Today I am going to talk about 10 Keys for A Phenomenal Relationship!
What if you have new possibilities for creating a phenomenal relationship every day?
The first key is Intentional Communication. Love is a choice, not an easy answer to getting life right. Choosing to ask questions and staying engaged verbally is essential for a relationship to thrive.
The more we are willing to talk to each other honestly, and learn how to stay present and listen, the more we are continually gaining valuable information about ourselves and our “enjoyable” other.
With every question, you are creating a space where you can choose toward the phenomenal future, life, & relationship that you both can perceive with enthusiasm.
Discussing what you would like your life to be like gives you clarity on what each of you truly desire. Sharing your desires for your future requires vulnerability and trust that you will not judge each other. Trust and vulnerability are both keys to true intimacy.
Intentionally communicating what does not work for us is also a key to having a phenomenal relationship. Especially at the beginning, we have the choice to be totally honest with any “deal breakers.” How many relationships end because people refuse to have an honest conversation?
Having a relationship that gets better and better includes having difficult conversations when you know they are required. The longer you wait, the harder it is to begin addressing whatever is concerning you. You might think you are keeping things comfortable by avoiding sensitive topics but the weight of the issue will get heavier and heavier the longer you wait.
Take a deep breath and start with a question, stay present and calm while you speak, especially focus on listening. Refuse to interrupt your partner while they respond, even if you feel frustrated.
Try not to jump to conclusions or judgments. Not everything means what you think it means. In fact, most difficult discussions will never end where you think they will, unless you have already concluded something. A gut wrenching, heartbreaking conversation could bring you closer to your partner. By acknowledging where you are in your relationship and where you desire to go, your relationship immediately expands into something greater.
The second key to creating phenomenal relationships is sexual pleasure and nourishing touch for your body. Remember, our bodies are in these relationships too. They desire to touch and be touched by other bodies. Are you willing to acknowledge how your body likes being touched? Are you willing to show your lover how to touch you, and discover what gives their body pleasure?
If you avoid touching or being touched, what are you actually avoiding? Are you just not a hugger? Do you also avoid having sex? First of all, it’s okay. Whatever is going on for you right now, it’s okay. Please do not go into self judgement of your body or your sex life thus far. If you want to stop listening or jump out the window, it might be why we avoid talking about sex openly, it tends to come with a shit ton of judgment. If you are having it, not having it, you’re somehow wrong, and there may be nothing that creates more judgment than sex. When we avoid sexual pleasure because are we scared of being judged, we are buying the judgement as real and true, immediately causing us to judge ourselves and our lovers, our bodies, and sex, even harsher.
Isn’t it strange how sexual pleasure is projected as dark and naughty? What if your point of view was that sex and pleasure is natural and has nothing to do with being good, or bad, right or wrong? If you are starting out with the judgment that sex is bad and everyones judgments are important, you are not going to discover your’s, your body’s, or your lovers’ true points of pleasure.
How much does that affect your relationship? Most men commit to relationships so they can count on having sex, and consider it an absolute necessity to their happiness, health, and well being. Just because men have that point of view does not mean that women should just have sex to have a man. What if sex could be just for fun for women too? It sounds strange saying out loud. 🙂
Guess what is also vital for most men in relationships? TO GIVE YOU PLEASURE! And then more pleasure. And then maybe one more time, just kidding. I had assumed and I think this is a common misconception, is that men just want to have sex because it feels good to them. And a lot of us women might either resent how often men desire sex and make them wrong, or we choose to have sex just for them, and assume that is part of what you do when you are in a relationship.
It is easy for couples to find their routine in bed and have a comfortable sex life and there is nothing wrong with that, but what if it could get better and better? And ladies, how much pleasure have we been avoiding that we might truly be enjoying?
And of course, our bodies desire more than sex and so do men. More touching. More nourishment. My husband loves when I scratch his back. I love having a yummy bath that relaxes my body. Find out what your body desires by asking more questions!
Next is what my husband calls Collaborative Imagination. When you choose to collaborate on an activity like cooking dinner, planning a dream vacation, even making the grocery list together, you are engaging and connecting with your loved one. You are also both taking part in enjoying and creating your relationship today and into the future.
Conspiring to plan something fun together, just for fun, and just for the two of you is conspiring ways to be closer. Going on adventures that you plan together gets you out of your routine and into quality time. This usually makes the relationship stronger.
You can also create a phenomenal relationship by surprising your partner with something you have always wanted to do together, or something that you know they would love. Spending the time to orchestrate a day just about them is a lovely way to show you care and will make a lasting impression. Get creative! What would touch their heart to receive?
I once sent my husband to Vegas when I was pregnant so he could join our friends last minute. He was so shocked and happy to go have a blast with friends and of course he brought me back a lovely handbag.
Talk about the future. Not just your dream vacation but what you desire your future to be like. Do you desire it to be wild and full of romantic adventures? Do you dream of a life of ease and quiet, away from the bustle of city life? If you could ask for anything to show up in your future, what would it be? What does your relationship look like in three years? In five years? In twenty years? These discussions will usually spark inspiration. Which is the next key.
Inspire each other. What inspires you? Do you love to paint? To be in nature? Even if you do not like the same creative activities, the more time you spend on your own, either writing in a journal or playing songs on your guitar, you are also inspiring each other to be greater and adding to your phenomenal relationship. Stay active in what you love to do no matter what, invite them to join you if you know it will be fun for them.
You do not need to share everything with your partner. If you love salsa dancing and he just isn’t interested, go have a blast dancing with friends who like to dance. If he loves to watch sports, great, what can you do for you while he watches the game? Please do not sit there making comments on basketball games with your face painted to prove what a perfect match you are!
It is silly to think that sharing everything means you are a close couple. There might be lots of activities that you both naturally enjoy together and that is lovely. Pushing each other to do anything that is not really fun for both of you is not kind to either of you. I know Dr. Chapman talks about learning each other’s love languages and that part of marriage is doing something you do not like to do. This is where I must ask, what the fuck else is possible?
I feel this weird, heavy, and I don’t know what other word to use, but phony energy when I ask my husband if he would like to take a longer walk than we usually do and yes slowly says yes just to make me happy. I immediately make an excuse to go home or just walk by myself because for me, forced family fun is just not fun. I would rather no one sacrifice their freedom to prove their love to me.
This is another key to phenomenal relationships, Allowance. Allowance in relationships is : you get to do whatever you like without being made wrong and your partner is allowed to do whatever they like without your judgement either, both while honoring each other (eg not sleeping with other people if you know that does not work for your husband), not leaving town without letting each other know etc, honoring is another key, which simply means holding in regard).
Even if you see your partner choosing something that you know is limiting them in some way, or not the choice you would make, and believe me, you will see this a lot in relationships, you refuse to “help them” make better choices. Remember, you being you and choosing more for you will inspire them, but you have to be okay with your partner making their own choices. Allowance is what creates more freedom in relationships. For many men, a woman who simply does not make them wrong is an extremely attractive quality. Please know that when you make someone wrong, you are REJECTING THEM!
This can bring up a lot of icky feelings. I have a friend whose girlfriend often lets him know how lucky he is that she is there to “make him the best version of himself.” I bite my tongue when she says these things but I am tempted to ask , “what’s wrong with him?” Of course I am relieved not to have these discussions where we have to sort through someone’s judgements of their partner. It is extremely unpleasant because not only are judgments lies, they are lies you are actually holding against yourself. We only judge others for something we have done that is similar or somewhere we are judging ourselves.
With judgment, positive or negative, we are still forced to prove our love and affection. If you need someone to prove they love you, are you giving them a job that actually belongs to you?
Now, there is something amazing about a relationship where you discover more and more of yourself because of the person who is loving you. I don’t know if I needed my husband to prove he loved me, but I had no clue what was lovable about me until he started loving me. And I honestly can only see maybe 1% of the ME that he knows and adores. And I am genuinely inspired by the woman he sees, and the woman my kids know me to be.
