The Complete Guide to Kissing

The Complete Guide to Kissing
Smooch unto others as you would have them smooch unto you.
Writing by Krista, illustration by Ruby A.
Well, it’s happened. You’ve found someone
you like. Someone you have a crush on.
This is huge . OK, this happens all the
time—but this time it’s different: This time,
this person you’ve been secretly obsessing
over forever and who is so cute and sweet
and nice and funny and smells good and
is ugh so perfect …this person likes
you too . You like each other, and it’s
amazing, like a needle-in-a-haystack, noone-has-ever-felt-this-way-before, I-can’tbelieve-we-found-each-other sort of thing.
You start hanging out more. You maybe
go on a few dates. And then you want to
kiss him or her.
This idea of kissing them starts to occupy your thoughts. You’re thinking about it
all the time, and every time your beautiful
perfect adorable crush talks, you can’t bring
yourself to take your eyes off their mouth.
You are staring creepily at their lips a lot.
Then one day your crush comes over and
you’re playing video games on the couch
(well, they’re playing video games; you’re
watching the light from the screen reflecting off their face out of the corner of your
eye) and…you snuggle a little closer.
Crush takes eyes off video game and sets
them on you. You and crush lock eyes. And
suddenly you both know: This is it. Your First
Kiss is about to happen. You lean in and
suddenly you’re in their face space, inhaling their warm breath, and then you gently,
gently touch your lips to theirs like a butterfly who can’t decide whether to stick around
or fly away and then it’s like a dam breaks
and you’ve both wanted this so much and
your crush grabs you and suddenly you’re
really kissing and it’s so easy and so fun and
so perfect and the music swells and as you
lace your fingers through your crush’s you
can feel in your heart that this is so, so right,
and that was your first kiss—and it was better than you ever could have hoped.
That’s how every first kiss with someone
new would happen if life were perfect. But
we all know how life really is, and while
the first time you kiss someone is often
absolutely lovely and wonderful and great,
it can also be awkward, funny, terrible,
gross, and occasionally—let’s face it—
really, truly awful.
You don’t have to look far to find stories about kissing, images of people kissing,
whole entire songs about kissing…but
what about the actual mechanics at
play? What if you don’t care about the
context or narrative surrounding the kiss
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but want solely to learn OMG what to do
with your mouth when you finally start kissing people? Like, is there a “right” way to
kiss? Major, fatal mistakes to avoid? What
if you’re a bad kisser and you don’t even
knowwwww??? This kind of information
is a lot harder to obtain. until now.
I’m about to break down for you, step
by step, the four basic types of kiss. (When
you’ve advanced beyond these, you won’t
need my help.) But first let me reassure
you: Kissing is not hard, you do not need to
stress about it, and you are most likely going
to be an excellent kisser (maybe you already
are). Kissing is just getting to know someone in a new way (like a handshake, but
with your lips!), and all the good manners
and putting-each-other-first type things we
already do on the regular with our friends
can easily be translated to kissing. If you’re
a thoughtful, considerate person already,
you’ll probably be a thoughtful, considerate
kisser, without even trying very hard. The
Golden Rule applies here: Kiss unto others as you would have them kiss unto you.
(Don’t worry if you aren’t sure how exactly
you would have someone kiss unto you—
we’ll cover that here.)
One final caveat: Don’t feel like you have
to follow anything I’m saying here. The
truth is that any way of kissing is just fine,
so long as you and your collaborator in this
endeavor are enjoying yourselves. It really
all boils down to your style. What follow
are just some basics to get you started and
help you on your own trip down Lip-toLip Lane. (Yes I just said that.)
Ki ss Ty pe 1 : The Fir st Kiss
W i t h A nyo ne , Eve r
Ooooh, this is so exciting. First kiss! Yeah!
But before we get down to logistics, your
first step should be asking yourself, “Do I
really want to kiss this person, or do I just
feel like I should?”
If you’ve never kissed someone, please
do not listen to people you hang around
with who act like it is everything. Judging by the number of emails sent to our
various advice outlets each month by kiss
virgins worried about either catching up
with everyone else or not catching up with
everyone else, you’re in good, abundant
company. No matter how old you are, you
are not the only person your age who hasn’t
had their first kiss. There’s nothing wrong
with starting your kissing career before
any of your friends, and there’s nothing
wrong with graduating from high school
or college without having touched your
lips to another human’s. This isn’t a race,
and it’s not like if you don’t have your first
kiss now the window of opportunity will
slam shut forever. You have all the time
in the world. And don’t worry that people
will ostracize you in college or that no one
will want to have sexytimes with you when
they find out that you’re not super experienced: College is full of virgins, including
some kiss virgins, and being a curious, engaged partner is way more important than
how many people you’ve done stuff with.
Also: If someone wants to kiss you but
you don’t want to kiss them…don’t. It’s
OK. It doesn’t matter if they gave you a ride
home or paid for the movie or took you to
prom or saved you and your entire extended
family, plus assorted pets, from a burning
building: You don’t owe anyone close personal access to your lips. Plus, you’ll be
kissing people for the rest of your life, so
why not wait until you really want to?
When your first kiss does happen, here’s
something else to keep in mind: It might
go really great or really badly or totally boringly or kind of weirdly or any of countless
different ways, but no matter what happens, remember that your first kiss does
not determine your kissing future. It’s a
kiss you’ll remember, almost certainly, but
it’s still just one kiss.
OK . O n to t h e n i tt y-gri t ty.
I think the hardest part about first kisses
is not the kissing itself, but knowing how
to initiate it.
How do yo u know
when yo u are abo ut to
ki ss o r be ki ssed?
Sometimes it’s obvious and the kiss happens in a really predictable setting. Your
first kiss might be a dare, or part of a game.
You might be going out with someone—
let’s say it’s a girl—and she tells people at
school that she’s going to kiss you. (This
is a rare gift, because now y0u have time
to properly freak out about it with your
friends.) When you’re young, first kisses
often happen at or after school dances,
or at the end of the night when you’re
going home from a place you went to together, either just the two of you or with
a group.
Thankfully, if you’re both into each other,
it’s usually pretty easy to tell when a kiss is
about to happen. One of you might be looking intently at the other’s face for longer
than normal. You might feel shy or nervous
or like you want to laugh. A pretty good
rule of thumb is: If someone’s face is really
close to your face, and they’re looking at you
intensely, or you guys are laughing about
something but your faces are way closer
than is normal for friends and
you feel a kind of charge in the air—then it
might be kissin’ time. If you feel like it, lean
in a little closer, and do…
K i ss Ty pe 1 (a) : The Int ro Ki ss
This is the first kiss you ever have with a
new person. It’s simultaneously a greeting and announcement (“Hi! I like you!”),
and a way for you to get a sense of how the
other person kisses, to see if it’s compatible
with the way you like to kiss.
Here’s how you do it:
solves the problem of how weird it would
be to see another person that close up.)
4. Tilt your head to the right or left—if
your partner is starting to tilt in one direction, you go the opposite way. This is so
your noses don’t collide before your lips do.
If you can’t tell which way the other person’s gonna tilt, your best bet is to go right.
I’d say most people go right like 95 percent
of the time. (And if you make a miscalculation, just laugh it off and keep going.)
5. Gently touch your lips to your date’s
lips. No big smacks (you’re not kissing
your grandmother or your dog); no wideopen mouth (you’re not trying to devour
them). Just your lips, about as open as they
are when you’re just breathing through
your mouth.
6. At this point, you can apply a little pressure. Your lips are doing that kissing thing
you do when you kiss your pets and relatives, but like 80 percent softer, and your
lips are lingering on theirs about 500 percent longer. Hopefully by now your date
will have started kissing you back, just as
gently. And hoooraaaaay, you’re kissing!
If the idea of kissing someone’s mouth is
still a bit scary, and/or you’re really shy, you
can always try…
“Ki ss Ty pe 1 ( B) : C heek Kiss /
Sm i le Co mbo
1. You’re sitting next to your crush. You really want to kiss him/her but really don’t
know how to start.
2. Check to make sure that your crush is
also leaning in toward you. (You don’t want
to be moving your face, eyes closed and lips
puckered, toward someone who is playing
Bejeweled on their phone, totally unaware
of the plane that’s coming in for a landing…on their face.)
2. Quickly, like a sparrow, you dart in, kiss
the side of their cheek, and then, when
they look at you, you grin adorably at them
while biting your lip. (This works really
well for same-gender first kisses when you’re
not sure if the other person is interested in
girls, because if they react like “Um, what
are you doing??” you can act like ha ha ha
nothing, you’re just really friendly and
love hanging out with them!)
3. Optional: Close your eyes. (When in
doubt, I say close ’em: It’s traditional, and it
An Intro Kiss is not about making out. It’s
a gateway kiss–the kiss that lets you know
1. Lean in.
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whether someone (a) likes you the way you
like them and (b) feels right to kiss.
Kissing is actually pretty hard to describe, you guys. Is this nice, soft intro kiss
good? Do you like it? Is everyone happy?
Great! If you want, you can stop here.
Orrrrr you can advance to…
K i ss T y p e 2 : F re n c h
K i ss i n g
I know this feels like a major jump, but
french kissing just means using your tongue,
and you can definitely use your tongue without seriously making out . If your
tongues touch, you’re frenching. The end.
So you’re Intro Kissing, lips only, and it’s
nice, and you’re liking it, and you want to go
further. Try opening your mouth juuuuust a
little bit more. (Your date will probably open
her or his mouth more too, either because
they’ve done this before and know what’s up
or because they’re following your lead and
are enjoying this as much as you are.)
With your mouth open, gently (gently is
the key word here, folks) touch your date’s
tongue with your tongue, then tongueretreat back to your own mouth. Don’t
like shove your tongue in their
mouth without any warning, or stick
it really far back in their mouth. There’s
nothing necessarily wrong with that per
se, but for the first-time french kiss with
someone? Give them a minute before
you go licking their molars. Your partner
will probably understand quickly what’s
happening, and will hopefully touch your
tongue with their tongue. Soft. Gentle.
Your tongue is pretty relaxed during all
this, but never totally idle—keep it moving
in a calm, languid way, like licking an ice
cream cone. Don’t give your partner a totally flaccid, listless tongue, but don’t stiffen
up either, for either of these two extremes
is equally gross to receive.
Once you’ve started frenching, you can
always go back to kissing sans tongue.
Retract your tongue and do some more
Intro-style kissing. Vary open-mouthed
tongue kissing with closed-mouth kissing.
(If you keep your mouths open the entire
time, things can get pretty sloppy fast.)
Keep kissing with your lips, and add just
a touch of tongue here and there. It’s much
better that way, and you can move into
making out later.
Ki ss Ty pe 3 : Maki ng Out
Making out is when you’ve been kissing
for a while and there are open mouths and
frenching and the tongues are…not being quite so polite. Making out is when
your arms are around each other and the
tongues are really going at it and you’re
kissing for longer than, say, 30 seconds. A
makeout session is basically you and your
partner trying to get as close as possible
without actually consuming each other.
Hands roam all over the place; you will
probably get turned on. This is the most
intense form of kissing, and it can last for a
very, very long time.
But no discussion of kissing would be
complete without mentioning the basic
anti-kiss: a kiss that’s the opposite of all the
ones we’ve talked about so far. And that is:
Ki ss Ty pe 4 : The
No n-Sexual Peck
The peck is what your mom gives you on
the top of your head, or the way you kiss
your dad, grandpa, grandma, or other relation on the cheek. The peck is affectionate
but completely nonsexual, and that is why
in movies, when the hero wants to kiss a
girl goodnight and she very obviously
turns her face so he can kiss her cheek, we
all know nothing is going to happen between them. If someone is aiming for your
mouth and you turn your head dramatically and on purpose, that is, in our society,
a clear-cut “You’re nice but no thanks, I’m
not romantically interested” signal. A peck
can hurt someone’s feelings, but sometimes
you don’t feel romantic about someone,
and it can’t be helped.
So now we know the basics. Great! We’re
kissing! (Not with each other.) It’s fun!
Hopefully! But sometimes it isn’t. Things
don’t always go smoothly, not even for very
experienced kissers. So now it’s time for:
Ki ss Tro ublesho ot i ng
Bad breath: So you want to kiss someone,
and they want to kiss you, and you lean in,
and they lean in, and…oh wow. wow. This
person has horrible breath. I mean the
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kind that is so terrible that you can almost
see it hanging in the air. What do you do?
Welllll…how much do you want to kiss
this person? Is this a first kiss with someone you’ve had a crush on for ages? Is this
your boyfriend of three months? What’s
the situation here? It’s obvs up to you, but
I would say that if you really, really want
to kiss this person, and you’ve never kissed
them before, you might want to go for it.
Just this once! Of course, this is only if you
like them enough to deal with this unfortunate situation in the hopes that next time
will be a bit…mintier. A gross, but hopefully worthy, sacrifice.
But if you know this person a little bit better than that, you can totally say, “Hey, do you
want some gum?” This can be embarrassing
for the poor girl/guy, though, so try this trick:
If you suspect kissing might happen at any
point when you’re out with someone, you
cannot go wrong by putting gum or mints
in your pocket and offering your date one
while chomping on one yourself, before kissing ever has a chance to happen. Act like you
just always eat mints, and it’s super-natural to
offer one to her/him.
And of course if it just doesn’t seem
worth it, at the moment you become alerted to the situation, when your lips are close
to theirs, you are well within your rights to
retreat and say vaguely, “You know what,
this just doesn’t feel right.” (And if you’re
on the other end of this, please don’t be
ashamed. Bad breath is easily treatable and
not a reflection on your character. If you
brush and floss regularly, didn’t just eat a
bunch of onions and garlic, and you don’t
smoke, ask your dentist and/or your regular
doctor to help you figure out what’s going
on. Nip the problem in the bud—isn’t it
worth it if it means more kissing? )
Slobbering: You’re kissing, you’re
frenching, and…your date thinks it’s their
mission in life to swab your entire mouth
with their tongue. To them, a sexy kiss is
the wettest, sloppiest one possible. They are
licking your lips, the inside of your mouth,
they may even (yes) lick your face. what
the hell is going on this is terrible someone help.
Slobbering is dreadful and often inflicted
by someone who really really really wants to
kiss but has very little experience doing so.
They’re trying to make the kiss really sexy,
and for some reason they think this is the
best way to do so. They are wrong. They
must be stopped immediately. Here’s how:
1. Pull away from the slobberer.
2. Assuming you like this slobberer, smile.
3. Say, “I like kissing you really softly, like
this.”
4. Then demonstrate what feels nice to you.
Kiss your partner very gently, throwing in
a little bit of tongue, but way less than
they were using with you.
5. Pull away. Smile. (You are so friendly and
encouraging and not at all humiliating!)
6. Then lean in to give them another chance.
Your partner (if they are not stupid) should
immediately try to emulate what you just
did. If the new kiss shows marked improvement, congratulations! There’s hope.
If, however, the new kiss is just as bad
as—or worse than—the original slobbery
kiss…I’m so sorry, hunnybun, but this person might not be ready for the hotness of
your kisses. (Unless, of course, sloppy kisses
are your jam. Who knows? Everyone likes
different things.)
But if you want to keep kissing them, but
not in the way where you feel like you’re being mauled by a bear, try these steps:
1. Stop kissing your partner immediately,
and pull away from her/him.
2. Give them a surprised/confused look,
and then slowly and carefully begin kissing them again. You can put a hand right
under their collarbone as a signal that you
want them to stay on their side of this kiss
rather than tackle you. Your hand is resting there, not actually pushing them away.
(If you’re continually physically pushing
someone away and they keep ignoring it,
this is worse than a bad kiss. It’s coercion,
it’s force, and the only positive thing about
it is that it lets you know right away that
this is not a person you want to be involved with.)
3. If this beast still isn’t getting your message, stop again, explain to them how you
Oddly aggressive kissing: You’re kissing,
you’re frenching, and…your date has totally taken over. They’re kissing you really
aggressively, maybe grabbing the back of
your head hard, shoving their tongue in
your mouth and pushing it around. Their
teeth actually touched your teeth, and you
didn’t like it. Meanwhile, you are clearly
not matching their level of forcefulness
and…gusto. This person is totally disregarding your body language, which is
communicating that you are not really into
this kind of kissing at all.
One thing you can do here, if you’re
really uncomfortable, is put a total stop
to the proceedings, go home, and watch
Downton Abbey. You can try again some
other time if you feel like it, but maybe you
won’t, and that’s just fine.
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want to be kissed, and demonstrate this
preference on their mouth. This is their
last chance: If this doesn’t fix the problem, take your leave. Go find someone
else to kiss. Kissing is supposed to be fun,
you guys!
Now, like I said, maybe none of this advice applies to you. Maybe you have your
own idiosyncratic kissing technique; that’s
awesome, since knowing what you like in
terms of kissing will help you figure out
what you like sexually for the rest of your
life. Maybe you’re the girl who loves
the feeling of a slack wet tongue resting
in your mouth like a dead squid. Again,
congratulations; you have a jump-start on
knowing yourself.
My point is that there’s no “right” way to
kiss. There’s only what you like, and what
your kissing partner likes, and whether and
how you two match up. Wait until you’re
really and truly ready, and then embark on
a lifetime of practice (the fun kind). 2
Let’s make some old memories.
By Erica
Thanks to Beth and Eira for modeling, and to Recollection Vintage for the clothes.