we’re shaking, the hair on the back of our necks is standing on end—we’re good. Outstanding! So unless you tell a man you want something different, you’re going to keep getting a whole lot of what you’ve already gotten.
Still, you have to be careful of how you ask for what you want. Like I said, men have tremendous egos when it comes to sex, and if you start with an attitude, “You know what? When you’re with me, you’re not doing the things I like,” feelings are going to get hurt—not necessarily just his. And whatever you do, don’t make a big production out of it. I told you in Act Like a Lady, Think Like a Man that the four words that scare the crap out of men and put them on the defensive are “We have to talk.” So approach the conversation strategically—delicately. Be smart about it. The best time to bring it up is while we’re in the actual act because when we’re having sex, we’re receptive to anything. If you say, “Baby, dive off the armoire!” he’ll take his behind right on up there. If you say, “Oh, I love it when you do that right there,” and “Ooh, turn me over now and go to the left, yeah!” he’s going to do exactly as he’s told.
You also have some other amazing tools to help you get the best out of your man; there’s text messaging—“Honey, if you help me out with the kids tonight, at around 9:30 when they’re in bed, we’re going to be in bed and . . .” Put a sticky next to his shaving kit: “Remember when you did that thing to me? Ooh, I was just thinking about it and got shivers! Can you do that to me again?” You could always call his cell phone and leave a message: “I love it when you talk dirty to me—when I get home, I want you to whisper some dirty things in my ear and touch me there when you do it.”
Over the course of two weeks, you can tell him everything you want him to know about what you like and get it. Because he’s getting what he wants—great sex with the woman he loves—and he’s pleasing her, making her happy. Which is all a man who is truly committed and in love with you wants to do.
We want to please the woman to whom we’re committed and emotionally connected. We really do. Because if the two of us are pleased—sexually, emotionally, mentally—well, there’s no way we’re going to step out on that. The chances of that happening go down to damn near zero, because what a man knows through experience is that all of those “hope diamonds” are really just quarters compared with the pot of gold he’s got at home. He won’t jeopardize that by doing something he knows won’t mean anything to him, but everything to you.
And that brings me back to why it’s so important for women to make sure that they exercise the Ninety-Day Rule—to really scope out a man and figure out if he’s worthy of the cookie before you give it to him. If you’re truly looking for a committed relationship, this guy has to demonstrate that he’s worthy of and ready for one. Giving him sex is not going to make him stay around—not for the right reasons, anyway.
And here’s the incredible thing about women I don’t quite understand: you know when a man is not feeling you yet you still give your all, you continue to try to make it work. Why play that game? Why not just weed out, up front, all the men you know are going to do nothing but cause you heartache and disappointment, and wait for the one who is going to do right by you? Please unders
tand, he’s out there. There isn’t a man living who can do without a good woman. Most men are going to get married. One of them will marry you. A real man won’t be able to fulfill his destiny as a man without you. How else is he going to have kids? How will he continue his lineage? He wants that legacy; if a man can’t do anything else, he wants his name to live on. Even if his father wasn’t around, deep down he knows he can be the one to fix that—to break the cycle and start the tradition and be thought of as someone special to somebody. That’s why our parents were so giving and hardworking—so that we could have a better life than they had. I’m sure my mother and father are somewhere looking at me and saying, “That’s our son. We done good.”
I remember when they were living and we were sitting around the Thanksgiving table and I saw my father lean over and tap my mother on the shoulder and say, “Did you ever think one of our children would be on TV?”
“Not in a million years,” my mother said. “Ain’t God good?”
And my father said, “I guess He is.”
That’s all a man wants—to have someone be proud of him and to be proud of somebody. It’s critically important to a man. And women help bring that about. We can’t have babies without you, we can’t build families without you, we don’t get to be the man of the house without you, we don’t enjoy dreaming without you.
We cannot exist without you.
Granted, we are not taught this. No man sits his son down and says, “Son, you can’t truly live without a woman.” But a good man will profess to anyone listening that he can’t live without his woman. For sure, when my mother died, my father told me one day, “Boy, I figure I’ll just go on and get out of here now, because life without your mother—ain’t nothing here anymore. I always knew that life wasn’t nothing without her.”