Long Relationships

Wait, we’re not taking bubble baths together anymore! We’re not waking up in the middle of the night to make love! We’re not going out on fabulous, romantic dates! She’s not coming to bed in lingerie anymore! He hasn’t brought me flowers in months!

Can you smell that? Science says you can. It’s those lusty pheromones you were giving off when you first got together…after a while, you don’t give them off like you used to. No, you don’t need a supplement or pill to fix this. What you need is the ability to think in a less attached way about your relationship. Realistically, it’s impossible to think that you could maintain the emotional, romantic, lustful, sexual pace that you did when you first got together.

First, don’t overreact. Just because the spontaneous passion is dwindling, it doesn’t mean you’re with the wrong person. Look at the change with excitement rather than disappointment. It’s impossible to predict what new habits and qualities your ever-changing relationship will have.

But, in order to move into the new phase of your relationship with grace, it is necessary to abandon the fantasy. It’s not fatalistic to think that way. Get rid of any preconceieved ideas about what other couples your age are doing, what your friends are doing, what you think you should be doing. It is simply a process of practicing Buddhist detachment about the phases of one’s life so that you can more comfortably embrace and celebrate them.

What you’ll find, if you give in and let your relationship evolve the way it is meant to is that you have a deeper, spiritual kind of love than you had before. Your love is not just based on the flesh, but on the experiences that you have had together and the discovery of each other. That connection will certainly lead to enough sex and intimacy to keep you occupied!

relationship, marriage, lust, passion, pheromones