What is the Fun Quotient in your relationship? Couples have the tendency to become complacent in their relationship including the fun aspect of their relating. This is traumatic to the relationship as it stifles its energy flow creating a numb, stuck and disconnect feel and dissatisfied partners.
Regardless of your relationship stage, it is imperative that you have fun with your partner. Your brain and body chemistry change when you have fun together. This engenders and supports bonding and connectedness. Partnership fun creates positive and loving energy in your in-between that creates aliveness, passion, and intimacy. There are other countless benefits to having fun as well – like strengthening your immune system and more.
What is your Personal Fun Quotient? Do you know how to relax and have fun? What is fun for you? What is surprising, exhilarating, hilarious? What type of humor do you have? What do you find silly, amusing, funny? What makes you laugh? Do you banter, tease, joke? Do you do pranks? Do you play sports or games?
What activities do you enjoy doing? How physical do they get? Do you clown around, horseplay? Are you in touch with your body? What gives you pleasure, delight, joy? Exploring these questions for yourself will give you some insights into what you bring to your relationship fun.
Are you in need of expanding your Personal Fun Quotient and being more open-minded, flexible, engaging? This is an opportunity for you to stretch yourself and expand your repertoire. This practice will assist you integrate this potentially lost, denied or disowned part of your self. Start becoming whole again and feel your aliveness – engage your potential!
Can you imagine the benefits to your relationship, and your life, when you start doing this? It’s amazing! Now, be cautious at the same time because you might throw your partner off and they might be resistant to the new you. Mindfully share this part of you. There is no need to spook your partner – invite them into the fun!
Enhance your Relationship Fun Quotient. Become partners in crime and make a project of having more fun together! How fun is that?!
Happy Having Fun!!
~ Your MetroRelationship ™ Assignment
Enhance your Relationship Fun Quotient. With your partner:
1) Create a Fun List (include high-energy ideas too) and pick one to do within the week; keep working your list
2) Create an Activities List of things you like or want to do together and pick one to do within the month; keep working your list
3) Create a Touch and Sexy List of behaviors and gestures you enjoy from each other, surprise your partner with one of theirs this week; keep working your list
Copyright (c) 2016 Emma K. Viglucci. All rights reserved.
Want to Use this Article in Your Own Website or Publication?
Be our guest! Here is how, you MUST include: Emma K. Viglucci, LMFT is the Founder and Director of Metropolitan Marriage & Family Therapy, PLLC, a private practice that specializes in working with couples, she is the creator of the MetroRelationship™ philosophy and a variety of Successful Couple™ content that assist couples succeed at their relationship and their life. Stay Connected™ with Emma and receive weekly Connection Notes in your inbox with Personal Growth and Relationship Enrichment insights and strategies, visit: www.metrorelationship.com.
Do you know when you get on your partner’s nerves? There is a general underlying theme to the complaints couples usually share and that is that their partner is being egocentric. Egocentrism gets in the way of witnessing our partner’s beauty, gifts and contributions.
It keeps us trapped in our mind’s machinations and delusions keeping us from Being our Authentic Self. Egocentrism prevents us from connecting with our partner and from having the relationship we want.
Most complaints can be boiled down to partners being egocentric. And, yes, this applies to those with codependent tendencies as well… Partners get stuck on their perspective, expectations, position, blaming the other or looking for the other’s shortcomings, and how their needs are not met. We can’t see our partner in all their glory – their brilliance, intentions, and love. We can’t be mindful and loving.
Egocentric interactions cause pain. Our behavior is reactive and calculated. We are out to get our needs met no matter what – most of the times at our partner’s and the relationship’s expense… The result is that we actually don’t really get our needs met…
Characteristics of egocentric behavior include being: inconsiderate, self-righteous, controlling, rigid, manipulative, flaky, unaccountable, aggressive, passive-aggressive, overbearing, invisible, withdrawn or non-involved. It is impossible to create a wonderful relationship when we use these tactics.
These hurt our partner and invite them to protect themselves, even retaliate, creating reciprocal negative and dissatisfying interactions. The stuckness in our relationship is made up of this yucky pattern.
Egocentrism comes from fear. We are egocentric as a means to make sure we are OK. Our ego is out to protect us unfortunately to our detriment as it forges “separateness” promoting additional fear and pain. What we desired in the first place, being connected, accepted and loved, is but impossible to get when we operate from this place. We are actually putting our hand up and saying ‘stop’.
Your stretch is to recognize when you are operating from an ego, fear-based place and move yourself to a heart centered, love-based place; mind your yucky thinking, engage your Authentic Self. When you recognize that you are being egocentric, you can bet your partner has not been experiencing you as loving. You have most likely been getting on their nerves and hurting them.
Once you are able to recognize that you’ve been egocentric, you can share your revelation with your partner. Share your fear script, your doubts, and your pain. Remember to speak about your vulnerability and not about how your partner contributed to the dissatisfying interaction. No need to overload, an acknowledgement of your wrong approach and reason behind it is sufficient.
Communicating on your process and sharing your vulnerability is validating to your partner allowing them to make sense of things, which in turn takes the sting away. This is an awesome repair skill to make nice after you’ve been hurtful. This level of self-ownership is empowering and healing, and builds intimacy and connection. Go for it, stop getting on your partner’s nerves!
Complete the MetroRelationship (sm) Assignment below to help you effortlessly implement this, make changes and immediately start experiencing the relationship you want.
Happy Repairing!
~ Your MetroRelationship ™ Assignment
This week, think about one of your reactions, positions, or behavior that you can recognize as egocentric, fear driven.
Think about how this could have been experienced by your partner… And, how they might have felt.
Create a soft, playful, fun, cozy, mindful, safe moment during which you can share your insight with your partner.
Add this to your took kit…
Copyright (c) 2016 Emma K. Viglucci. All rights reserved.
Want to Use this Article in Your Own Website or Publication?
Be our guest! Here is how, you MUST include: Emma K. Viglucci, LMFT is the Founder and Director of Metropolitan Marriage & Family Therapy, PLLC, a private practice that specializes in working with couples, she is the creator of the MetroRelationship™ philosophy and a variety of Successful Couple™ content that assist couples succeed at their relationship and their life. Stay Connected™ with Emma and receive weekly Connection Notes in your inbox with Personal Growth and Relationship Enrichment insights and strategies, visit: www.metrorelationship.com.
After the infatuation and dating stage, fun and romance doesn’t just happen in relationships. Great committed relationships don’t just happen. We have to put in conscious effort to create the relationship we want. Here are some tips for creating and enhancing your intimacy, romance, passion and fun with your partner:
1) Make time for each other and for having quality time together. Pick a time of day that is just for the two of you.
2) Stay connected through out the day by sending each other inspiring, funny, cute, loving or sexy emails, cartoons, cards, notes, etc.
3) Schedule consistent dates, couple outings, events and plans that excite, stimulate and enrich you as a couple. (Attend our Couple Events!)
4) Expand your repertoire of activities you do for fun. Add Gaming to your couple time – play board games for some warm and cozy indoor fun!
5) Surprise each other with little gifts, nice gestures, or different ways of responding.
6) Do romantic and sexy gestures at a frequency chosen by both of you: go on a hot air balloon ride, go to a famous romantic restaurant, have a midnight interlude that includes chocolate, strawberries and champagne, give a bouquet of exotic flowers, play hooky from work and go to the movies for a matinee or home for some intimate time, play footsy under the table at your-in-laws..
7) Integrate more physical activities into your joint activities: Garden (start preparing now by planning and designing your garden together), workout (join a gym or create an exercise program to do together), join a co-ed sports team, have outdoor fun by skiing, hiking, rollerblading, horseback riding etc., paint your house, have sex…
8) Fill a drawer in your room with fun and sexy toys and games, lotions, candles, lingerie and other goodies to have handy for when you are ready for them!
9) Get a Spa Treatment together!
10) Touch: hold hands, sit next to each other with bodies touching, cuddle, hug, embrace, hold, squeeze, pat, stroke, caress, massage, rub, fondle, pet…
BONUS:
1) Invite your partner to be silly and LAUGH: have tickle sessions, pillow fights, chase each other around the house, have water or food fights, listen to your favorite music really loud and dance around…
2) Have exhilarating experiences: bungee jump, parachute, hang-glide, scuba-dive, ride roller coasters, go on a safari trip, visit a haunted house, watch scary movies…
Start connecting more intimately today. Make sure you keep the fun and romance alive! Re-ignite the passion!!
Happy Romanticizing!!
~ Your MetroRelationship ™ Assignment
Have a brainstorming session with your partner about fun things you’d like to do together. Think outside the box and get creative. Pick 3 items form the list and schedule them into your calendars!
Copyright (c) 2016 Emma K. Viglucci. All rights reserved.
Want to Use this Article in Your Own Website or Publication?
Be our guest! Here is how, you MUST include: Emma K. Viglucci, LMFT is the Founder and Director of Metropolitan Marriage & Family Therapy, PLLC, a private practice that specializes in working with couples, she is the creator of the MetroRelationship™ philosophy and a variety of Successful Couple™ content that assist couples succeed at their relationship and their life. Stay Connected™ with Emma and receive weekly Connection Notes in your inbox with Personal Growth and Relationship Enrichment insights and strategies, visit: www.metrorelationship.com.
Fun is important in our relationship. Having fun releases different chemicals in the brain that engender good feelings which get then associated with our partner. This is a good thing. Having fun with our partner should be a priority in our relationship. We can get huge returns on this investment!
It is difficult at times to remember to have fun a sad state of affairs but very common. Couples get stuck in their routines and getting through their days managing their responsibilities as best they can that they consume all their energy and resources leaving little for the couple itself.
Top on most people’s list is having a great relationship. People are consumed with thoughts of how is it going and what else they’d like from it. It is a wonder they are not Minding their relationship 24/7 and having a blast. A lot of people think they are working on their relationship and can’t understand why it is not more satisfying.
The problem is, as I’ve written before, that they are putting in the wrong efforts. They are misusing even more resources and energy leaving the couple in a dire state and the partners hopeless and frustrated.
But couples are resilient and partners stick it out for a while before calling it quits. It is during this time, when partners are sticking it out, that it is paramount to refocus and re-channel the efforts made to connect with our partner, enliven the relationship, get our needs met and create the relationship and life we want.
One of the ingredients for accomplishing this is having fun with our partner. There are different kinds of fun to be had: being playful and getting physical, creating and working on projects, going on outings and trips, sharing dreams and goals and working together on accomplishing them, learning new skills together, and identifying different ways to play.
Integrating fun into our relating promotes good feelings, receptiveness and cooperation creating an ally and a teammate of our partner! With an ally we can win any game we set ourselves out to play!!
Happy Playing!!!
~ Your MetroRelationship ™ Assignment
Make a list of 5 fun things you would like to do within the next month and have your partner do the same. Now pick and choose from your lists creating a joint list of 5 items you and your partner agree do together to have FUN. ENJOY!
Copyright (c) 2016 Emma K. Viglucci. All rights reserved.
Want to Use this Article in Your Own Website or Publication?
Be our guest! Here is how, you MUST include: Emma K. Viglucci, LMFT is the Founder and Director of Metropolitan Marriage & Family Therapy, PLLC, a private practice that specializes in working with couples, she is the creator of the MetroRelationship™ philosophy and a variety of Successful Couple™ content that assist couples succeed at their relationship and their life. Stay Connected™ with Emma and receive weekly Connection Notes in your inbox with Personal Growth and Relationship Enrichment insights and strategies, visit: www.metrorelationship.com.
There is no better way to create wonderful memories and meaning in one’s relationship than with rituals. Rituals are a special way to show love, appreciation and importance for the partners throughout time in the life of the relationship.
Relationships are made up of interactions between two partners which can be negative or positive. Their repetition provide the overall feel of the relationship. Rituals collaborate with this process.
Couple rituals play a central role in giving color, substance, and style to the relationship and mark off one couple from another, giving each a special character. They make a major contribution to the stability and continuity of the life of the relationship. They assist in creating and maintaining a couple’s identity (unique values, standards, role prescription, and perceptions).
Rituals encapsulate the essence of who partners are within their relationship through the reenactment of specified behaviors. This is a tool that can help change that overall feeling and enhance the meaning of the relationship and its satisfaction quotient.
There are specific characteristics to positive couple rituals. They are symbolic, consistent, respectful and meaningful. They have a sense of specialness and importance. They provide a sense of “weness” and organize partners’ behaviors. Partners feel a void when they are skipped or absent.
Rituals can be creative and exclusive to celebrate anniversaries of events and holidays, or repetitive woven into our routines. There are actually three categories of rituals:
1) Celebrations. These specific to the couple such as engagements, weddings, anniversaries and Valentine’s Day; and family celebrations in which couples partake. Family celebrations can be religious holidays such as Christmas, Easter, The Passover Seder or secular holiday observances such as Thanksgiving, New Year’s Day, or the Fourth of July, within the American culture anyway.
2) Traditions. These are less culture-specific and more idiosyncratic to the couple and their family and recur with regularity. These might include: Summer vacations, dates, birthdays, parties of various kinds, special meals.
3) Ritualized routines. These are the ones most frequently enacted and the ones least consciously planed. To this category belong rituals such as a dinnertime, bedtime routines, leisure time activities on weekends or evenings, everyday greetings and good-byes, contact during the day, ways of staying current, etc. These interactions help to define partners’ roles and responsibilities and are a way of organizing daily interactions.
When rituals play out over time their richness reaffirm symbolism of values, affects, and perspectives hence their power to be conduits of change.
Which couple rituals in your relationship capture the essence of who you are as partners in your relationship? Which rituals promote positive feelings in your relationship? Which rituals promote meaningful and satisfying interactions? Which rituals allow your relating to create the relationship you want?
Use Positive Couple Rituals to change and enhance your relationship today!
Happy Ritualizing!!
~ Your MetroRelationship ™ Assignment
Create robust rituals to celebrate your coupleness. Revisit your rituals and see which ones you want to do away with, which ones you want to keep and why, and which ones need tweaking. Make sure your rituals help you create your relationship vision.
Copyright (c) 2016 Emma K. Viglucci. All rights reserved.
Want to Use this Article in Your Own Website or Publication?
Be our guest! Here is how, you MUST include: Emma K. Viglucci, LMFT is the Founder and Director of Metropolitan Marriage & Family Therapy, PLLC, a private practice that specializes in working with couples, she is the creator of the MetroRelationship™ philosophy and a variety of Successful Couple™ content that assist couples succeed at their relationship and their life. Stay Connected™ with Emma and receive weekly Connection Notes in your inbox with Personal Growth and Relationship Enrichment insights and strategies, visit: www.metrorelationship.com.
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Emma K. Viglucci, LMFT has been in the mental health profession in varying capacities for the past 20+ years. She is the Founder and Director of metrorelationship.com a psychotherapy and coaching practice specializing in working with busy professional and entrepreneurial couples who are struggling getting on the same page and feeling connected. The work helps couples create a radiant and successful relationship and meaningful life by becoming a strong partnership and increasing their connection, intimacy, and fun. Emma is the creator of the MetroRelationship™ philosophy and the Successful Relationship Strategy™.
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