Quote in the photo:
“I will always be committed to make of this this small house your cuddle at the end of the day.”
Have you ever had the sensation that intimacy was the best thing ever happened to you? Ok guys, calm down, we are going to talk about sex – yes, but this is not just another article on “x ways to” .. 🙂
What I would like to write about today is intimacy. Intimacy understood as the state of being intimate, having a close, familiar and usually affectionate or loving personal relationship with a person.
But lets start with the “beginning” …
I think we all know what intimacy is. We all have been intimate with someone in our life. And we also know that in long term relationships (usually), intimacy is something that tends to dissappear or at least reduces itself at some point, mostly because of our hectic lives.
Taking a look at some statistics, it seems that intimate relationships have been falling apart for the last two decades or so. It may be because couples haven’t learned reliably how to sustain pleasure in intimate relationships. And the difference has never mattered so much before, as nowadays we have the “luxury” of living in a splendid isolation, despite the fact we are always “connected”.
Society and culture provide for all of our needs, especially the need for autonomy, but don’t provide the need for intimacy. And I would also say that sex has been separated out from intimacy. As you might know, intimacy involves both emotional and physical closeness and openness. We actually end up confusing the two, when it happens to fail in satisfying our need for closeness and sex.
Both partners bring to a relationship expectations about what they want and/or don’t want, what they’re willing to give and not willing to give. And most often, all this is out of awareness. Most partners don’t even know that they expected something until they realize they’re not getting it.
Most of the disappointments that drive our actions and reactions in relationships are build up with expectations that are most times hidden from our partners and sometimes even from ourselves. During our lives, we acquire systems of beliefs that direct our behavior outside of our own awareness (see past relationships, family beliefs and so on). Questioning the “self” and being “aware” is essential to attaining and/or rebuilding a sense of intimacy.
And now ta daaa!! .. the fun part! 🙂
Here are some things that we might all consider, in “boosting” our intimacy.
1. Give each other some space
One of the main things you have to remember while in a relationship, is that it is important to give yourself, and your partner some space. If you and your partner spend too much time together, it is easy to get annoyed,and that can easily take away the passion of a relationship. By giving each other space, you can give the time to miss each other, making that “little reunion” pretty special.
2. Make Passion a Priority
Up there with honesty, integrity, and love and respect, passion should be another important trait you show in your relationship. If you make a habit out of expressing your passionate side, you will find it much easier to keep up with it, and keeping the passion alive will come more naturally!
Passion and sexual tension need to be reignited regularly to keep love strong and growing.
3. Experience Passion within Yourself
Something people often forget to do, is to actually experience the passion within themselves. How are you supposed to be able to express passion with someone else, if you aren’t too sure what you are passionate about? Figure out what makes you passionate before trying to figure out how to spark passion with someone else.
4. Don’t forget to touch!
What I mean by this is: don’t forget to use physical affection. There is something about a soft, gentle caress of the skin by the one you love that ignites a spark inside of a good relationship. Little things keep relationships going strong.
5. Play
With stress from jobs, bills and so on, it’s easy to forget how to have fun. Don’t forget to enjoy yourselves as a couple, even if it means just having your own little dance party in the middle of the living room, watching your favorite childhood movie on the couch or even just eating strawberries and ice-cream!
6. Express love and gratitude
A good way to keep passion sparkling in your relationship is to be spontaneous. There is no planning needed during being spontaneous. It keeps things interesting between you two, and it keeps the passion burning!
7. Don’t’ let intimacy become unimportant!
Although intimacy isn’t the only thing that makes a relationship, it certainly is an important factor if you want to have a passionate relationship (and no, I’m not just talking about sex). You should always remember to take time out of your busy life to express intimacy with one another.
8. Do things together
I know I just wrote some line up that you should spend some time on your own, this is not a contradiction. 🙂 No flame burns forever, and love is no exception. The busyness of modern life had deprived many couples of time together, so you might just want to shower together, involve food in foreplay, have a beach getaway together, give each other a massage, cook a meal together, you might even want to shop for underwear and lingerie (or some other treats) for each other (and this is something very sexy .. 😉 ).
Of course, these are only some of the things you can do to boost the intimacy of your relationship. In the end, the important thing is to be aware of what happens and give the right attention to yourself, your partner and your intimate relationship.
Let me know which of the points above you like more and share what you did or plan on doing to grow your intimacy.
Kisses! 🙂
PS: Special thanks to my friends Pamela Mandelli and Angelo Cucchi for their friendship and their lovely house, where the picture for this article was taken.
