Save your Relationship!

How To Save Your Relationship

 

Save Your Relationship

What is your relationship like? Are you quarreling frequently? Has it become more of a convenience than a haven from the world out there? Do you want to save your relationship?
What if you could recapture that long ago sweetness and spark that your relationship once had? Would you like to feel that again? The answer may not be simple . . . but then again, maybe it is.


We propose that you need to do something different—something novel—to change your way of relating, to REfresh your relating and REdiscover each other again. Novelty is the new love drug of choice.
Recent research shows that novelty, taking risks or trying something new, can actually trigger the release of dopamine in the brain, the happiness hormone which would help you save your relationship. Dr. Arthur Aron writes in the New York Times, that self-expansion, the desire to grow and change is critical to boosting a couple’s level of commitment and increase their happiness.

You can do something novel by yourself and bring what you discover home to your partner, or you can do something new together. If you do this alone, you may become a more interesting person to be around and you might even start seeing your partner in a new light. Or if you do this together, instead of the attitude of “working” on your relationship, you could learn to “play ” in your relationship. What a novel idea!

 

Save Your Relationship - Where do you start?

You could go to a different restaurant, take a cooking class together, start walking or hiking together, go to a concert, or volunteer for a good cause. That might be helpful, at least in the short term.
But what if you were to go on retreat—alone or together. This could be as simple as a weekend alone or something more involved, like attending a workshop and getting to know yourself and each other better? We both go to one workshop a year alone and then of course we teach our own workshops together. About half the people who come are couples.

I recently met a newlywed couple at a workshop I attended. They were both doctors. She planned the wedding—he planned the honeymoon. As part of the honeymoon he signed them up for a workshop. They discovered exciting new things about themselves and each other that week. My perception was that their love for each other grew far deeper. I appreciated his creativeness and their collective openness.

You learn to stop blaming each other for differences that seem to get in your way, and you develop a new depth of appreciation for being the unique people you are.

That’s really what loving someone is about—appreciating them for who they are—and also feeling appreciated— with each person taking 100% responsibility for their part.
If you are not in a relationship and have had trouble creating a healthy relationship, come learn how to “do yourself” differently—in new and healthier ways. Come save yourself—then the relationship will follow.