Romance!

If your relationship is lacking in intimacy lately, here's a great example of how to get out of your rut. My friend Jon Bradbury wrote this post *on his own, of his own accord* to his lovely new wife today.

I bought the ring one year after our first date. An October wedding was plan C. The country club was plan B and plan A was marrying her a long time ago. Pretty much from the first moments of our first date!
—  with Allison Uhl

This guy gets it in a way that, sadly, I think too many people don't. "It" is the act of creating romance. Sunsets are nice, but the sun ain't setting to make your special someone feel love and connection. That part is up to you.

This isn't about flirting or trying to get "business time" started. It's about keeping the butterflies, that spark when you touch hands unexpectedly, it's about tending that relationship garden.

Don't give me some lame "but I don't know how" - there's a lot you didn't know how to do until you learned it. And forget "I don't do stuff like that" - that crap ain't gonna fly. Fact is, you want this kind of heartwarming affection from your special someone too!

But I know this won't be the last time my friend makes this kind of romantic gesture because he understands that she's worth it and their relationship is worth it. Can't start a fire without a spark, y'all.

It doesn't have to be a facebook post, though we do live in modern times and use modern methods of communication, so it's definitely not a bad option.

One idea I suggest is that you watch The Notebook and write down all of the words that come bursting from your heart. Then later, when you feel like expressing some genuine feelings, grab your notes and pick one to share. Write it on plain old lined paper, fold it up like you used to in school and discretely pass it under the dinner table. Send flowers to the office but make sure the note was hand written by you. Send a postcard to your own house if they get the mail. Pick some random date of the year and make it your "Just because I love you" day and organize a day of doing their favorite things and make sure you keep doing it annually.

Thank you Jon for helping me with a point I've been trying to make. And anyone who takes this guidance and applies it, you're sincerely welcome :)

I mean, let's stop allowing the long held fantasy that marriage should be basically wonderful if you're with the right person. The truth is that those marriages that look so perfect and easy probably actually fall into one of these categories:
The couple can put on a really good show.
The couple happens to fall into the micro-fraction sized group of people whose marriage actually is somehow, magically easy.
They have worked their butts off to keep the love alive, often more than once throughout the course of their relationship.

Look at how hard it is for you (any "you") just to have a healthy and positive relationship WITH YOURSELF. Or with your coworkers. Or parents. Etc, etc.

Then add another equally complex human being to the mix, with whom you now have to navigate all of the same wonderful, crazy-making, crappy, awesome stuff that is life.

Isn't the whole point of being in a committed relationship so neither of you have to go through all that alone?

The ol' standard marriage vows are too easily set aside as cliche. Old words that sound biblical but don't really apply anymore.

But take another look (yes, take the gender specific aspects out) and who doesn't deeply desire to be honored and cherished? To be held and know kept safe within another person's heart?

Those things don't happen all on their own from nothing. If you want to feel loved, you can't just sit there and sulk. You can take some initiative and change the way you see your special someone, change how you perceive their actions, change your own actions and how you perceive yourself.

"Love" as a feeling is fleeting. But to choose to love as an action, as something you DO, that is when the real magic happens.

That love feeling is wonderful but it's purely chemical. It has little value in the long run. You nor your special someone did anything to make that love feeling happen. You didn't earn it, create it. And neither of you made or let it die. That love feeling is just the matchstick getting lit but you've (each of you) got to chop the wood, fan the flames and sit downwind of smoke sometimes if you want the fire to keep going.