Tag: relationships

COMMUNICATE FROM THE HEART

You can foster a loving atmosphere with heartfelt communication. Thank your partner for the little things. Say well done. Commiserate, but don’t try to blame or ‘fix’ if they have a hard day at work. Be respectful, of their time, effort, attention. Sure, it may not be the best breakfast you’ve ever had, but if they tried to be romantic by serving it to you in bed, great.

Don’t take things for granted either.   Of course we all love to get presents for birthdays or Christmas, but don’t get so fixated on that new pair or earrings of great pair or sneakers that you totally  miss the fact that your partner made breakfast in bed, or detailed your car until it was showroom new.

Remember than any gift you give, is a conscious choice to be loving, to think of you, and to put you first instead of spending the money on themselves. It is not owed to you and is not as important as a loving atmosphere between you and your partner. Christmas or your birthday is only one day. You need to be loving for all 365 in the year. And for all the days of your marriage if you get married, not just your wedding day in front of all your friends and family.

There is a particularly awful cereal commercial on the TV lately, in which a hapless guy who strongly resembles the human equivalent of an Old English Sheepdog, tries to engage his wife in a conversation about the new cereal she is eating.

She looks more like she is drinking vinegar, tunred down mouth, narrowed eyes, because he seems to be implying she needs to lose weight, when all he is doing is reading from the box.

Of course, the more he reasds from the box, the more pissy she gets, until the pooint where communication breaks down totally.
To her demand, “What else does the box say.” The guy sheepishly gives up. “Shut up, Steve.”

To which the guy gets a smug satsfied sarcastic smile and no doubt crawls away to lick his wounds, while she goes back to chewing the cereal with such tight-lipped miserable fury you would think she was eating overcooked liver, not a delightful new health cereal.

This woman is clearly not communicating from the heart. In fact, she is acting like she has no heart, no compassion for her supposed love one at all.

ROMANCE AND SARCASM ARE NOT REALLY COMPATABLE Are you going around in your life treating your partner in that manner? Think of the origin of the word sarcasm. It means to rend or tear flesh. Are you ripping your partner to pieces if he opens his mouth over the least little thing? He’s a guy, for Heaven’s sake. He is never going to be as eloquent as your favorite movie or TV stars on screen. Those guys are scripted. This is real life.

You can all relate to the miserable feeling you had if you ever said something unskillful or embarrassing in public. Why put your partner through that tortuous feeling when you could be fostering romance instead.

Maybe the woman in the ad was a bad morning person, but really, if your spouse or partner is willing to take an interest in anything new that you do, go with it! And vice versa. I know a lot of women who hate golf, but go because they get to spend time with their man, and get to go out into some fairly pretty natural settings. And to the 19th hole afterwards. All of this can be time for communicating and keeping your energy in tune and in synch with one another. To stifle communication like the woman in the ad is to stifle the free interplay and flow of love.

UNCONDITIONAL LOVE

All of us would like to be loved unconditionally. But are we willing to offer unconditional love to others? REALLY?

I will love you even if:
You forget my birthday
You don’t take me out to dinner
You forget to take out the trash
You leave the toilet seat up
You squeeze the toothpaste in the middle fo the tube
You run up huge credit card debts
You are unfaithful to our relationship

Until you can say “I will love you no matter what you do or say,” it is not unconditional love.

Think about three situations where you could have expressed your love for your partner better. Then think of three instances where they could have been more loving towards you. Do they have anything in common?  If so, what can you do to choose love instead of anger?

LOVE IS AN ACTIVE CHOICE

Staying in a relationship is an active choice we make every day.  We may have many different reasons for staying in the relationship, but the primary reason for being a couple is to love and cherish each other.

So, we can choose. Do we act in a positive and loving manner, praising, being warm and affectionate?

Or are we negative, critical, always finding fault, freezing out our partner if they displease us? Do we hold a grudge, or come up with a worse-case scenario?

Are we expecting our partner to be a mind-reader and punishing them when they aren’t? Are we offering them the same unconditional love that we crave, that we wish for ourselves? Or are we always judging them and finding them lacking in some spoken or unspoken way: if only he would… Or yes, he’s good but not good enough…

Again, this is all in the eye of the beholder. But wouldn’t you rather be happy and wrong, than right and alone? If you cling you your wants, needs and beliefs as RIGHT, you’ll most likely be left with them and only them. The love in your relationship will evaporate if you don’t work to keep the romance between you alive.

Read more in: Keeping the Romance in Your Relationship Part 6

HEARTFELT COMMITMENT
The subtitle of Dr Chapman’s book, How to Express Heartfelt Commitment to Your Mate, is also a valuable lesson in romance, which should be felt in the heart.

If you are constantly discontent and always thinking that the grass is greener elsewhere in another garden, you are not expressing heartfelt connection and commitment with your partner.

You are also causing your own unhappiness, because it is your mind creating the discontent by constantly comparing and contracsting what you have, with what you wish for–or think you wish for.

I always thought I wanted a Westie terrier-I ended up with an abandoned 14 year old with sharp teeth, jaws of steel, and kidney failure. I always thought I wanted a cocker spaniel, but $10,000 in vet’s bills later… You get the idea.

AN ATTITUDE OF GRATITUDE
Yes, I got my Westie, and she was hard work, especially toward the end, having to give her an IV every day when she wanted nothing more than to rip my arm off and eat it! But the joy she felt when we gave her a bath, or when she hunted squirrels in the park with my 4 year old dog, was wonderful to see.

I got the cocker spaniel I always wanted, but she came with a host of health problems, but each day she improves and grows in confidence, and knows she is loved and adored for the first time in her life.  I am grateful every day for the unconditional love she gives not just to me, but the whole family.

PERFECT IS IN THE EYE OF THE BEHOLDER

Neither of my dogs is perfect—tbut then, perfect is in the mind of the beholder.  The same is true of your partner. And yes, he might have seemed perfect at first, and then he changed.

Is it really that he changed, or, is it that your point of view or opinion changed? That once you were out of the infatuation phase of the relationship (which usually lasts 5- 8 months) and once you are married and past the honeymoon, the things you thought once thought were adorably quirky end up being as annoying as fingernails on a blackboard.

But by being grateful for the little things every day, you’ll stop looking for greener grass. You’ll be happy with the grass itself. You will also be thankful for the challenges that your partner brings to your life, such as helping you learn to be more patient and how to try to live in peace and harmony.

This article is continued in Keeping the Romance in Your Relationship Part 5.

THE FIVE LOVE LANGUAGES
In Gary Chapman’s wonderful 5 Love Languages series of books, at http://www.fivelovelanguages.com, Chapman presents the theory that each person has their own main way of communicating his or her love from amongst these 5 methods:

Words Of Affirmation (praising, thanking)
Quality Time
Receiving Gifts
Acts of Service (errands, laundry)
Physical Touch

Each of us has a primary love language, and a secondary one. Chapman accounts for the ‘loss of love’ after we marry (or move in together) as due to couples failing to speak each other’s love language, or, in some cases, mis-communicating within the love language, because, let’s face it, not all of us are the greatest orators.

We learned lessons about love from family, friends, past relationships, romantic and otherwise, as witnesses to our parents’ and friends’ relationships, marriages and even divorces. All of these can affect how we ‘speak our love language.’

With divorce running at 50%, it makes sense to wonder what conscious and unconscious messages we are communicating in our relationships? And are we getting married with “Until death do us part,” very firmly in mind, or “Until I decide it just isn’t working/meet someone else”?

THE WINTER OF OUR DISCONTENT
What are the common reasons for divorce?

Money and infidelity.

We live in the most prosperous country in the world, in dwelling FULL of material goods, hot and cold running water, indoor plumbing, refrigerators full of food. How much is enough? And is is so important that it’s worth damaging your primary love relationship?

Only 4% of affairs ever result in a long-term relationship, with long-term defined as two years or more. (Yikes-that’s LONG TERM?)

Over 70% of those who had the affair wish they had never been unfaithful, and wish they could go back to the way things were with their spouse.

Clearly, something is amiss here. So let’s break it down: What needs is each spouse trying to get fulfilled in each case?

HOW MUCH IS ENOUGH?
We ALL want to be successful, happy, free from suffering and want. Feeling loved is a very real need. But how much is enough?

Your own mind defines ‘enough’. Plus, a lot of people are not clear about what they are looking for in a relationship, so how can they feel romantic with someone they believe is not giving them what they want?

We are not arguing that people should settle for less, but there are ways of communicating your needs without seeming selfish, putting your partner on the defensive, or making them feel that no matter what they do, it is never good enough.

If your partner tries to give you a gift or arrange a ‘special’ time together, give them credit for a good, loving intention, even if it isn’t exactly what you wanted. Nothing in life is perfect. Not even you!

The most wonderful thing about relationships, though, is that they can be a wonderful garden for personal growth. But like all gardens, it needs to be tended, and weeded.

Read on in
Keeping the Romance in Your Relationship Part 4.

YOU’VE LOST THAT LOVIN’ FEELING?

If you have been together for some time with your partner, and feel that passion had gone onto the back burner, or worse still, in the freezer with the ready meals, why not consider a romance agreement?

It might help you spark things anew, or at least put your needs as man and woman back out on the table, and possibly even defrost them too. We will give an exampe of one later in this series.

PASSION IS FOR PARENTS TOO!
Yes, you might be parents, but what were all the things you loved most about each other that brought you together in the first place.

And as someone once said to me, “You most important job as a parent is loving your partner, because no matter what, you will always be connected through that child.”

What kind of connection, or dis-connection, are you creating in your house?

As your children are growing up, you will constantly be giving them messages about how to express love, and what makes a good marriage.

Obviously, the sexual side of your relationship should always remain private around small children and other members of you family and friends, but an atmosphere of appreciation, romance and connection, love and affection, is something you can cultivate with your partner all the time.

THE BEST THINGS IN LIFE ARE FREE

Best of all, the best things in life really are free, or inexpensive. It doesn’t take much to leave a love note, send a ‘Thinking of You’ text message or email, or bring up a cup of coffee to your partner before you head off it work. There are so many different ways to show you are thinking of your partner, it is just a case of knowing his or her likes and needs.

LOVE THEM THEY WAY THEY WISH TO BE LOVED, NOT THE WAY YOU WISH TO LOVE THEM—OR BE LOVED YOURSELF

We might think that we ARE trying to cultivate romance, and our partner is the ‘unromantic one’. This perspective can cause hositlity and resentment.

But remember, everyone has their own point of view. Most of the time, we are in our own head; often, we can even get stuck there and become convinced that ours is not only the RIGHT point of view, but IS actually the ONLY point of view.

We tend to love the way WE wish to be loved. We probably don’t give our guy a box of chocolates for Valentine’s Day, just like they don’t give us a socket wrench set for our birthday.

But are there expectations in your relationship on his part, or yours, which are equally out of synch with their likes and dislikes?

THE BEST OF TIMES, THE WORST OF TIMES
Can you name three of the best times you ever had with your partner—do they have a common theme? Can they do the same? Can you come up with the three WORST times you spent together as well?

BEST and WORST are also very subjective notions, but chances are if you and your partner cultivate more times like the ones on your top 3 lists, your connections will continue and grow even closer.

Again, LISTEN to your partner, taking the trouble to learn THEIR likes and dislikes. Try not to hear what they are saying with a ‘filter’ of your own tastes, or some preconceived notion of what romance ‘is supposed to be like’. Really listening with your heart and mind will help you discover the way THEY actually wish to be loved.

Read more in:
Keeping the Romance in Your Relationship Part 3

Keeping the romance in your relationship is really all about staying connected with one another.

How do you stay connected? By spending time with each other, sharing with each other, and yes, through the connection of sex.

COUPLES COUPLE!
Sex is the ultimate connection and reason why a couple is together as a couple—to couple! Otherwise, you could just go to dinner or the movies with anyone, and get a baby via the sperm bank!

Clearly, humans feel a natural sexual desire and passion, and seek a healthy outlet for it.

If intercourse gives you thrombosis
And continence causes neurosis,
I’d rather expire
Fulfilling desire
Than live in a state of psychosis.

So why does sex in the 21st century seem so problematic that advice about it is screamed at us from every magazine headline? If we are living in much more liberated times than ever before, just what IS the trouble with sex?

Sexual intercourse began
In nineteen sixty-three
(Which was rather late for me)—
Between the end of the Chatterley ban
And the Beatles’ first LP.
–Philip Larkin (June 16, 1967)

THE KEY TO IT ALL: A FOUR-LETTER WORK ENDING IN -K
Oddly enough, in an age where we are on email and cell phones 24/7, our communication skills seem to have broken down completely. There may be a lot of TALK, but not a lot of listening. The best mobile network or WiFi connection, but no communion.

What passes for busi-ness is really just BUSY-ness, and writing the To Do List, is a substitute for actually doing the things on the list. Which means the list will NEVER get done. There will always be a new list. So why not add intercourse to you list?

Have you ever thought about the word intercourse? It means TALK as well!

To be strictly accurate, the word intercourse is defined as:

The exchange of ideas by writing, speech, or signals: communication, communion, intercommunication (Roget s II: The New Thesaurus, Third Edition. 1995)

Isn’t THAT the kind of romantic relationship you would like? Real intercommuncation and communion?

IS THERE REALLY ANY SUCH THING AS ‘HAVING IT ALL’?

Often the couples who want to ‘have it all’ end up having the least amount of sex and romance. It’s like everything else on the to do list is more important.

Or, as some psychologists have suggested, that people get married/settle down so they can stop having sex/looking for sex. They want to focus on other things, career, house, nesting, children.

Sex is sacrificed in favor of ‘getting ahead’-but many partners wake up one day and wonder how on earth they got HERE? How the romance may hve started out so blissfully, and ended up relegated to a furtive fumble every few weeks if you’re lucky.

Intercourse with a woman is sometimes a satisfactory substitute for masturbation. But it takes a lot of imagination to make it work.
Karl Kraus

Focusing on long term goals is fine, so long as BOTH couples are on board with that agenda. And not BORED with it.

If you ARE wondering how you got HERE, and ARE Bored with the lack of romantic spark in your relationship, read on…

See more at Keeping the Romance in Your Relationship Part 2