3 Ways to Improve your Relationship this Week.

Photo by Jeremy Banks on Unsplash

Navigating relationships can be tricky. Here are a few tips to help improve your relationships this week.

These are things you and your partner(s) could try out this week to help improve communication and foster connection. These strategies are great for romantic relationships, but they can also be used for friend relationships or adapted to do with your entire family.

1. Head, Heart, Hand

Head, Heart, Hand is about checking in with your partner, so you can tell each other how your day or week has been. You can do this daily or weekly or on some other schedule that works best for you. How it works is that you ask each other to say something on each category for the check-in.

Head: Something that has been on your mind around knowledge or wisdom. For example, if you have been reading a good book or learned about something new, you could talk about it in this category.

Heart: Something that has made you feel good that day or week. For example, you saw a really cute puppy on your walk.

Hand: Something you have been physically doing that you enjoyed. It could be that you tried a new machine at the gym, built something new, or cooked a new recipe.

Try to be as specific as possible. This helps you build connection with your partner and talk about things that maybe you otherwise would have missed.

For mine this week, I might say: Head - In the book I’m reading, there was this really funny quote. Let me share it with you. Heart - This was so funny: I was sitting on the couch, and our cat parkoured off my lap, jumped onto the table, parkoured off the wall, then did a little spin. Hand - I feel so good because I made lasagna from scratch for the first time, and it actually tasted good!

2. HALT

Sometimes we get into arguments because we are just tired or hungry or something else is going on with us. Does that ever happen to you? You say something you didn’t mean because you were “hangry” or just needed a nap. One way to avoid this is to ask yourself to “HALT” before a conversation with your partner. Ask yourself if you are Hungry, Angry, Lonely, or Tired (HALT). Then, address those needs first and before having the conversation.

You can even pause a conversation if you notice any of those start to creep up, address those needs, then come back to the conversation. Just maybe let your partner know ahead of time that you plan to start using HALT.

Before your next important conversation, remember to HALT, address that first, then have the conversation (without the hanger :p).

3. The Gratitude Jar

Thinking about what you’re grateful for can go a long way, but it can feel overwhelming to commit to thinking of things or writing them down every single day. And forget asking your partner to do that! But hey, if you’re already doing that, good for you! If that feels intimidating, I recommend starting with this.

Grab a jar or bin… it can be cute or not, really whatever your heart desires. Make a commitment with your partner that each week, you will both write down one thing that you are grateful for that happened that week and put it in the jar. Be really specific (i.e., I went for a walk and saw this cute little bird singing and hopping around vs. I went for a walk and saw birds) because when you look at the papers later, you want to remember the memory. Then pick a date in the future (a year, for example) and read the papers together.

This activity is good for a few reasons. It helps you and your partner start to notice some little things that are happening throughout the week that you enjoyed, things that you might have otherwise missed or forgotten about. It also helps you build connection with your partner because you’re doing this activity together and sharing some highlights from your week. And at the end of it, you can create a meaningful fun date night reading them again. You could even pair the activity with other date night things (like making pizza together, going for a picnic, playing board games). It’s up to you. Either way, it helps you build positive memories with your partner.

Relationships take work. These are some easy things that you can do to improve your relationship in a fun way.