Health & Sex

Pucker Up: Kissing Secrets Revealed

Make It Memorable

Two keys to a memorable kiss are pleasing your partner and pleasing yourself.

"Put your whole body into the kiss," says Marilyn Anderson, author of Never Kiss a Frog: A Girl's Guide to Creatures from the Dating Swamp. "Without words, your lips should say, 'Baby, there's more where that came from!' There are ways to keep it fresh and new all the time."

She suggests starting with gentle kisses on the neck, move up to the ear, then go to the lips. Take some small breaks and then come back to the lips.

"Here's my kissing tip: Put a hand on your kissing partner's neck," says Pamela Weiss, marketing director in Los Angeles. "It adds passion, like 'I can't get enough.' And let's be honest, that's what makes for a great kiss."

Don't get hung up on what a kiss might lead to. Enjoy it for its own sake.

"A good kiss is deep and soulful and you should feel each other's love through the kiss," says Dan Landau, an engaged graduate student in Bridgewater, N.J. "A great kiss is an adventure in itself, not a stepping point to something else."

Falling Off the Kissing Wagon

Steamy make-out sessions usually happen early on in a relationship, or the honeymoon period.

But later on, when people are in a long-term relationship, they too often stop kissing and lose that intimate connection, says Anderson. In a Redbook poll, 79% of women said they don't kiss their husbands nearly as much as they'd like.

"You've got to keep kissing in the game," Anderson says. "The emotional importance of a kiss is where it all begins and you shouldn't let it go just because you've known someone for a long time."

"When my wife kisses me, it's like she's telling me, 'I love you' without words," Desmond says.

Time hasn't made kissing ho-hum for Landau and his fiancee, either.

"If anything, our kisses are better now than they were initially," Landau says. "We know each other on a much deeper level after two and a half years together. When we first kissed, there were sparks. Now, there are fireworks."