So you meet someone, and for the first three to four months of knowing them, they are your life. Well, of course you do have a life outside of them, which is what you try to convince yourself. While the two of you are apart, you find yourself rereading text messages to each other about your debate on odd pizza toppings at 3 AM, smiling like an idiot.
What about when you’re with your friends and instead of asking them about how their lives are going, you rave about your new love for hours on end in an attempt to release some of the excitement from your brand new “pinch me is this real syndrome.”
Better yet when you’re in class for lecture and your professor is telling the same story for the fifth time in a row this semester, but all you can imagine is your crush surrounded by one of those great innovative Snapchat filters – the one with the hearts? Yeah, you’ve got a life outside of them is what you say.
But what do you do when that honeymoon phase begins to fade? How do people sustain relationships and marriages for years without getting bored? Here’s my perspective:
Make time for each other
When you first start dating someone, you seem to have time for them — basically all the time. Well, why wouldn’t you? Not only are you trying to make a good first impression, but you also want to know everything about this apparent catch of yours from A to Z.
For the first month or so, you spend hours talking to them on the phone, every single day maybe. But, now there’s seems to be a struggle to find time for the occasional night phone call between both of your busy schedules.
Between school, work, trying to have a healthy social life, club meetings, catching up on shows, and trying to make sure your sanity is still buried underneath it all, it might be hard to find time. However, there’s always a will and a way to make sure to pencil in your snuggle bunny.
Take interest in the other person’s life
This one may seem obvious, but you’d be surprised at how many couples feel like they have nothing in common or that there’s nothing to talk about, because all they want to do is talk about themselves and not engage with one another. It’s fine to talk about how much you love MMA matches and what happened on the fight last night, but don’t forget to ask how their day was.
Little things (such as surprises) matter
Now, I’m not telling you to walk into Cartier and pick out a spankin’ new watch, but if you know your boyfriend/girlfriend has an obsession with Ben & Jerry’s Vanilla Toffee Bar Crunch, it wouldn’t break your bank to pick up a tub.
Explore together
When I say explore I don’t just mean take multiple road trips. In addition to that, find new things to do together. Do you usually spend your weekends in bed binge-watching episodes of Stranger Things? It’s time to switch it up one weekend and go to a trampoline place!
It’s easy to be with someone and be completely comfortable doing what you do best, but when you spend time with someone you love out of your usual element, you find out more things about them that you would have never known if you never ventured. You’d be amazed at how many dimensions a person has to them.
Open up
This may be the most important thing on this list, and it’s the hardest thing to do. Open up about how you feel to your partner, in regards to life, love, or just something as simple as how your day went. Be transparent. Reflect. Do this often.
You will understand each other way more, be reminded of why you fell in love in the first place, and feel closer than ever.
People often mistake the honeymoon phase of a relationship ending as their partner not being the one. Essentially, they are endlessly chasing the high feeling that comes with that part of the relationship. What they fail to recognize is that a strong and healthy relationship takes effort and compromise, and will not always be perfect. With these tips, hopefully you can rediscover your partner and keep that flame lit!