My sweetheart Dale and me

When you hear the word “foreplay” do you automatically think of sex? Most people do. Fact is, foreplay comes in many different sizes, shapes, colors, and flavors. You see, foreplay isn’t just about sex. It’s also those things you do that make your sweetheart over-the-moon happy that he or she hooked up with you. It’s those things that make your sweetie feel high-on-a-pedestal adored, can’t-live-without-you cherished, and worship-the-ground-you-walk-on loved. Let me give you some examples of recent acts of foreplay here in the Dean household:

• Dale looked high and low to find and surprise me with coconut gelato because he knows the only ice cream I can’t say no to is coconut gelato. I love it and he wanted to do something I-love-you special for me so he went on the hunt.
• I warmed up the left over Chinese food when Dale came home exhausted from being on his feet all day. That doesn’t sound like much unless you know that I need a map to find the kitchen because I never go there. Dale does all the cooking. We had lived in our home for almost a year before I ever used the oven and when I did, I needed instructions. Cross my heart, that’s the sorry truth.
• I was chained to my desk, hammering out blog posts, when Dale walked into my office with a glass of wine, freshly made guacamole, and chips. He set the libations and food on my desk, and quietly exited so as not to break my train of thought.
• Dale had an important meeting about the garden he’s building for our local YMCA. I called him shortly before the meeting to wish him luck.
• As we were drifting off to sleep, we held hands.

Emotional foreplay isn’t about grand gestures. Oh, sure, I’d do (virtual) cartwheels if a new Porsche with a big red ribbon showed up in the driveway and Dale would kick his heels (he can really do that!) if I handed him tickets for a hike up Mt. Kilimanjaro, but you can only pull those kinds of surprises off once in a blue moon. It’s everyday that matters. It’s the little things, the thoughtful gestures that say, “I love you,” that really matter. Small gestures take so little effort yet have a HUGE positive impact on your relationship.

Think about it. What does it take to give your sweetheart a compliment, bring him or her a morning cup of Joe, top off a wine glass, pick up coconut gelato, make a phone call? It takes almost no effort. Pay attention to what your sweetheart likes, what’s important to him or her, and how he or she is feeling at that moment. Is he tired? Is she frazzled? Does he need encouragement? Does she need a little support? Do what you can to say, “I notice and I care.”

If you want a Wow! relationship, then remember that just as great foreplay is essential to a Wow! sex, great emotional foreplay is essential to a Wow! relationship. Foreplay. It’s something you do every single day. Start now.

Seduction: Not Just Another Date Night

Okay, this one is for the ladies’ eyes only but, in the end, it’s for the guys, too. So, girlfriends, when was the last time you planned to seduce your guy, and set the stage for a night of wild abandon? If it’s been a while (or even if it hasn’t), here’s an idea that will have him eating out of the palm of your hand and loving it.

Set a date for your sweetheart to meet you for a drink in the bar of a local hotel. Make it a nice one. Without telling him, reserve a room. Check in early so you can set the stage. Spritz the sheets with a soft scent. Don’t overdo it, make it subtle. Or, scatter rose pedals on the sheets. Put votive candles in every nook and cranny. Have champagne cooling in the ice bucket. Set up a picnic of finger foods to feed to each other. Make the main course an aphrodisiac such as oysters. Plug your iPod into speakers so you can play smoky, sultry jazz by someone like Cassandra Wilson. Put bubble bath in the bathroom for a soak. Have your sexiest lingerie ready to change into and have silk pajamas for him.

The day of the date, treat yourself to a spa treatment so you’ll be soft and touchable from head to toe. Give yourself a break from daily demands so you’ll be rested and ready for the evening. If you have kids, be sure to arrange for overnight babysitting.

At the appointed hour, meet your sweetheart in the bar wearing the sexiest dress you have and accessorize it with stilettos. Enhance your cleavage with a push-up bra. Enjoy a cocktail with your sweetheart at the bar, then hand your sweetheart the key to the room, and tell him you’ll see him in ten minutes. Race to the room, light the candles, and change into your lingerie. Turn on the music and stretch yourself seductively on the bed. When your sweetheart walks in, invite him to change into silk pajamas.

Take your time. Enjoy the picnic. Enjoy each other. Enjoy the luxury of being in a hotel room. Getting out of your environment and away from the everyday reminders of everyday life is a great way to have a sexy, one-night vacation. If a hotel room and a day at the spa aren’t in the budget, then give yourself every spa treatment you can and turn your bedroom into a hotel room.

Clean up all the clutter. Change the room to look different, e.g., change the bedspread or bring a chair into the room. Toss a throw on the bed or chair and add lots of pillows. Put fresh sheets on the bed and have the bed turned down with mints or fresh flowers on the pillows. Adapt the above instructions to home.

Nothing is more flattering or a bigger turn on than being seduced by your sweetheart. It’s fun to seduce. It’s fun to be seduced. Give it a try. I think you’ll like it.

Dating while married is more than having occasional fun together

“Dating” is to marriage what “foreplay” is to sex. Dating is the seduction phase of a relationship, the equivalent of the human mating dance where every move is designed to seduce the object of your adoration into loving and wanting you as a mate. In short, once the sparks begin to fly, you intuitively understand that if you’re going to “seal the deal” and get this amazing person to mate with you, you’d better do everything you can to impress, please, and show your best side—not just occasionally, but all day, everyday, 24/7. That’s emotional seduction through emotional foreplay.

Unfortunately, we humans think (at a subconscious level) that just as sexual foreplay is no longer necessary once sex has taken place, put-your-best-foot-forward emotional foreplay is no longer necessary once we’ve sealed the deal with wedding rings. Courtship was successful, we conclude, and, therefore, there’s no more need for the mating dance. There is a major flaw in that reasoning, however, and it is this: marriage, as divorce statistics readily prove, is not irrevocable. It is a choice, one we make daily and, therefore, if you want your partner to choose every day to be with you, then you must emotionally seduce your partner by engaging in everyday emotional foreplay just as you did when you were dating.

Emotional foreplay is doing those things that resonate with your partner as loving, kind, thoughtful, supportive, positive, and generous. It is those things you do that make your partner feel cherished, appreciated, and special. It’s putting your best foot forward. It’s keeping your promises and agreements. It’s being responsive to your partner’s needs and wishes. In short, everyday emotional foreplay is doing exactly what you did when you were dating.

Are you doing that? Do you hold the door for your sweetheart, fill his or her wine glass, and are otherwise thoughtful, kind and polite? Do you say thanks for the little things? Do you surprise your sweetheart with small but meaningful gifts? Are you attentive and a good listener? Do you find ways every day to make your sweetheart’s day a little easier or more pleasant? Do you text, email or call just to say hello? If so, then you’re an ace at emotional foreplay.

Or have you gotten lazy, critical, thoughtless and self-centered? If so, and if you want to keep your relationship, then remember this: just as great foreplay is essential to Wow! sex, great emotional foreplay is essential to a Wow! relationship.

Dating while married isn’t about the occasional “date night.” While it’s good for you and your relationship to get out together, dating while married isn’t so much about dressing up and going out on the town as it is about maintaining the mindset you had when dating, i.e., when you were laser-beam focused on emotionally seducing the person who became your spouse. Dating after marriage is about everyday emotional foreplay and the reason it is so important for you to continue dating after marriage is that if you don’t, you may find yourself single, doing for another what you should have been doing for your partner all along.

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Dating isn't something you do, it's a mindset.

You’ve heard it said that familiarity breeds contempt. Taken literally, that means the better you know someone, the more contempt you’ll feel for that person. I dunno.  I know my husband really, really well and I’m not contemptuous of him at all.  I think, however, that in a relationship, familiarity can breed boredom and laziness.

Nobody knows for sure what causes the first spark of attraction to fly. What we do know is that once the spark flies, your brain goes into overdrive. It oozes a hormone cocktail that has the same affect as cocaine. Really. That’s why new love is so seductively intoxicating, why you can’t think of anything else, and the air is alive with the snap, crackle ‘n pop of sexual energy. You’re quite literally high on your own hormones. It’s the best feeling ever. We never want it to end.

We like that feeling so much that we’re afraid it’ll slip through our fingers. So, we do everything within our power to “secure” the relationship and in so doing unwittingly destroy the very thing we hope to capture forever. Here’s why:

Dating and falling in love is a phase in the continuum of a long-term relationship that has exactly the opposite attributes of a marriage. What we love (and crave) about that phase is the adrenalin rush, the excitement, the spontaneity, the edginess of being vulnerable and emotionally at risk, the mind-blowing desire for the object of our obsession.  What we want in marriage is safety, security, predictability and routine. Do you see the problem?

Sure, you read somewhere that it’s a good idea for married folk to have date night as a way to keep the sparks flying. So, you have an occasional (or regular) night out. You do your best to tune out distractions, focus on each other, and spend quality time before returning to reality. That’s a good thing—well, at least it’s better than nothing. But here’s the deal: you can go on 50, 500 or even 5,000 “great dates” that include everything from an intimate home picnic to a Paris junket and still be left wondering what happened to that indescribably delicious feeling you had back when you were 24/7 dating. So let’s not confuse an intermittent dinner-and-movie date night with “dating.” Dating isn’t a thing you do from time to time. Dating is a mindset coupled with behavior.

When you were dating you were eager to impress and to please. You put your best foot forward. You were generous, attentive, and quickly stepped up to any plate. Of course you did, you were doing your best to win the heart of your beloved. Once you won that heart, sealed the deal with a ring, and were secure in the relationship, what happened? You stopped putting your best foot forward so that your less attractive attributes showed up. You weren’t quite as eager to please or impress. You got lazy and complacent.

If you want to keep the spark alive, then adopt a dating mindset. Treat your spouse the same as you did when you weren’t so sure that he or she was part of your happily ever after. Be eager to please and impress. Be attentive, generous and quick to step up to the plate. If you don’t, then the end of your story may be just the opposite of what you hoped back when you were falling in love. Oh, and while you’re at it, as the married-you, be just as creative in the romance department as you were when you were the dating-you!

The enemy of a great relationship is complacency. It begins so innocently. You forget how attractive, funny or caring your honey is because you’re together all the time. You get wrapped up in your “stuff” and forget to do the little, day-to-day things that make your sweetheart aware of your love. You forget how good life feels because you picked someone amazing and the lottery win of being picked back. Before you know it, you reach the relationship expiration date— the day one of you wakes up and thinks, “What am I doing here?”

The antidote to complacency is dating. Unfortunately, many couples stop dating once the deal is struck. Continuing to date after marriage or committing to a life partnership, however, is critical to keeping the ooh-la-la factor alive IF you do it right. Here’s how:

Set the stage for a great date long before the date begins. Not every date has to end in sex, but it’s sure nice when it does! After all, you already know you’re going home to the same bedroom. As I tell my audiences and the couples I coach, foreplay is all day, everyday. It does not begin when her warm body slides up next to his. It begins at breakfast and continues throughout the day. It’s the small gestures, the acts of kindness, the thoughtful, sweet and loving things you do that warm things up emotionally. You see, for great sex you need to stimulate two vital organs—the brain and the heart. Once that happens, you’re ready for the other kind of foreplay! Oh, and don’t forget the good night kiss at the door or a little make-out session in the car. Just because you’re crossing the threshold together doesn’t mean you can’t enjoy a little spice-it-up time before you do.

Dress the part. Flash back time: remember how you used to prepare for a date with each other? Ladies, you thought all day about what to wear, you were flossed and glossed gorgeous, smelled heavenly, and felt sassy. Guys, you were showered and shaved, smelled great, wore nice clothes, and had the car washed. Do it again. Get dressed up for each other! Lookin’ hot casts a magic spell of deliciousness.

Find a quiet space. Dating your mate is so much more than dinner, the same old conversation, and a movie where you can’t talk at all. It’s about being together. You need to turn off the noise so you can turn on one another. Sometimes that means literally going to a quiet place where you can hear each other—an intimate restaurant, a bench by the ocean, or even the back seat of your car. And, it always means turning off the noise in your head and paying attention to your sweetie whether you’re talking ‘til dawn or dancing ‘til dawn.

Leave the grind behind. Nix the crap you usually talk about—this is not the time to talk about your kid’s grades, the jerk at work, or the home repairs that need to be done. This is the time to talk about the stuff you used to talk about when you were first dating. If necessary, plan ahead by making a list of topics. Be an attentive listener. Ask questions. A nod of your head, the touch of your hand, laughter or a smile, show that you are fully engaged and present. The best conversations, the ones where you learn about your sweetheart (and sometimes about yourself), happen only when all the background static is silent.

Remember, this is a date. It’s your time to be fun, relaxed, flirty and sexy with the person you love and adore. Keep it sweet and don’t forget dessert!

Shela Dean is a Relationship Coach, Speaker and Amazon Bestselling Author of Frequent Foreplay Miles, Your Ticket to Total Intimacy. She is also the author of the popular Everyday Foreplay blog. Subscribe today!

Intimacy in our committed relationship. It can be so elusive. Sure, you get snippets of it here and there—enough to make you long for the real deal. You get glimpses of what achieving the Nirvana of connections is all about, You want it. You crave it. You even know what it takes to get it. Too often, however, the desire for intimacy is overcome by fear, the fear of being naked and exposed in front of someone who has the power to hurt you when you are most vulnerable.

You can experience physical intimacy with your duds on—a hug, a kiss, holding hands—but the ultimate intimacy is sans clothing, skin-on-skin, lights on. To be naked in front of another person is to be exposed and vulnerable. Even the most secure of us, will think twice about shedding jeans and tee-shirt if the last time you did, your sweetheart said, “You oughta do something about that gut.”  Being clothed makes us feel protected and allows us to hide what at least we perceive to be our flaws. This is even more so when it comes to emotional intimacy.

You can—to a point—be emotionally intimate with mental “clothing” to protect those bits and pieces of your life that are painful, embarrassing, or shameful. When you are willing to go only so far, however, you cheat yourself of a truly intimate connection. It’s human nature to hide those things we fear will affect how others (especially our sweetheart) feel about us. To experience that deep connection we all crave, however, you have to strip down to emotional vulnerability. Let me give you an example:

Julie and Darren had been dating for several months and one night were lingering over a bottle of wine, sitting on the floor of Julie’s living room, fingers intertwined. Soft jazz was playing in the background and they were talking, still getting to know each other. Darren could be described as a man’s man. Julie referred to him as her Marlboro Man, just the kind of guy she liked. He was active in sports and Julie speculated that he was the guy who always ended up as the team captain. When she made that comment, Darren went quiet for a moment, and looked at Julie as if he were engaged in an internal debate. She raised her eyebrows as if to say, “What?” Darren kissed her fingertips and then began telling the story of how, when he was in the Army going through basic training, he was chosen as the platoon leader. A couple of guys in the platoon took a disliking to Darren and one night filled his shoes with human excrement, discovered by Darren only when he went to put his shoes on. Threats against Darren resulted in his being segregated and protected from the rest of the platoon until the situation was resolved. “So much,” he concluded, “for being the Marlboro Man,” and then said, “I’ve never told anyone about that before.”

In telling this story, Darren let Julie know that there was much more to him than the Marlboro Man exterior that she found so attractive. He took a big emotional risk but, oh boy, did it pay off. Julie was so touched that Darren had entrusted her with this story, she fell more madly in love with Darren, vowed to always be worthy of his trust, and knew that Darren was worthy of her trust as well. It was a moment, for both of them, of the kind of intimacy that is the hallmark of a truly great love.

Trust to the tenth power is what makes both physical and emotional intimacy possible. To give it and to get it, get naked.

Okay, I’m going to be honest. This is not an entirely original idea. It was inspired by Brenda and Gill, the most clever couple I’ve ever met when it comes to keeping things playful and spicy. For example, they’re fond of having candlelit black tie dinners for two and they each wear nothing but a black tie. They might spend Saturday night in a fiercely fought game of strip poker or bikini Twister. Yep, they like to to get naked which, as you might imagine, leads to the boudoir, which leads me to the point of this article.

In today’s economy, we all need to save and most of us have less do-re-mi to spend on a night on the town, let alone a weekend getaway. As a result, a couple’s date night too often involves a remote control and, before you know it, you’re in that rut you said you’d never fall into. So, try this on for size . . .

Put a decorative bag or box in the bedroom and every time you have sex, throw money in it. Pick an amount based on your economic ability and set a savings goal. Brenda and Gill wanted to go to Hawaii and, at the time (which was before this economic crunch) they could each afford $20 with every occasion of conjugal bliss. What’s more, they gave tips for exceptional performance and multiple Big O’s! It took them less than a year to earn that trip. And, I swear, I never saw them without a smile on their faces which leads to the next point.

More sex can be good for your bank account and it’s definitely good for your relationship and your health. This is a time in history when fear of job loss, worries about economic security, and everything from wars to oil spills to global warming to you name it, can lead to down-in-the-dumps lethargy or even full-on depression. Having sex is the antidote. Sex stimulates feel-good hormones and helps you stay in your happy place despite the economy. It relieves stress and who among us can’t use a little stress relief? It helps keep your immunity in tiptop shape. It increases and helps you sustain emotional intimacy. Now, more than ever, we all need feel-good hormones, to be in our happy place, to have less stress, be healthier, and have greater emotional intimacy. And who can’t use a bigger bank account?

Open your Sex Savings Account and start making deposits today. It doesn’t matter whether you toss in twenty bucks or a quarter. Make it within your economic reach, set a goal, and see how quickly you can get there. Next time you’re tempted to splurge on a fattening Starbucks coffee, think about adding to your Sex Savings Account instead. Rather than buy lunch, pack a brown bag and use the savings for a deposit to your Sex Savings Account. With a little thought you’ll come up with dozens of ways to spend less on stuff you don’t need and put more into your Sex Savings Account. You’ll have more money. You’ll feel better. You’ll smile more. And, you’ll be closer than ever to each other. Pretty cool, huh?

There are plenty of so-called truisms out there, all designed to make us “okay” with things that aren’t “okay.” For example, “Sticks and stones may break my bones, but words can never hurt me.”  We all know that’s baloney. Words can hurt like hell.

And how about this one: “What you don’t know can’t hurt you.” This truism has been readily debunked by the medical profession. Simply put, if you don’t know your tapioca pudding is laced with rat poison, having dessert will definitely hurt—if not kill—you.

It’s in the context of relationships where this truism is far too often heard and used as justification for bad behavior. If your sweetheart never knows you’re having an affair, no harm done, right? Wrong! Living with a big fat secret means there’s a big fat part of you that you can’t share with your partner. That big fat secret is the source of emotional distance from your partner and what will keep you from being 100% present in your relationship. In short, it’s what YOU know—and what you must forever keep from your sweetie—that hurts your relationship and, thus, your partner. Your sweetheart may never know about your infidelity and may never realize that he or she doesn’t have all of you, but don’t think for one minute that just because “ignorance is bliss” that you haven’t taken away what should have been given to your partner.

Now, if you’ve already done the deed and mended your ways, then “let sleeping dogs lie” because “confession is good for the soul” but sucks if you’re on the wrong end of that confession. Going forward, just remember that if you surrender to temptation, you will forever shut down a part of you that should be shared with your sweetheart.

I’m not suggesting that you can’t have your secrets or your privacy. It’s not critical that you share every little detail of your past or present life with your partner. A juvenile marijuana arrest may be so far in the past as to be currently irrelevant. Your current cocaine use is another story. That you once gambled away thousands of dollars in a drunken stupor may be an embarrassment you never share. Secretly spending every lunch hour at the track after a quick stop at the ATM is another story.

When you behave in ways that you hope your sweetheart never learns about, you put emotional distance between you and your partner. Worrying that your partner will discover the truth creates stress and anxiety that get in the way of your being a 100% present and loving partner. That hurts you. It hurts your relationship. It hurts your sweetheart.

Acting with integrity, living an open life, and behaving only in ways that are okay for your sweetheart to observe allows you to give yourself fully to your partner and to be fully present in your relationship. Emotional intimacy is the hallmark of a great relationship and what sustains a couple through the rough patches. Doing anything that causes distance or interferes with emotional intimacy hurts everyone involved. So, the next time you’re tempted to do something that if “kept secret” won’t hurt, think again.

It was in grade school math that I first learned about reducing fractions to their lowest common denominator. I hated math. Still do. But, I’ve learned that “reducing to the lowest common denominator” is a great term for describing how, in human interaction, we “sink” to the most basic, least sophisticated level of those with whom we are engaging. If you’ve ever argued with a child, you know what I mean. Before you realize it, you’re on that kid’s level.

We all behave badly at times. We get angry and lash out, we are disappointed and have a meltdown, or we’re just grumpy for no apparent reason. When it comes to our primary relationship, the tendency to “reduce to the lowest common denominator” often results in the other partner mirroring bad behavior. The results are never pretty. Example:

Matt was responsible for preparing a complicated bid on a job for his engineering firm. An ill secretary and a finicky Internet connection were the tip of the what-went-wrong iceberg. With minutes to spare, Matt hit “send” on the email that submitted the bid. He left exhausted and cranky. Lila, who had a day of meetings, had that morning asked Matt to pick up dinner. He did. As he walked from the garage to the back door, the food bag broke. The potato salad container burst on contact. The roasted chicken popped out of its box and rolled under a hedge. Lila heard Matt’s expletive, she rushed to the door, and asked, “What happened?”

Matt snapped. “What happened?” he yelled. “I dropped dinner. The perfect end to a totally miserable day.”

“Why are you yelling at me? It’s not my fault,” Lila knee-jerk responded.

“If you hadn’t insisted I get dinner, this wouldn’t have happened,” he knee-jerk (albeit irrationally) responded back.

“So it IS my fault,” she shouted and stormed into the house, leaving Matt to clean up the mess.

Things go wrong—usually at the worst possible time. The oven malfunctions, the appetizer burns, and your snooty in-laws will arrive any minute to a smoke-filled house. The TV with the gi-normous screen you’ve been bragging about goes on the fritz moments before kickoff, and 22 of your buddies will miss the game of the century. As you’re leaving for your sister’s wedding the baby throws up on the perfect silk dress you shopped for months to find. The flight is cancelled and you’re late getting home from the business trip you didn’t want to take, causing you to miss your own birthday party. Few of us handle these moments with the poise and equanimity of a mature adult. Nope—at such moments, we’re sure there’s a cosmic conspiracy to ruin our life and, thus, a meltdown is justified.

What’s more, when our partner does or says something that hurts our feelings, angers, or disappoints, the natural tendency is to sulk or lash out. Our partner “reduces to the lowest common denominator” and, before you know it, you’re in an argument where words you’ll later regret are said.

Bad behavior is usually the manifestation of an underlying emotion. Jack wasn’t really blaming Lila for his bad day, he was just expressing his frustration. A meltdown is an expression of disappointment at things not turning out as hoped. Sulking and verbal attacks on our partner usually stem from hurt feelings.

While there may be no valid excuse for bad behavior, especially when taken out on our sweetheart, who among us hasn’t gone there. When it happens, the smart partner looks beyond the behavior and responds to the underlying emotion. By doing so, you avoid “reducing to the lowest common denominator,” help your sweetheart return to the world of sanity and reasonableness, and, most importantly, avoid damaging arguments.

One of the coolest things about being in a committed relationship is having someone to grow old with, someone with whom you share so many memories that sitting in the rockers on the porch won’t be boring at all, you’ll have so much to talk about.  Equally as cool is how, if you open your mind and heart, your sweetheart can teach you things you might not otherwise ever learn, and can even help you be a better person.

My sweetheart Dale and I are alike in many ways—the same sense of humor, a love of adventure travel, the same political views, an enjoyment of good food.  We get along great, have tons of fun together, and almost never quarrel.  We also have a very fundamental difference.  I’m more of an A-Type and he’s definitely a B-Type.  In summary, here’s how Wikipedia describes the two:

• Type A individuals are impatient, time-conscious, have difficulty relaxing, high-achieving workaholics who multi-task, drive themselves with deadlines, and are unhappy about delays.
• Type B individuals are patient, relaxed and easy-going, generally lacking an overriding sense of urgency.

It should come as no surprise to you, then, that timeliness has always been an issue in our relationship.  Rewind the tape back to when we were first dating and on our way to an early evening BBQ.  I was contributing the salad and we were running late.  As I’m glancing at my watch to see just how late we were, Dale pulled off to the side of the road and said, “Wow, look how the afternoon light is falling on the hillside.  It’s so beautiful, let’s just enjoy the view for a moment.” Just as I was about to open my mouth to point out we were late and had no time for this silliness, I glanced over at the hillside and, you know what, it was beautiful.  After a few minutes, we were on our way and the salad delivered in plenty of time.  That was a pivotal moment for me and I wondered how many other beautiful sights I had missed because of my rush through life.  Perhaps, I thought, it was time to see the world more through Dale’s eyes.  While I’ve still got those Type A tendencies, I’ve learned that there are times, many times, when tapping into my inner Type B makes my life healthier, more enjoyable and more beautiful.  My sweetheart taught me to relax and to see beauty I would otherwise have missed.   Wow.

Too many people trash their relationship by trying to make their partner their clone, insisting that their way is the one and only right way.  Sure, I could have badgered and nagged Dale into being the clock Nazi I was and, believe me, I did plenty of that in the beginning, arguing that his being late was arrogant and self-centered.  Then one day it hit me: it was arrogant and self-centered of me to expect him to become my clone on this issue.  Now, I don’t demand perfection and, because he understands how important timeliness is to me, he pays more attention to the clock when it’s truly necessary to be on time.  I win.  He wins.  Our relationship wins.

Your differences can be the source of constant irritation or, if you open your mind and heart, they can be the source of growth and greater closeness.