At the early stage of your marriage, it is so easy for you and your spouse to feel attracted to each other. Everything is so exciting and new, every day you two have an opportunity to learn more about each other, and you two exchange the rush of excitement for daily routine and comfort. However, over time, this tends to become discouraging, you may find your spouse not as attracted to you as he/she once was; and the same to your spouse. Such a kind of feeling is quite normal, but it should not be neglected.
To better deal with the loss of attraction, let’s discuss the points below:
1 The average amount of time you spend together:
If you spend the majority of your free time together, you might consider some alone space away from your spouse; this can help make the together time more exciting; if you have become too codependent with your spouse, probably you assume that your personal life will cease to be interested or passionate without closeness/intimacy; in such a situation, you should change your mindset; in your daily life, there are a lot of significant things that you can do without your spouse; and as long as those things can improve your mood or give yourself something to look forward to, they are worth trying.
One day when you find that your personal life has become more exciting than before, you will also realize that you are also better able to engage in quality time with your spouse. It is well understood that when you stay positive and passionate, you are more willing to live your full life, and meanwhile, your spouse will also be influenced when interacting with you; this helps you two connect with each other on a deep emotional level.
On the other hand, you should make an effort to spend more time together if you admit that you and your spouse have kinda drifted apart. For example, you might have a date night several times per month, plan a special dinner or weekend trip… For married couples that can’t meet each other often, it seems to be a difficult thing to remain physically connected. However, the most fundamental solution is still to find quality time together; in such a situation, no matter how far apart you two are from each other, or no matter how busy you are, you ought to try to create more chances of meeting each other online.
Anyway, the key point is to focus on deepening emotional connection. In any long-term relationship, passionate feelings and sexual intimacy only flow from that source.
2 Prime your spouse’s brain with appreciation:
People’s brains like to receive messages that appear consistent with their thoughts, actions, and words. Therefore, if you always take your spouse for granted and don’t recognize his/her efforts to maintain the family, over time his/her brain will rationalize: ”I work hard for this marriage, but he/she just ignores…” Especially if you have gotten used to making negative comments about your spouse’s behavior, he/she will consciously pull away from you; after all, no one likes to stay with someone who despises them.
And yet the reverser is true too; when you find your spouse’s desire waning recently in your married life, if you choose to recognize all the work that he/she has done for the marriage, then it will remind him/her to think, “I have put forth so many efforts into this long term relationship, and he/she respects me so much…”, then he/she will naturally come to realize that he/she needs to cherish the relationship.
For more tips on how to make your spouse feel appreciated, you might go on to read the post below:
How to make your husband feel appreciated – Show him appreciation.
How to make your wife feel appreciated – Keep these in mind.
On the other hand, you might wire your brain for appreciation; just like gratitude journaling, when you prime your brain to look at those positive things in your daily life, you alter the way that you see your entire life; with such a mindset, you can become more positive and optimistic gradually. Surely, this will impose a positive influence on your relationship. Everyone is willing to stay with a person with positive traits (e.g. helpfulness, sense of humor/cheerfulness/friendliness, and optimistic attitude), but your spouse is also not exceptional.
In fact, many people complained that their spouses ever thought badly of what they did/said, or that their spouses took their life and conversations with them too seriously; they desire their spouses to adopt a more tolerant, friendly, and relaxed attitude towards them; Therefore, the more you see his/her actions through the assumption of good intentions and the lens of love, the more you are likely to win his/her favor.
Just like gratitude journaling, as long as you prime your mind to seek positive feedback in your daily life, you can filter out more positives. This mindset change will have a cascading and beneficial effect of changing how you feel about your entire life.
3 Funnel your sexual energy towards your spouse:
Sexual energy should be perceived as a finite resource for a married couple. And yet it is a pity that most married couples do not funnel all of their sexual energy towards their spouses, especially for those couples who have been married for years. For example, they squander their sexual energy by watching porn movies, admiring other attractive friends of the opposite sex, and masturbating regularly… their sexual energy which is left over for their spouses is not enough; over time, both parties lose in their sexual life.
So do you have a similar experience as described above? Image sexual energy as running water in a river; you can channel it in any direction that you want. The more you channel it in the same, right direction, the steadier the water flow gets (the more water can run fast through them, as river beds deepen over time).
If you feel like your sex life is not as fulfilling as you would like, you might consciously channel more of your sexual energy toward your spouse. For example, if you enjoy masturbating by watching porn videos, you might masturbate to videos/pictures of your spouse that he/she made for you or that you two made together. In this way, you can prime your sexual connection with your spouse, as opposed to someone outside the relationship.
Whether you and your spouse are in a long-distance relationship or not, you might as well take full advantage of the wonder and beauty/handsome of those x-rated images of your spouse.
Maybe, you and your spouse have been married for many years, you feel like you lose the enthusiasm to maintain sexual intimacy with your spouse; in this case, you need to learn to rediscover your spouse; for more tips, you might go on to read the post below:
How to improve sexual intimacy – Keep a happy marriage
4 Try to figure out what causes loss of attraction:
Understandably, when you sense the spark has faded, the moment is very emotionally draining. And it is uncomfortable to recall the unpleasant past. However, if you desire to reignite the old flame, you need to gain an in-depth understanding of why you lost attraction to your spouse gradually. Remember, you can hardly work on the solution without knowing the reason(s) well.
Surely, when it comes to why a partner lost attraction to the other one, the reasons can vary from couple to couple; you may need to figure them out on your own, and the following just points out some common reasons:
Harbored anger/resentment: in a long-term relationship, holding on to anger or resentment can turn to a significant loss of attraction towards each other. Whether you harbor anger/resentment towards your spouse or you realize that he/she harbors anger/resentment towards you, the best way to solve this issue is to learn to communicate negative emotions calmly and clearly in front of each other.
Communication deterioration: have you two got used to talking about more and more issues in practical terms? Do you feel overwhelmed by daily trifles? If so, you two may have ignored those intimate topics; the lack of emotional communication can lead to a gradual loss of attraction toward each other.
Failure to share activities: loss of attraction is apt to develop when a couple no longer shares exciting or fresh experiences; maybe, as your relationship lasts, you two tend to fall into a dull routine and stop sharing fresh, exciting adventures with each other. The lack of shared activities can easily cause you two to put time and energy into things that are not involved with the relationship.
The psychology of letting go: it is great to feel comfortable about your relationship; but if either of you gets overly comfortable and lazy in your married life and lets go of daily things both mentally and physically, it can also lead to a great loss of intimacy.
Boredom – in a long-term relationship, boredom is often linked to loss of attention, affection, and interest towards each other. Maybe, one or both of you two still craves novelty/romance, but meanwhile, you sense the relationship has already been locked into a daily routine somehow; and you two may grow bored with each other because the feeling of familiarity seems to become all-encompassing and everything seems to be taken for granted. Especially if you have been married for many years, you need to be aware of the point – being bored with married life can undermine closeness. In turn, it reduces marital satisfaction.
Loss of physical attraction – no one likes to see the body spotted by pasty white skin, or excessive fat… however, you can not stop the decay of your body; especially after you two have a child, it becomes easy for you to put on weight and get out of shape due to various factors, whether you are a father or mother. Anyway, such a physical problem can be well managed as long as you are willing to take efforts to change yourself; you see, a lot of people still keep a relatively healthy and attractive body after marriage, compared with others.
The final word:
If you feel like you are not attracted to your spouse and you feel stagnant and bored in the relationship, don’t despair, it is absolutely possible to find your mojo back. If you are fully committed to reigniting your marriage but have no idea how to do it, you might go on to read the page below to follow the comprehensive guidance that is offered by Brad Browning, a marriage coach with 12+ years of experience:
Maybe, you are also interested in the related post below: