Looking to boost your intimacy this winter? Relationship therapist Sofie Roos shares things that helped her own relationship
As a relationship therapist, it’s easy to just talk about what other people can do to boost their love life, but for once, I wanted to share a few things that me and my wife do when it comes to working on our relationship.
For us, the real game changer has been to have recurrent relationship check-ins. The idea is very simple: have a moment in your routine where you sit down and ask each other how we’re doing and if there’s anything we need extra of right now.
This has really helped us to stay emotionally connected, and to communicate about things that we weren’t so good at saying before, which has given us a much more peaceful, stable and rich relationship.
Another thing that’s done a lot good for us is to look more into each other’s eyes and stay silent. We just share that moment together, which, when you get comfortable with the intense intimacy, becomes a very beautiful little time. We do this by sitting on the sofa or in bed facing each other, and then we keep eye contact. Sometimes we’re close, and other times we sit with some distance.
A third thing that’s made our relationship richer with love is to give each other micro-affirmations. We do this, for example, by commenting when we notice something one of us has done for the other person or for the sake of the relationship, or by leaving a love note on the bedside table before going to work. It can be literally anything small that makes us feel more appreciated and seen in our everyday lives.
These small acts of love have actually made a really big difference by making us feel more in love, appreciated and desired.
Hugging one another for 10 seconds. Sharing an experience from our day during each dinner. Going to bed together each night. Having phone and screen-free time togehter. Taking a shared morning walk every Sunday. These small things can make a big difference.
And now I want to encourage all you DIVAs out there to try some of these things this winter! It doesn’t have to be something big. You can pick any of the things I do, or come up with something you feel you need, and then try to do that consistently. Because when it comes to relationships, I’m the first one to say that it’s the small things that make the biggest differences, so just put in that little energy and I promise you’ll get a thousand back.
Sofie Roos is a Swedish licensed sexologist and relationship therapist, as well as author for the sex and relationship magazine Passionerad.
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