Creating Sparks That Last & All Things Relationships

Dormant Feelings Can Be Re-Ignited You can also find new ways to feel by learning more about each other. To recap on last weeks’ post about honest and open vulnerability and making a commitment to the happiness of your relationship, I’ve got a few pointers below to steer the process in the right direction.  To learn a little more about your mate it’ll help to understand some of these ideas: Unique         🔸 What are your interests, individually and as a couple? Connect     🔸Physically and emotionally with eye contact Consistent     🔸 Commit ahead of time to a time frame that suits both your calendars for date events Vulnerability   🔸 Be prepared to talk of sensitive issues without fear of betrayal Laughter     🔸It really is the best medicine ; choose outings that tickle your funny bone I am not a marriage counsellor, I’m not even a relationship guide; what I am, is a wife. I have been a wife to the same man for 33 years. I won’t say always happily because that would b

FIND YOUR UNIQUE SPARK Choose ways to ignite your relationship that make both of you happy Image credit @casey-horner via Unsplash ♥ Notice how I said ‘unique’?   There is no one size fits all to a relationship so don’t compare your relationship to anyone else’s.  Each one is a unique fit. I largely chose our dates myself for Date Year but I made sure to integrate James’ preferences as well. This is how our experiences became unique to us. I use words like ‘both’, ‘our’ and ‘us’ because marriage is exclusively about the two of you. Three’s a crowd, no doubt about it. We’re not talking about socializing, we’re talking about connecting. Your marriage needs to grow the two of you together so choose your date experiences wisely. ♥ Be consistent. Don’t let the inconvenience of everyday life get in the way of making a commitment to the happiness of your marriage.                           ♥ Regularity brings results. A once-off just won't cut it. ♥ Honest and open vulnerability is a nece

Goals to Make Your Relationship Zing! Image credit @unsplash by @jonathansborba When James and I completed our Date Year Experiment, we came away with solid ideas of what we wanted our relationship to look like. We set goals to ensure that we got the very best outcome. I'll outline some of them here, along with additional ideas from practicalintimacy.com https://pin.it/1N7Qi1l 🔥 Know your boundaries and limitations:          ❣   As well as knowing your own boundaries and letting your partner figure out theirs, you also   need to know your limitations: own your faults, your shortcomings and areas of   required improvement. Don't try to dictate your partners' limitations to them, this is about you taking ownership of your own stuff. 🔥 Validate your own feelings and emotions:         ❣   Maintaining the status quo to keep the peace is not an option. Name your feelings, name your emotions without having to defend them. They just are  because that is what you're experienci

NO SPARK STAYS ALIGHT WITHOUT EFFORT Our Date Event for the year proved to be thoroughly worthwhile. James and I had bonded over new experiences and quality time alone, but that by no means meant we could sit back and watch our marriage continue to flourish all on its own. Just as there is no perfect person out there, yes I’m talking to you, there is also no perfect relationship or marriage out there. If you consider for a moment, that essentially you are two strangers from different backgrounds with your own opinions, cultures and personality, so you are bound to disagree on some topics, which is to be expected. And if you’re not disagreeing some of the time, I would venture to say that one of you is sacrificing too much of your self or possibly even being unnecessarily passive.  We should be playing to each others’ strengths not highlighting weaknesses, but building them up as best we know how. Relationships require fine-tuning all the time Every day we are faced with situations tha

 Best of Both Worlds https://unsplash.com/@courtniebt13 Our date on this occasion required compromise. Not usually a big problem in healthy relationships so it was little hardship to convince James to come with me to the Market. As we strolled around looking at this stall and that, he even showed interest in the items I was looking at. A door stopper for one, which the ever practical man in him couldn't help but state, "I can fit one for you." Well thank you dear, I thought, but I don't want a spoke sticking out of the skirting on the wall for the door to magnetize to, I would prefer a more aesthetically appealing one like this weighted anchor thanks. Instead, I concurred to have a look at other options. In the end, James was happy for us to go back to the stall to buy the anchor door stop. Well wouldn't you know it? Nope, it wasn't sold, it was still sitting there waiting for me, but the vendor's Point of Sale device couldn't connect to the wifi signa

How to Practice Self Love We're going to take a step back today with the important distinction that it is not a step backWARDS.  We're going to remind ourselves that without self-love our relationships suffer. What does loving yourself mean to you? In my experience, radical self-love is both internal and external. Earlier this week I'd had a bad nights' sleep and woke up feeling it. I recognised the need for a little 'me-lovin' so took myself out into the garden. Alas! There were roadworks out the front (I live in a cul-de-sac!) and a jackhammering neighbour out the back! No space for self reflection outdoors. So what did I do to show myself a bit of self-care? I wrapped myself up in bed. My mindset was nowhere near ready for affirmations of self love so I simply listened to my breath. After just a few minutes my focus turned inward. I noticed that I was well, I was loved and I was very fortunate to be wrapped up in bed. The switch was miniscule. I hardly notice

  Follow your nose, it knows what to do Rocks of Knowledge Given the fire ravaged state our small town was in at the time, our intended 5km bike ride to the beach had to be re-planned. The poor air quality and visibility would have compromised our health and safety and besides, other people had suffered far greater loss than our intended bike ride. We hopped into our car instead and decided to ‘see where we would end up.’ Following the roads to cleaner air we found ourselves in Tuncurry and literally followed our noses to be led hand-in-hand to the Rocks of Knowledge. Firstly following our noses was both literal and figurative as we sought out clearer air to breath and quite frankly found ourselves   at the Rocks of Knowledge . If we had ridden our bikes, we certainly would have had a wonderful time, but on this occasion instead, we got to hold hands and amble into a profound wisdom to trust our instincts – this was a broader aspect of knowledge we hadn’t expected to acquire, yet