Margue,
Cerri won't be here until tomorrow....but I can answer this question with complete assurity. <img border="0" title="" alt="[Razz]" src="images/icons/tongue.gif" /> (One of the few *giggle*...mainly because it's on the site)
Straight from the horses mouth:
</font><blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr /><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial"> The solution to your problem is to schedule time each week where you can give each other your undivided attention. And then schedule everything else in your lives around it. Think of your time together as earning each of you $1000 an hour. It's time you could not afford to miss, and you would see to it that you would earn every penny. As it turns out, your time together is worth more than that, a lot more. It will buy you something that $1000 an hour could never buy you, your love for each other.
How much time? I suggest that you schedule 15 hours each week of undivided attention. At this moment, that may seem to be an overwhelming and impossible goal to achieve. But if it is, then meeting each other's emotional needs will also be overwhelming and impossible. That's about how much time it takes to meet the needs of affection, conversation, sexual fulfillment and recreational companionship, four of your most important needs. You met some of those when you dated and you fell in love with each other as a result. If your lifestyle prevents you from doing it now, your love for each other will eventually disappear, because you will not be able to meet each other's needs.
Two hours a day will just about do it. Or you can plan to be alone together one hour a day and make up the difference on the weekend. Assuming you have about 110 hours a week of productive time, it represents less than 15% of your total time to be spent doing what is most important in your life -- meeting each other's needs. It's about the time you would spend at a part-time job.
The time you plan to be together should not include children, relatives or friends. It should be just the two of you, so that you can give each other your undivided attention. And the purpose of your time together should be to meet each other's most important emotional needs, such as affection,sexual fulfillment, conversation, and recreational companionship.
If you have not been spending much time together lately, your first dates will seem awkward, and you will come face to face with incompatibility that is creeping into your marriage. But as you follow the Policy of Joint Agreement in deciding what you do when you are together, the awkwardness will fade, and you will find it to be the most rewarding part of your week, just as it was when you were dating each other.
You will also find yourselves coming up with excuses as to why you must miss a date. The reason is that you are not used to being together on schedule, and it will take a while to adjust to the idea that your dates are set in cement. Your courtship would not have lasted long if one of you stood up the other due to more pressing responsibilities. The same is true for marriage. If one of you tries to break a date, the other will feel neglected, and rightfully so.
Another suggestion is to schedule time when you are both full of energy. Don't give each other your left-overs. I usually recommend that time after 11:00 pm doesn't count, even if it turns out to be the most romantic experience of your day. That's because, on average, we're not worth much after 11:00 pm.
From my perspective as a marriage counselor, the time you spend alone with each other are the most valuable moments of your week. It's the time when you are depositing the most love units, maintaining your love for each other, and ensuring the success of your marriage. To neglect scheduling that time may prove to be one of the biggest mistakes of your lives.
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