Mindful Relationship - How To Love Mindfully

"I love you, not only for what you are but for what I am when I'm with you." - Roy Croft

I felt like my husband and I had been on a different page. We were reading a different book entirely. I felt completely disconnected and I didn't know how to reconnect with my partner. We were behaving more like roommates than partners. We weren't fighting, just not connecting. I was lonely and sad without my husband, my best friend. No, he wasn't physically absent, but emotionally he was.

HAVE YOU EVER FELT DISCONNECTED FROM YOUR PARTNER?

Maybe it was due to the routine of married life and kids. Or maybe not. I began to feel insecure about how he felt about me. Was it me? Was he bored with me or was I bored with him? The more I worried about our lack of connection, the further apart we grew?

I approached my husband one Sunday morning and expressed my loneliness and worry. He was feeling the same way. We realized that we were disconnected because we were not setting aside time to connect. When was the last time we had an honest, heart-to-heart about how we were feeling? Most of our conversations were about the kids, the house, money, and running the household.

We wanted to be proactive and change the way we had been acting like strangers under the same roof. We created a weekly love connection to strengthen our marriage. It was time to check in with each other and ourselves. We needed to be open about how we were feeling. The silence that we were having was only making things worse. We held back our feelings, and those feelings grew. Once we cleared the air, we felt closer, connected, loved, and listened to. We implemented the weekly love connection every Sunday. Each week we did our love connect our marriage grew stronger. We both felt loved and secure in our marriage.

WEEKLY LOVE CONNECTION!

Make connection time a priority! Give it the same respect you would for a meeting with your boss. If your relationship is important to you, treat it as such. Be present! Set aside a designated time to connect. Pick a day and time when you can both be present (mentally and emotionally). Eliminate all distractions like phones, TV, IPad, and let the kids know you two need a few minutes alone. Sit facing each other and hold hands, so that you are physically present. Be open to hearing and receiving what your partner has to share with you. Put your EGO aside and actively listen to the other person. There is no need to become defensive, hurt, or angry because you are purposely asking for feedback to improve your relationship.

TAKE TURNS EXPRESSING YOUR FEELING

Each one expresses how they are feeling using the prompts below. The other will listen with an open heart to what the response is. The prompts are examples of sentence starters you can use. The main objective is to acknowledge all of the positives you see in your partner. This strengthens the relationship in two ways. First, you see the good in your partner and your marriage. Second, your partner feels seen, heard, and loved.

• "Thank you this week for ....."

• "It made me feel loved and appreciated when you...."

• "I enjoyed our time together when we ...."

• "I really appreciated it when you..."

QUESTIONS

Ask the question below and be open to hearing and receiving the answer. This is not to be used to criticize your partner, rather than make them aware of how to better love you. Many times our partner doesn't know what we need to feel loved.

• "Is there anything you need from me this week?"

• "How can I make you feel loved?"

Don't worry if at first you and your partner feel silly. In the first couple of weeks, I kept giggling. I was not used to being so vulnerable. I felt like I was standing emotionally naked in front of my husband. We had been married for 14 years and thought we knew everything about each other. We didn't share our needs for love and our appreciation for the other person regularly.

Try this weekly love connection for three months and see how it impacts your love relationship.