Welcome back to Partnership Aligned Podcast! Around here we talk about the deeper ways to improve your relationship. And today I want to talk to you about the deepest topic there is within relationships; intimacy.
So what is intimacy? Intimacy is a feeling of closeness and being emotionally connected. Which at the end of the day is the best part of being in love, isn’t it?
And you hear this term intimacy being thrown around a lot. I think it’s one of those things that people talk about but never really dissect. So that’s what I want to do here today by giving you three ways to create more intimacy with your partner.
- The first way is the scariest way and that is vulnerability. This topic is what comes up most when I am coaching someone on their marriage. Vulnerability means that you share your thoughts and feelings openly. Vulnerability is the pathway to intimacy. Because if intimacy is closeness, then being vulnerable is what makes you feel close.
So often when a client comes to work with me, she is not telling her husband how she is feeling. There are several reasons for this:
The first is fear. Telling anyone your thoughts and feelings can be scary but to tell the person you live with and want to spend your life with is really scary because if your thoughts and feelings aren’t validated, it’s very uncomfortable.
Something I say very often is that both ways are hard. Telling your partner how you feel is hard because of the fear of conflict. But not telling your partner how you feel is equally hard because then you have conflict within yourself.
This is the most impactful experience I had in my marriage. This inner desire to express myself but just not being able to. I wanted so badly to talk about the things that were bothering me. But something kept stopping me. It was fear. Fear that we would fight or fear that I wouldn’t feel heard.
What I learned from that is that the conflict I felt within myself was so much worse. Because it affected the way I felt about me. And my relationship with me is the most important relationship I have – because it shapes all of my other relationships.
The other thing I learned is that the longer I go without being truthful about my thoughts and feelings, the harder it is to be vulnerable. At least for me, I got really up in my head about how being honest now meant I had to admit I wasn’t being honest before. For whatever reason, that really tripped me up.
But I also learned that there is a way to say it! Anything can be said with enough humility. So instead of saying something like, “hey I was lying before, this is how I really feel.” I would practice saying things like, “I’ve been afraid to talk to you about this because it makes me feel so exposed but I’ve decided that I would rather feel exposed than feel distant and disconnected.”
The other big reason I see people having a hard time with vulnerability is because they grew up in a household where it was never modeled. Or worse, it was shamed. This is why getting to know yourself leads to a deeper relationship with your partner. If you can identify where the root of your vulnerability fears come from, you can then start to work through them. You can’t put a destination in the GPS without a starting point.
2. My second suggestion for how to create intimacy is to ask questions. Questions are so important for intimacy. At the end of the day, knowing your partner on a deeper level is what helps with the closeness. So ask your partner questions about how they’re feeling, what their reflections are, and what they think about most.
Need help with this? I’ve got your back! I wrote you a free guide called 21 Questions That Will Bring You and Your Partner Closer Than Ever! In that guide, you will get some guidance on how to prepare for a question-rich conversation, the 21 questions itself, and then some reflection. I designed these questions to promote closeness, intimacy, and some butterflies.
Ever wonder why the butterflies are strongest in the beginning? Sure, the excitement of being new plays a big part. But it’s also the excitement of getting to know each other. I think sometimes we forget that there is another level. There is a deeper level of getting to know each other which is even more exciting.. and these questions are a great way to make that happen. I’ll link it in the show notes so you can go ahead and download it for free today.
3. The third way to increase intimacy in your relationship is to replace judgment with curiosity, stop expecting your partner to be different. Accept them for who they are. Let me clarify for you what acceptance is. Acceptance is not approval. It is not condoning anything. Acceptance means you are going to stop using your precious energy into trying to change them.
If you feel judgmental towards your partner, I promise you they feel it. And it creates a barrier to intimacy. So instead, I suggest you take your claws out of it and drop into curiosity. Get really curious. Why do they always say that thing? Why do they act that way?
Why do they react to specific situations with such intensity? This of course would be easy to access through asking questions, as I mentioned. For more on this topic, check out episode 2, The Secret to Ending Conflict With Your Partner. It’s one of the most downloaded episodes and it’s a good one.
You know, every time I create a podcast episode, l always think to myself how life changing this work is. How it changes everything. It changes things big picture, such as the way you feel about yourself and your partner, and it also changes the little every day things. It helps you put space between you and your next reaction. It help you feel inner peace. It helps you reduce the drama.
But I also think about how this work is not easy. When I went through it, there is absolutely no way I could have done it on my own. I needed someone to help me through the process. And even now, I still have coaches and mentors that I turn to. Because as Lauren Regula says, you can’t see the label from the inside of the bottle.
But when you choose to really work on your marriage, I mean really make some deep changes that last, it’s imperative that you find someone to guide you through that process. I would be honored to be that someone. But I care more about your growth than I do about having you as a client. So if it’s not me, then find someone who you vibe with. Someone who’s words are the words you want to be saying.
Increasing intimacy is definitely one of those processes that will bring up all your shit. All your fears, your stuff from your parents, your defenses. There is no reason to go through it alone.
Everyone is going through the same things. Desire for approval, fighting that inner critic, wanting to be accepted, loved, and understood. It kills me when I see two people who love each. Other go through the same thing separately. Let’s go through it together. Let’s open up to each other about our insecurities and our fears and watch the magic happen.
