Take time to make the effort

Always take the opportunity to remind your wife or girlfriend of how special she is. Try not to let sex become routine. I know it’s easy to let sex slip by the wayside when you have the realities of everyday life and you are tired, but it is worth making an effort rather than thinking you can keep putting it off.

Compliments are a good idea, too. It is easy to assume your partner knows you love her, think she is sexy or that she made you a great meal. But women like reinforcement, and a compliment is a gift. If you keep your thoughts to yourself, you are being stingy with your gifts!

Again, if you have been in a relationship for a while, your conversation can dry up – or it can become too focused on the domestic details – you know the kind of thing I mean. Discussions are about what you will have for dinner that night, how kids are doing at school and whose turn to take the bins out.

Instead, why not have conversations about your hopes and your dreams? Ask about books she has read recently and why she enjoyed them. Discuss each other’s childhood and find out what she wants to do.

Women like to think effort has gone into something, too. If you are taking a woman out on a date, imagination is a beautiful thing. It might be easy enough to book a table at a restaurant, but what if you take the time and trouble to find out what restaurant your date has been dying to visit? Why don’t you see if you can arrange for the chef to come out and talk to her to ask what she thinks of the food? Or why not see if you can book her at a newly opened place?

Another idea for originality is to join her in one of her hobbies. Maybe you hate the opera, but she goes regularly with a girlfriend. Go along for once and find out why she loves it.

And if all else fails, there are always shoes…