I've manifested many other things in life without the pink candle (or any candle, for that matter). I think that was the original article writer's idea to make it sound "romancey". But it does send a good subconscious signal of "I'm serious about this." So I'm all for that. Anything to boost subconscious involvement with manifesting will make it much faster. But 30 traits should be plenty -- that stretches you enough to really make you think, but not so much that you're just tossing out everything that comes to mind, whether you really want it or not.