In a healthy, loving, long-term relationship we have to continuously and consciously choose to fall in love with our partner. It’s an ongoing choice. They certainly didn’t teach us that back in high school or in the movies. It’s always been suggested that when we fall in love, we just stay in love. We just have to find the “right” person to fall in love with.

So, how do we fall in love?

From a nonromantic point of view, we program ourselves to fall in love. It looks like this: You look at that person and say, “Wow! S/he is beautiful! They’re so smart and witty! I just love the way they say that and that little action is so adorable! I think I’m falling in love! This is the one for me!” This is our self-talk when we fall in love with someone. Then as time passes, our self-talk changes and it sounds like this: “Oh my God, how disgusting. I can’t believe they just said that! I hate it when they do that! And, they’re doing it again! No! Not again! I can’t believe I’m with them! They’re so stupid and clumsy! I have to get out of here!” With this type of self-talk, we program ourselves to fall out of love with our partner. And, we do.

As I said earlier, in a healthy, loving, long-term relationship, we have to continuously and consciously choose to fall in love with our partner. We have to continuously focus on those aspects of our partner that we love and tell our self how those things, or attributes, make us happy. It’s also nice for those positive things to come out of our mouths so our partner can hear what we love about them.

It’s a choice to focus on what works and what we like verses what doesn’t work and what we don’t like. When we focus on what’s not working, we then get what we are focusing on: More stuff that’s not working. It becomes a painful downward spiral.

Some people say, “That’s nice, but I just don’t know what to focus on. I don’t know what to say.” Okay. I’ll help you out a bit. Below is a list of some things to focus on in your relationship. It might sound or feel a little sappy at first, but check it out and see what results you get in your relationship. I suspect you’ll create a relationship with more love, joy and intimacy.

Say to your partner: “What I love about you is (fill in the blank).” In other words, “What I love about you is your heart.” “What I love about you is your loving me.” “What I love about you is your: music, your being, your peace, your life, your sharing, your oneness, your aliveness, your honesty, your actions, your visions, your mystical self, your saneness, your leadership, your compassion, your transformation, your movement, your simpleness, your desire, your newness, your grace, your listening, your touch, your alertness, your humanness, your excellence, your divineness, your humility, your understanding, your expansion, your naturalness, your vastness, your solutions, your expression, your embrace, your discovery, your respect, your support, your beauty, your sexiness, your hair, your eyes, your hands, your body, your mind, your orderliness, your piles of clothes, your wet towel on the floor, your cooking, your driving, your playfulness, your thoughtfulness, your etc, etc, etc.