How does love return to everyday life?

We both have a lot to do, but everything is running smoothly. Why is time for two so important?

Because time stress is one of the biggest love killers for a relationship - even if the deadly effect reveals itself rather creeping. In a survey conducted by GfK Marktforschung, around a quarter of the respondents, who had seriously considered separating from their current partner, "gave too little time for one another" as reason for this. 42 percent called "frequent dispute" as a potential reason for separation. Both things are connected: If you have little time for each other, argue more.

One might think: Who spends less time together, has less time to argue, right?

Unfortunately, it is not that we spend the precious time together for two, to let us go well together. If there is never the opportunity to discuss problems or clarify misunderstandings, then you have to use the time you have with each other constantly to extinguish current fires. So often come into conversation, then accumulates no trouble, which later escalates in a monster crash.



It sounds as if spending time together is always about wallowing in problems. But do we have to talk about our relationship all the time?

No of course not. But at least once a day make a real connection to each other. This can be a conversation, but it can also be a foot massage on the couch or in the morning a not only fleetingly kissed farewell kiss. "Even if you slept with each other every night, an unexpected loving embrace in the kitchen could give you more of a real sense of solidarity, and you need that kind of moment every day," says couple therapist Mira Kirshenbaum. If one had to carry out a certain medical procedure every day, for example injecting insulin, one would also do that. So why not make a real connection to the partner once a day? "It's just as important for the health of your relationship," explains the couple's therapist.



A fresh cell cure for love so. Sounds a bit like kitchen psychology.

Can be scientifically proven. Because love and partnership also have a lot to do with biochemical processes. During sex, and especially during orgasm, we release the binding hormone oxytocin, which strengthens a partnership and makes us all attracted to each other. But even if we touch each other in our everyday life, embrace or kiss, we release oxytocin. That's why you can not touch yourself often enough in everyday life.

Especially in the morning there is always a total rush, we prefer to stay out of the way. How could we start the day more relaxed together?

The simplest way would be: Shower together again! This not only saves water and time, you also have real ten intimate minutes together in which you are physically close. And soaping each other makes you happy for the stressful working day.



As we live together, we automatically spend a lot of time together. If you already share the everyday life: Is not it more important that everyone has free space?

Of course you have to take good care of yourself. Only those who can recharge their batteries from time to time - while playing sports or meeting their best friend - will have something to give their partner. Nevertheless, it is not the amount of time you spend with each other that is decisive, but their quality. Joint dishwasher cleaning is not yet an investment in the partnership.

All right, let's do something together. But what?

No matter, the main thing, it takes you out of the everyday spiral. Sometimes it is enough to go to the cinema together - then you talk about the movie and not again about the colleague, the children, the urgently needed rebuilding of the flurries or the upcoming visit of the parents-in-law.

Sure, cinema always works. But should not we have a real adventure together?

Absolutely, says the science journalist and author Bas Kast. He calls excitement in everyday life as one of the most effective love formulas. Because "adrenalin brings the passion on Trot - not only at the beginning of a relationship, but also in the later partnership." Kast has collected scientific experiments that prove that. In one, researchers shared long-standing couples in two groups. One was to do an activity once a week, which the couples themselves described as "exciting" - mountain climbing, dancing, attending a concert or skiing. The other group should do something that was described as "pleasant". So cook together, visit friends. After ten weeks, both groups were asked about their marital bliss, and in fact the first group was much happier with their relationship, while relationship satisfaction remained the same for the second group.

So adrenaline really has an impact on love?

Yes, and that's simply because our brain confuses fear and attraction, Bas Kast explains. This shows the so-called bridge experiment of two Canadian psychologists from the 70s. In a national park they had an attractive woman in the middle of a rickety suspension bridge approach randomly passing men. After that, they repeated the experiment on a sturdy wooden bridge. The men from the suspension bridge were significantly more interested in the woman than the men from the wooden bridge. "The brain registers how the body gets upset and tries to figure out the excitement, looking for a reason and finding two options, the bridge, or the woman," explains Bas Kast. And then it happens that the brain actually decides wrong - for the woman. This effect can also be used in a long-standing relationship.

What could be a common adrenaline rush, which brings me and my sweetie back really up?

Depends on what it makes sense, it does not have to be common free climbing, maybe it will do a paddling tour. Former stuntman Jochen Schweizer specializes in helping people to memorable moments: "We have also organized a romantic dinner in a hot air balloon followed by a tandem parachute jump, or a pair of helicopters flew to a glacier where a spectacularly covered breakfast table opens they were waiting, "he says.

Skydive? Not with me! Does it always have to be something dangerous?

"You do not necessarily have to let it jump to experience something spectacular as a couple, but also a shared Zen meditation can be incredibly touching and connecting," says Jochen Schweizer. Sometimes a little gimmick is enough to break out of the well-worn patterns: Instead of going to your favorite Italian, as always, it can be the dark restaurant for a change.

Speaking of well-worn patterns, we could spend a lot more time together if we did not mess around with our smartphones and laptops in the evenings. How do we manage to get rid of the digital distraction?

No one wants to share the bed with his partner's 356 Facebook friends. Nevertheless, take 35 percent of all smartphone owners their device to bed, use it even before falling asleep and even in the morning before getting up, as a mobile phone manufacturer in a user study found out. On this point we can for once learn something from the world of work: corporations like Volkswagen turn off after work their mail servers to prevent the burnout of their employees by the constant accessibility. Why should not this also work in family life? If a couple agrees on a ban on Internet from 9pm, there's still plenty of time left for Facebook and Ebay without the burnout of love. Incidentally, Facebook boss Mark Zuckerberg has contractually agreed to run his wife Priscilla on a date every week and spend at least 100 Facebook and phone-free minutes with her.

seriously? I'm supposed to sign a contract with my husband, how often do we go out together? How unromantic is that, please?

That is not unromantic, on the contrary. Two busy people are committed to giving each other regular, unrestricted attention. And if they do that in writing, it increases the chance that this appointment will actually take place.

For many couples, the children are the reason why there is a lack of togetherness. But many parents feel guilty about shoving babies off to babysitters.

Imagine your child in ten years, as he says to you: "Too bad that this did not work out with you and dad and you had to part, but I'm totally thankful that you were always home in the evening and with me Played 'Uno'! " And, is that a realistic idea? No? Just!

But to really spend time together once a week is pretty short, right?

That may sound like little, but it is realistic - especially for working couples with children. And the program we all have might not even be able to do that. "Today, most couples are in a tremendous triple burden, and both want to support their careers, children, and relationships equally well, which is a huge challenge," says coach and process consultant Christin Colli. "When it comes to children, you can not say: oh, I'll take a break now! In the job you can not cut well, so it's usually at the expense of two-person relationship.

OK, but do I have to plan my time together so meticulously? I do not want love after appointment book!

Why not? We also plan everything else: our career, the everyday life, the parenting, when we meet friends, who does what in the household. Why should the time for two happen by chance? "It's an illusion to believe that the time for each other and the time for sex will drop somewhere," says Christin Colli. "If we do not give priority to it, it will not happen."

Should we have a date for sex? What, please, has become of the good, old, spontaneous Übereinanderherfallen?

Well, if you are freshly in love, you will not know the problem, because you are always in sharp focus on each other anyway. But in long standing relationships between tax returns and laundry often no longer has much room for spontaneous quickies on the kitchen table. Erotic tension then no longer falls from the sky, you have to make it aware. If you have time for sex on Wednesday evening, you have the whole Wednesday to get yourself in the mood.

It can be, but what if I do not feel like it anyway?

There may still be trouble in the air, or some daytime experience will not let you go. Then the body does not switch to his "sexy and passionate" mode at the touch of a button. "Especially women need a real encounter before sex," says Christin Colli. "You can just sit in peace and listen to each other, everyone is allowed to tell what's going on, and the other just listens to, without interrupting." The desire to physically connect with each other also emerges clearly after such a real dialogue lighter.

In the restaurant you can always see couples sitting silently at the table together. Clear case: They have nothing more to say, right?

That does not have to be. On the contrary, it can also bear witness to a deep connection, if you can just keep your mouth shut. Just because you constantly chatter each other, that does not mean that you really tell something. "When you just look each other in the eye, you also show yourself to the other, because there is something that is too limited in words anyway, a real connection to the heart," says Coach Christin Colli.

We are not candlelight dinner types. Does that also work with the heart connection when we are traveling with friends?

Of course, a couple can feel connected to each other in the midst of a large group. There are those magical moments in which couples look at each other across a full dance floor or across a party society - and all the other people around them seem to be faded out for a brief moment. A "you and me, baby!" - moment, so to speak, by feeling real togetherness in a room full of people.

It all sounds like spending time together is always an effort or an adventure. Do I have to worry because we just like to drown in front of the telly for two?

That's right, you can not ride roller coasters all the time. Collecting rumble and relaxing is also important. And if that works well in front of "Bauer sucht Frau" - why not? But you could use the commercial breaks to plan a next adventure together, if only for the next vacation - or simply to look hard and close in the eyes.

Oprah's Favorite Passage from A Return to Love | SuperSoul Sunday | Oprah Winfrey Network (March 2024).



Relationship, conflict, love