Everyone wants to have a strong relationship with their partner, but they might not be sure how to keep it that way. Life can become busy, stress can take over, and relationships can be on the back burner. However, when you want your relationship to be happy and healthy, there are plenty of things that you can do to create a lasting bond that goes beyond how crazy life can become.

Making time when you have none

It’s essential that you create some time in your hectic life to be with each other. Even when work and home life becomes crazy, you need to be able to retreat to this time in order to reconnect with your partner. This means that every day, you should have some time set aside for you and your partner to be with each other. It doesn’t have to be hours, but it should be time that isn’t spent doing anything else by talking to each other. A five minute backrub or a walk around the block is all that you need.

Make contact each day

If you’re working in separate workplaces, you will want to make sure that you are contacting each other once a day. A simple email or a quick phone call can let the other know that you are thinking about them and that you want to let the other know that you care. It doesn’t have to be anything long and involved – just a little email that says ‘I love you and hope that you have a good day’ is sufficient.

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Do you see the world through rose colored glasses? Traditionally this saying was used to describe someone who only sees pleasant things around them, blissfully ignorant of any problems. Roses actually come in a variety of colors, so you could wear a set of yellow or blue rose colored glasses and experience a completely different set of emotions than with the traditional red or pink lenses.

Throughout history, roses have been given on every imaginable occasion, and this highly symbolic gesture has continued to evolve in meaning and tradition. Give the wrong color rose and you could be socially ostracized- well, most likely not, but it never hurts to be aware of the symbolic meaning of the roses you are going to send.

Many of our ideas about the symbolic meaning behind plants and flower colors come from Victorian times, when people did not feel free to verbally express certain feelings. In the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, first in Europe and then later in the Americas, language-of-flowers dictionaries flourished, giving proper Victorian people a more societally acceptable way to communicate deep, passionate feelings.

Red, at least on St. Valentines Day, is the most commonly given color of rose, and it usually symbolizes romantic love. It can also symbolize courage and passion, but giving red roses to someone not aware of this could lead to an uncomfortable misunderstanding. Be aware of the possible perceptions of your intended recipient.

While all red roses symbolize desire, subtle variations in color can have different symbolic meaning. Amaranth red roses are a symbol of long standing desire, and cardinal red means sublime desire. Carmine means false desire, and fiery red can represent flames of passion. A deep red rose can indicate bashful shame. The burgundy rose has always been symbolic of unconscious beauty.

Do you need a rose that sends a more platonic message of friendship and good will? Consider the yellow rose, messenger of joy, friendship, caring, sympathy, delight. A yellow rose can also symbolize new beginnings, and can say, “Remember Me”.

In Victorian times, yellow roses were a symbol of jealousy. The ambiguous nature of the meaning of yellow roses lends magic to this color choice as a gift.

The white rose is commonly used in weddings, and in this context it signifies happy love. It can also mean spiritual love and purity, humility, charm, or innocence. It can also mean, “I am worthy of you,” or be used as a gesture of platonic love.

Lavender roses symbolize love at first sight and enchantment, and can also be used to say “congratulations” to a graduate. Any shade of purple rose exudes a sense of majestic beauty.

A pink rose can hold many meanings. A darker pink rose can symbolize gratitude and appreciation, while a lighter shade of pink could show admiration, sympathy, or joy. Orange roses can signify enthusiasm or desire, or a feeling of warmth, whereas coral usually implies only desire.

The final two colors of roses are intertwined with the world of fantasy and mythology. While neither black nor blue roses occur naturally, both are attempted by florists through drying and dyeing. Black has traditionally been symbolic of death. Consequently, the black rose has been seen as a bad omen, but may also signal rejuvenation. The black rose is probably best used only as a gag gift, however, its meaning is likely to be misinterpreted and you may wind up scaring someone. The blue rose has been considered the “holy grail” of roses. While scientists are currently trying to genetically engineer this elusive flower, the only ones now commercially available are created using blue dye. The blue rose symbolizes fantasy, impossibility, and the search for miracles.

Sending roses has always been a way to express feelings that are difficult to convey in words. By carefully selecting the color , you add a touch of class to any gift and can convey a message steeped in emotion and history. Even though you are no longer blissfully ignorant about the meaning behind the colors of roses, at least you can find the rose colored glasses that best fit you.

Do not reject a woman with a child or two out of hand. There are many reasons for this situation. First, almost all Russians get married between the ages of eighteen and twenty-two.

Like any marriage where people get married at a young age, people can grow apart, as they get older.

Alcoholism, disenchantment with the responsibility of family life, the allure of available women outside marriage, the economic and political upheaval that has taken place over the past fifteen years, have all taken a toll on marriages in Russia.

Consider that many of the Russian women you will meet, who do not have children, may well have been married before. Maybe you have been married before yourself.

Consider that children raised in Russia often are better behaved than American children.

Also, there is a higher percentage of young widows in Russia than in western countries. Safety standards at work in Russia are not what they are in the west.

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What is the most infamous male stereotype when it comes to dating? Certainly the one about men trying every trick in the book to get a woman to sleep with him has to head the list. No need to elaborate. There are plenty of web sites that I can refer all y’all to (regardless of gender) if you want to see how that works. As we touched upon in the last newsletter, there are plenty of “pick-up artists” specializing in helping men tune up their trickery.

The truth is, however, that men don’t necessarily have the market cornered when it comes to keeping their intentions under the table. Women are quite capable of their fair share. My belief is that the most common brand of dating trickery proffered by women tends to fly under the radar a bit easier, however, and therefore is hardly ever (if at all) called out. Since women are a bit more subtle about all of this, I’m going to focus the majority of this newsletter on understanding their side of the equation. After all, male trickery is altogether too obvious…which continues to cause me sheer amazement at how often women fall for it.

So what about the women? What do I mean?

Here it is. Just like men try to trick women into sleeping with them way too early in the relationship, women tend to try to trick men into exclusive commitment way to early.

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Has your relationship fallen into a routine in which the passion has fizzled or perhaps even been extinguished? How would you like to rekindle the spark that used to burn so passionately? You may have a solid marriage that has weathered the storms of life, but this can still lead to complacency. With some effort, you can ignite passion in your relationship all year long.

So many couples wait for factors to line up perfectly as in a solar eclipse before they experience the renewal of passion between them. You can make passion as predictable as a sunrise but you’ve got to get out of your comfort zone. You have to stretch your thinking into new areas you didn’t even know existed before. Are you willing to change how you do things?

Two critical things will determine the future of your relationship. If you’re not careful these two things will negatively influence the quality of your relationship.

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