The Relationship Therapy Podcast with Tony Miller, Sr.
The Relationship Therapy Podcast with Tony Miller, Sr.
Keeping the Flame Burning in Your Relationship
In this Episode, Tony introduces a new voice to the Podcast. His new Co-Host is Valerie Miller, his wife! They have teamed up to bring us a very special. Episode. They come out of the gate talking about "Keeping the Flame Burning in Your Relationship. Often Relationships get old or they experience a distance. Part of the reason for the distance is because they haven't worked on Keeping the Flame Burning! Tony & Valerie gives us some very informed Nuggets to making the fire doesn't go out. I'm sure that they have used some, if not all of these during their 35 plus years together. Find out what's missing from your Relationship that may be the reason your fire is going out. Because if your fire goes all the way out, your Relationship might be dead!
Keeping the Flame Burning in Your Relationship
1. Keep Surprising Each Other
2. Maintain the Physical Contact
3. Unplug From Everything
4. Have Regular Relationship Check-Ins
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You've been together. You loved one another. But all of a sudden, there's space. There's distance. Something happened to put you in that position. You must maintain what you had in your relationship. And one of the best ways to do that is to keep the flame burning. Because when the flame goes out, the relationship dies. In this episode of the Relationship Therapy Podcast, we're going to talk about keeping the flame burning in your relationship.
SPEAKER_01:Everyone listen up because it's time for the Relationship Therapy Podcast with your host, Tony Miller Sr. and co-host, Valerie Miller. They are going to do their best to take your relationship to the next level. Whether you are married or whether you are dating, Tony and Valerie are going to give you the hard facts and solid principles you need to strengthen your relationship. Now here are your hosts, Tony and Valerie.
SPEAKER_00:Hello everybody. This is your host, Tony Miller Sr., and welcome to another episode of the Relationship Therapy Podcast. I am excited about doing this episode, not only about the material that is going to come out of this episode, but because I have an opportunity to introduce my co-host. Co-host, you got something you want to say?
SPEAKER_02:Hello, everybody. This is Valerie Miller, and I'm so excited about being the co-host with my husband on this relationship podcast.
SPEAKER_00:And I'm just thankful for you saying yes, and we're going to have a great time presenting to anyone who's listening because we want relationships to be stronger. We want them to be healthier. We want them to be better. And whatever we can say to do that, to make a relationship better, is our assignment. This particular episode that we're starting with is a specialty of my wife Valerie because she presents this to premarital couples during premarital counseling. She does this to almost every single couple, and she is really well abreast to what the information that we're getting ready to go. You ready to start?
SPEAKER_02:Ready to start, baby.
SPEAKER_00:Okay, so this week we're talking about keeping the flame burning in your relationship.
SPEAKER_02:Yes.
SPEAKER_00:So the first point that we want to make is keep surprising each other.
SPEAKER_02:Keep surprising each other. When we keep surprising each other in relationships, we are demonstrating our cares and concern for our mace. There are keys to keeping that flame burning. It is very beneficial for the happiness of the couple and for the strength of the relationship.
SPEAKER_00:These spontaneous acts of surprising each other will keep your significant other guessing as well as understanding the thought process that you have to go through in order to uh surprise them. When you know that your mate has you on their mind, you can't help but keep a smile on your face. So, Valerie, how do we do that? Give me some of the uh nuggets on how we do that.
SPEAKER_02:Well, one of one of my favorite nuggets is gift, just like today before I went off to work, I fixed a little gift bag for Tony and left in his chair.
SPEAKER_00:And that's great. And it was a surprise. And those are some of the things we can do. But another thing that we can do is not only did she leave me a gift bag, but she also left me a note telling me that she loved me. And so those are things that strengthen the relationship. So you can talk about different things like that inside your relationship. You can handle that. Anything else, Valerie, you want to say?
SPEAKER_02:Yes. And another nugget you can use is you can call your spouse or you can text your spouse, you know, doing the date, seeing how they date going. You know, just send them a love text or just give them a call and check on them and see what they're doing.
SPEAKER_00:You can do like Stevie Wonder. He said, I just call to say I love you. To say I love you. Yeah. And then also you've got to make sure you keep your date nights going. Oh, yeah. You have to keep your date night. That's one of the things she stresses with us. We cannot get complacent in our relationship and just become homebodies. I'm a natural homebody. And I'm not. My wife loves for us to have spontaneous nights out. Matter of fact, last night was one of those. We were going for one thing, and I surprised and said, Hey, let's go out to eat. And we enjoyed that. And then we went riding. And that is something that we did, and we surprised one another in the last 48 hours. We've done that for each other, and that helps the relationship get better. That keeps surprising each other, makes us a better couple.
SPEAKER_02:I agree, darling. It really does. It really does. And I think another nugget we can add to that, Tony, with keeping the fame, flame burning is surprise, you know, like a surprise trip or a visit, you know, like one weekend, I just come home and say, Hey, Tona, pack your bag. Let's go somewhere.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, that has happened before. She's surprised me with the hotel trip. I've surprised her with birthday parties and things like that. Any way you can show your mate that they are on your mind will help the relationship grow stronger.
SPEAKER_02:The second nugget on keeping the flame burning is maintaining physical contact.
SPEAKER_00:Maintaining physical contact in your relationship is very important toward the longevity of your relationship. This contact can help relieve stress and bring comfort to both hearts.
SPEAKER_02:Maintaining physical contact brings couples closer together with each other. Life has a way of separating us. But when we take advantage of our ability to have physical touch, physical contact, it keeps us connected to one another.
SPEAKER_00:So, Valerie, you start off with this one. How do we uh maintain physical contact?
SPEAKER_02:One way, Tony, to maintain physical contact is one of my favorite things I like you to do to me, uh, giving me different, giving me massages from head to toe.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, when we were on our anniversary cruise last year, that was one of the first things we did. That very first day, we went and got an hour-long massage. And massages feel great, and it's even better when it's a couple's massage, because you can still be in the same room with one another, but still have somebody else massaging you, and you can enjoy that, and that's just maintains contact. It's even better when you do it with each other. My favorite one in maintaining contact is old school, and that's holding hands. So many older couples are still doing that, and it just warms my heart when I see older couples holding hands. I don't see that many young couples doing that. And so Valerie and I, we hold hands while driving, we hold hands when we're walking somewhere, and it's just another way to display that I love you.
SPEAKER_02:And one of the ways I like to maintain physical contact, it's like when Tony and I have date night at home, you know, after we get through eating and watching TV or something, I like to put on music and I like to slow drag, you know, dance. I'm not a big dancer, but one of my favorite dances is slow dragging.
SPEAKER_00:And she likes to slow drag, she really does. But mine, I want to talk about is kissing. Kissing is an important uh aspect of a relationship, and my wife, Valerie, loves to kiss. We kiss each other in the morning, kiss each other goodnight, but she really loves deep kisses, and those deep kisses, if you're married, can lead to other things that married folks do, and often they do. Okay.
SPEAKER_02:And another major physical contact I like is cuddling up. You know, we sitting at the house and had a nice meal and we were just watching TV, you know, and sometimes Tony be in his chair, but I like to get over there with him and just cuddle up and watch a good movie or so or show.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah. And another way we cuddle is in the bed. Uh, not to be sexual about it, but we like to cuddle. Let me tell you a quick story about when we first got married. First two weeks of our marriage, I didn't think we were going to make it because she would put her arm around my chest and her her leg crossed my legs, and it just made me feel claustrophobic. I was, I was uncomfortable. But now when she removes those legs from me or she's not there in the bed, I miss it. And that that is physical contact that is no longer within uh the bed with me, and I miss it because I've grown accustomed to having it with me. And so that's all we've got for that particular subject, but we'll get on to the next one. Now we've reached the third nugget on keeping the flame burning. Unplug from everything. Now I know you've heard me talk about unplug before, but I'm gonna talk about this one with my wife. When a couple can unplug from all of their distractions, the main focus is each other. Often when we get so caught up with work, maybe children or possible other hobbies, we tend to forget about one another. Unplugging gets us back on track with each other.
SPEAKER_02:Yes, that's right. And there is nothing like shutting out all of the noise and just spending quality time with the one you love. If couples only knew how the flame can be rekindled when all eyes are on each other, um, one other unplugged thing we can talk about is me, which is something that Tony and I uh do a lot together now. We have a couple devotional book. You can read books together, you can read the Bible together, but we actually have a couple devotional book that we read from time to time, and we take turn reading, and then we discuss what the devotion is talking about. And I truly enjoy that. And it don't take us anywhere from like 15 to 20 minutes, maybe sometimes 30 minutes, because I'm long-winded, but it just depends. But I just really enjoy that.
SPEAKER_00:We've learned so many things from that devotion that we didn't know or what we knew and we've forgotten to do or to display with one another. So it helps us, but also another way to do that, to unplug, is to take a time and establish a tech-free zone. Maybe you want to fast for two to three days with no screens, no technology, no phones, and just be with you and your mate so that they understand that all eyes are on them, the focus is on them. You're just wanting to spend that quality time with them without any of those distractions that may come in your way.
SPEAKER_02:I like that, Tone. I'm gonna be looking forward for you to do that with me. And the next one I think is good is finding new hobbies. I like to find, I think unplugging from everything is really good when the two of you can find different hobbies that you all can do together that you don't normally do like me. When I was a little girl, I used to love the skate. And I told Tony, I would love for us to go skating or even bowling. Bowling.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, I'm more of a uh high octane sport type guy, like playing racquetball or pickleball. And so we're gonna try some of these things together uh just so we can unplug, not worrying about our cell phones, not worried about who called, not worried about the jobs. We're just spending that quality time that's needed for couples to keep that flame going. Too often we forget about one another because life has hit us hard and we're worried about careers or advancing here or bills, and we really need to just spend that quality time with one another, and it will be beneficial to the couple. Don't you think so, Valerie? I sure do.
SPEAKER_02:I sure do.
SPEAKER_00:Now we're about to go into nugget number four, but before we do, we're going to recap the first three nuggets.
SPEAKER_02:The first nugget of keeping the plane burning is keep surprising each other.
SPEAKER_00:The second nugget was maintain physical contact.
SPEAKER_02:The third nugget was unplug from everything.
SPEAKER_00:And here is number four regular relationship check-ins.
SPEAKER_02:How do you know when your relationship is going well? One of the best ways to know without guessing is to sit down with your make and ask them, how am I doing? Relationship need check-in to find out the health of their relationship.
SPEAKER_00:It would be shameful to think that everything in your relationship is going well. And then something happens, and then out of the blue, your partner drops the bomb on you that they don't love you anymore. What are you going to do from that point? What are you going to say? You need relationship check-ins to keep that flame burning. So this is our last one. What do we, what, what, how can we do that, Valerie?
SPEAKER_02:Well, one of the one of the things we can do, Tony, to uh have a regular check-in relationship is we need to schedule a time, sit down and talk and decide how often are we gonna have the relationship check-in? Is we're gonna do it weekly, bi-weekly, monthly, but come up when we're gonna exactly do it and stick to it.
SPEAKER_00:And stick to it, you're right, because that's important. You've got to make that a priority in your relationship because it is for the health of your relationship. Another thing, when you are in these uh check-ins, you've got to ask your partner open-ended questions so they can give you answers. Don't just ask questions that give you yes or no answers. Let them have a deep conversation with you so that they can say what's on their heart, so that they can know how you're truly feeling. Don't hold back how you feel. You have to, because see, that's what these check-ins are for, to really gauge where your relationship is, what your partner's thinking, what you're thinking. So make sure you ask open-ended questions. What else?
SPEAKER_02:Another one is Tony, we need to avoid blaming each other. Avoid the blame game. Yes, avoid it.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, because when you blame one another, you're throwing off what you've done and you're pointing at what your mate has done. And oftentimes, probably 99% of the time, both parties had a part in something that went wrong in the relationship. So you gotta stop blaming each other. And then another one that I love is to practice active listening. And I just recently talked about that. And what I mean by active listening, that means that you're giving your mate the opportunity to say what they've got to say, and you're actively listening, not so that you can respond, but so that you can actually hear what they're saying and what they are truly meaning when they say it. I like that, Tony. That's great. And one of the things about being an active listener is it gives your mate an opportunity that you're really trying to grasp what they're saying so that the problems that may be there can be solved. And anything else?
SPEAKER_02:Oh, yeah, sure. I I think another one toning for relationship check-in is we should always try to keep the conversation respectful. You know, just keep it respectful. I don't need you going off on me and cussing me out, just keep it respectful.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, it it needs to be uh respectful. You need to hear that word over and over again. Just because your mate said something to you that stung, it hurt, it doesn't give you the right to say something to sting them back. If it's something that you're doing wrong, fix it. Don't cry about it, don't take it out on your mate. You just fix it. And then don't go digging to look and find what you didn't have before. Be respectful in that, and I guarantee you, if you do it, it will help the relationship. Well, that's all we've got. I've enjoyed doing this with my co-host, my wife. How did you enjoy it, baby?
SPEAKER_02:Oh, I loved it, baby, and I'm looking forward to doing many, many more with you.
SPEAKER_00:And we're gonna do so many more. But please remember this it takes two to make a relationship work. Boom!
SPEAKER_01:Thank you for listening to the Relationship Therapy Podcast with Tony and Valerie Miller. We hope that you enjoy this episode. Tune in next time for more insight on how to make your relationship better. If you have any questions, please email us at tmrelationship therapy at gmail.com. We would love to hear from you. Until next time, remember, it takes two to make a relationship work.