Connection exercises for couples to build intimacy

Soul gazing

To engage in soul gazing, face each other in a seated position with your knees close to touching and hold eye contact for 3-5 minutes. Yes, you are allowed to blink. Yes, it may feel slightly awkward for the first 1-2 minutes if you’ve never tried this before. And yes, you should avoid talking during the exercise.

If the quiet is too uncomfortable for you, choose a 4-5 minute song and commit to holding the eye contact for the duration of the song.

In a world that is increasingly trying to grab our attention and distract us, this connection exercise is sure to efficiently re-spark the home fires. Doing this a few times per week will give you that slowed down connection you and your partner are looking for.

Extended cuddle time

So simple, yet so often ignored.

What is your bedtime routine? Do you distract yourselves with cell phones, laptops, or books? Do you rationalize that using those things helps you get to sleep? Well, the happy chemicals that get released in your brain from cuddling and/or sex help you get to sleep even easier.

Whether it’s close to your collective bedtime or not, having an extended cuddle session a few times per week does wonders for your intimate relationship.

What would you like to see change in your bedtime routine? Think about it, talk to your partner about it, and then incorporate it into your lives as a non-negotiable connection habit.

The 7 Breath forehead connection exercise

Whether you’re lying on your sides or sitting upright, face each other directly and gently touch your foreheads together.

Put your chins down slightly so your noses aren’t quite touching (it’s okay if they touch a bit but touching noses is not necessary for this exercise).

With your foreheads touching, breathe seven deep, slow breaths in sync with your partner. Similar to the eye contact exercise the first one or two breaths might feel like they’re taking up a lot of conscious thought, but by the third or fourth breath it will feel like a very natural thing to do.

This exercise isn’t limited to seven breaths (you can keep going for several minutes if you’d like). If you and your partner are overachievers who like extra homework you can absolutely do this exercise for several minutes if you feel so inclined.

Uninterrupted listening

This is the first verbal exercise on the list, and for good reason. I think that in order to drop into our connection with our partner it’s beneficial to start with some non-verbal exercises. Exercises 4, 5, and 6 are verbal, and I would strongly recommend doing one or two of the aforementioned non-verbal exercises first before you start in with your words.

For this exercise, set a timer and let your partner say whatever they need to in order to vent to you. They can talk about their day, their career, how they feel about you, what’s been on their mind lately… whatever they feel like.

During their verbal brain dump, it is the receiver’s job to simply listen. The receiver doesn’t offer any advice or verbal feedback in any way. You just imagine your partner’s words as a flowing stream of emotion, and you soak it up.

You are free to give non-verbal listening cues with your eyes or body language. But the exercise as the receiver is to simply listen to whatever the speaker has to say. Once the timer has gone off, the roles switch and the other partner has their turn to speak in an uninterrupted stream of consciousness.

One partner might be more verbal than the other, and that’s just fine. Often the partner who is quieter or in their head more of the time will welcome the chance to verbalize their thoughts without interruption because they might feel more frequently interrupted in their daily life (whether by their partner, friends, or co-workers, etc.)

Culled from jordangrayconsulting.com