3 Ways to Keep Your Love and Passion Alive

How do you keep a relationship loving, intimate, alive and growing over the long haul?

We are constantly on the look out for ideas to keep the spark alive in our relationship and we love passing them on to you. Just the other day, the Borders book store that is not far from our home had a going-out-of-business sale and we went shopping. Since we love books and our house is full of them, we had fun picking out some new books that would give us some new ideas to keep our love-making fresh and exciting.

One of the books is filled with erotic (but not too over the edge) stories that we're going to read to each other while we're on a vacation that's coming up.

So a trip to the book store might be fun for the two of you or you might choose something else...

One way you and your partner can reactivate your love and passion is to attend our workshop that's coming up--a "Get Closer Weekend." (Check out our short video aboutgetting closer to your partner)

Here are some ideas other ideas from three people who agreed to share how they keep their passion and relationship alive and growing...

1. Be open to trying new things.

"For our marriage it is the openness to try different, new things. Go to new places, buy new things, try new activities. Just the willingness and the openness to do any of these things has a great power. Whether we continue them or not isn't the point its the trying it and being honest. It's showing trust in the other persons
ideas. We have found simple things like playing a computer game my husband truly enjoys but I have never tried. Going to a new place that I have gone but he hasn't."

2. Change things up and flirt with each other.

"After 12 years of marriage and 4 kids, my wife and I understand the need to 'work' to keep intimacy in our relationship. Truth be told, it is not work. We are both very good at doing the small things... sweet talk, gentle
touches throughout the day, demonstrate respect for each other. But we also look to change things up a bit. I
recently bought my wife a new cell phone with texting capabilities. I taught how to text and she almost immediately began texting me highly suggestive messages while I am at the office. By the end of the day, we have worked each other up mentally that we are really looking forward to see each other when I get home. Poor kids get sent to bed early A LOT recently."

3. Surprise your partner and communicate daily.

"One of the key things we do to keep our relationship alive is to make sure we can surprise each other. Surprises can take the form of presents of course, or simply an unexpected evening out, meal for two or even a gesture, a kind word here and there, a joke, a new way of looking at things, a new aspect to the relationship, a new activity together.

Otherwise, of course communication is key, and being open to listen to the others' concerns and feeling able to express one's own concerns is extremely important. We schedule time on a daily basis to see how the other person's day went, and also at the weekend to reflect over the week. When travelling, there are many forms of communication which can help to keep things alive, so we're thinking of each other: text messages, phone calls, e-mail."

If you have other ways of keep your relationship loving, alive and growing, we invite you to send us your story.