Let’s explore a fresh perspective on the concept of "date night," suggesting a rename to "Mega-Moment of Love" or "connection time." The emphasis is on the broader purpose of prioritizing quality, one-to-one moments rather than adhering to a set schedule. The key is flexibility, personalization, and the freedom to choose any day, time, or activity that resonates with you and your partner. From shared experiences and learning to non-restrictive physical affection, this approach fosters unique, memorable connections that strengthen relationships. Whether it's a romantic partnership or a friendship, the goal is to appreciate and prioritize the value of these special moments. Will you join us in prioritizing your Mega-Moment of Love?

About the Host:

Meet Crystal, your relationship and social health coach. Crystal is the founder of Sparked Forever Relationship & Singles coaching. She started her journey supporting the neurodiverse community in navigating this, sometimes frustrating, neurotypical social world. Lessons and inspiration from her earlier work drives Crystal’s passion for bringing couples and singles together through acceptance, understanding and big picture thinking to grow vibrant relationships. Crystal understands that the foundation for our social health and well-being starts with making connections to others. When Crystal is not working with couples, she loves to be out on adventures with her partner and bonus kids or spending time connecting with friends over good food and fun music.

Links:

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https://www.instagram.com/sparkedforever/

https://www.instagram.com/sparkitsocial/

https://www.tiktok.com/@sparked_forever

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Welcome to our love space today. I hope you guys are having a great day, wherever you are listening from, we actually got a lovely little fairy dusting of snow this morning. So that's why I'm peeking out the window. Enjoying, as I'm talking to you guys today. So today we're going to be thinking about date nights. And I get it, I know that many of you guys out there think that they're lame, or outdated or like this weird ritual of like going out to dinner and coming home and having sex and it's like, meaningless, and it's just something you're told to do. And that adds no value to your relationship. So if these are kind of the thoughts you have no, I mean, actually, even when I was thinking about talking about this, I Googled just to see what would like come up. And many of the first articles that come up are like, you know, date nights are outdated, you know, that another one was like, I think it was like I cut out date nights and our marriage improved. So I was like, Oh, well, this is really the opposite of what my perspective is. But when reading through a lot of these articles, it was actually that the people were getting really stuck in the details of what a date night, it's like, like a date night means only that you go for dinner. And that you must get if you're a couple with kids that you must get a babysitter and then you must come home and have sex. And I can see that if that is your definition of a date night. That that schedule, that list of activities, that routine that's not for everyone. Right, but relationships, and social connections and love is for everyone. So I think one of the first things that we need to do is to not get stuck in the details that that's what a date night is because actually, that's not what it is. And, and oh, this is actually what we need to do is to help our brains get out of that one kind of definition that when detailed focus definition is let's come up with a new name. So something along the lines of like, you know, making time for connection time, Oh, I like this one, okay, or making time for our mega moments of love. So I often talk about our micro moments of love. And those are those tiny daily things that we do like remembering to pour coffee for someone, or you know, having a hug or kiss goodbye or hugging or kissing or whatever you do for affection when that person comes in the door, right acknowledging their presence, and not that they just come in and 10 minutes later, you guys are like, Oh, hello, unless that's what everyone makes. Everyone, you know, especially for some couples where it's like a neuro, spicy mix. Some people do need that, that, you know, come into the house and unwind time, and then we get our Hello later. So yeah, if that's you, then cool, but you know, whatever those micro moments that are loved are making everyone feel connected, and kind of keeping you going on a daily basis and keeping you energized on a daily basis. Those are your micro moments of love. So your Mega moment of love is going to involve those same things, right, your communication, your affection, your kindness for each other. And putting in energy and the energy you put in will create energy, but your Mega moment of love is going to be a longer, more intense, more focused moment. So that could be something like going to dinner or going to a play together or a sporting event or something, something where you're spending a lot of a one to one time. And this can actually even, like even if we just bring this out to friendships and think about it. You know, there's lots of times where we can hang out with people in a group. And then we have our kind of slightly closer friends where it's like, ooh, that person even though I just saw them the other day or week or whatever, and we hung out in a group I need to have someone to one time actually need to have a little friend date time with them. Because you need to feel that you know, you need to have that time to have longer connections to talk more about where you guys are in life where each other's lives are going you know that time to put energy into each other laugh together. Hear about each other's experiences when you're not around each other, you know have have your own shared intimate experience in that moment. Because that's your a moment actually read a really great book in the spring called The Art of gathering and it is by be up Arcor really, I mean, I am a people person, and I love my, you know, gatherings and having people over and whatnot. So I really appreciated it from that point of view. And I'll put it in the show notes so that she will get her recognition and that you guys can check it out if you're interested. So she talks about how every gathering, that people have together, that it's special, and it's unique, because you can never relive, or recreate that moment in time again, so even if you we have the same, you know, tried to do the same party with the same place in the same food and the same people and like, tell everyone to dress the same, there's actually no point in time, where everyone will be the same as they were on that day. And at that party, I just find that really fascinating. And I mean, it probably seems pretty, you know, like, Oh, of course, that's the case. But I find that a really magical idea to pause and think on that there is no point in time will, we will be that same person with that same knowledge who had that same day, to have that same moment again. So that one to one time that we share with our friends, and we have that shared experience, whether it's just popping by someone's house for tea, or, you know, going out and having a fun night together, that that's a special shared experience moment that only you and that person get to have. And that's the same as a date night or sir, it was rather a mega moment of love, right? That grows and strengthens your bond as a couple, because only you are getting to have that one to one shared experience together. Right. And that moment can actually be recreated. As I just said, it's unique, right? It's unique to that time and space and and that day that you're having. And that can actually, if we think about that recreation piece, when we have such a wonderful time, just as human beings, we want to have that time again. And actually so funny. This, coincidentally I didn't even really think of this when I was thinking of talking about this, but just the other day went up for a family birthday. And we went to new restaurant. And it was fantastic. We're having such a fun time. Like, there's just like, I mean, I'm a cocktails person. And there's like a little there's a person pushing a little cart with like cocktails that they would make tableside. And just like lots of unexpected little surprises, and the food was great. And you know, even even the noise level was great. That's not something that everyone thinks about. But you know, maybe some of my neuro spicy people out there, think about that, like how loud are places, right, and I like I like it, so that it's loud enough to feel like the hussel and bussel in those like kind of buzzin a bit because I like to feel that people energy. But I also don't like to yell right down, you know, while I'm trying to have a conversation. So even like that noise level was great. And you know, humans are such little creatures of habit that like halfway through the meal, I even write lol right to my level of life. And I was like, Oh my gosh, we need to come back here. The meal hasn't even ended yet. So you can say I like I know me, when we go on a date, we have a wonderful time or sorry, when we have a minimum of love. And it's a wonderful time, we sort of want to recreate that. And some of us which and this is totally fine, are really creatures of habit like we have two, one or two favorite restaurants. And those when we decide to go out, that's where we want to go, we

only want to go to those places. And if that's what works for your brain, cool. But for a lot of people, we can get stuck in this and it feels more like a rat, rather than like those are my two favorite places, and I need never changed them. It's like, ooh, those are the two places we always go to. And if you're always going to them, and every time you go, you know what it's like that law of diminishing marginal returns, right? Every time you go, you get a little bit less out of it. Sometimes you might get a little bit more, but the idea really like behavior wise is every time you go, you're gonna get a little bit less, a little bit lasts a little bit less. And sometimes it can start to feel that that shared connection time is losing its magic. And the reason it's losing his magic is not it can feel confused. It's not necessarily because your relationship is losing its magic. It's because you can't recreate that energy and the and the magic that that date had when you first went on it. Right and we can get stuck and thinking it should and then it feels like more work because we're constantly trying to like chasing the dragon. We're like constantly trying to chase this thing. Rather than switching it up and having a new experience and seeing if we can find a new kind of wonderful right and to put in all of that work and then have it be kind of a hit or miss experience can actually be very punishing for a lot of people Oh, and by punishing I mean, like, it's gonna decrease the amount you want to do it in the future. And the other part, if you know, if we think about the date night, as really just being that piece of you know, like that, if you're stuck in that old definition of it being like, Oh, we go out for dinner, and then we come home and have sex, and you must 100% have a babysitter. And then that can also make a lot of pressure, right? What if I eat too much for dinner? Way too much, and I'm non food for sex, or like, oh, my gosh, this is the only time we have sex with a master and bla bla, we're gonna disappoint each other. If we don't, that that and that pressure, those expectations can also feel punishing can also feel like I don't want to do it. And that was actually one of the big points in the articles that came up on Google was that these people were feeling pressure to do date night, and a very particular way, like the dinner and sex kind of schedule. And it's not for everyone, and it wasn't for these people. And so I can see why when they decided to stop that it felt better and more uncomfortable. So again, we're pulling out to that big picture idea if we zoom out. And we remember that our important idea here is that we're making time for make a moment of love, because we're making time to have a one to one connection with each other. If that's our focus, then we get to color in those details. However we want with whatever activities and things that we want to do. Well, isn't that freeing? Oh, my God, how freeing is that, then it can be doesn't have to be a Friday night or a Saturday night it can be any day of the week can be any time of day, where there's lots of us that work from home and have flexible schedules and things like that. Not all of us are working a nine to five anymore. Okay, so it doesn't have to be even a dinner evening thing. Anytime a day. I know going crazy with it. It can involve food or drink or not, who cares? It has to involve the things that you guys enjoy and like, right can involve staying in or going out, you can get a babysitter, don't get a babysitter, wait till the kids are in bed. Don't whatever you need to do, you know, it just has to be that you prioritize sharing an extended moment together, that you prioritize sharing that connection piece. So let's get ourselves out of these date night blobs out of thinking it's outdated or that your relationship doesn't need it or you if we've reversed it. And I said tell me your relationship doesn't need time for you to take a moment and connect and focus on each other. Why? You'd be like, oh, we'll obviously have to answer yes, because it'd be crazy to say No, exactly. So we're gonna reframe it we're rethinking these date nights as our connections times or our mega moments of love whatever you want to call it you know To each their you know make up your own jazzy name for I love it. DM me, tell me what these jazzy names are. You can find me on Instagram at sparked forever or on Tik Tok at sparked underscore forever. And, you know, ask yourself, this is your moment now. So we've we've really thought it for you. Oops, I just hit the microphone. We've rethought it for you. Okay, we've re named it we've reframed the thinking around it. So now is the time for you to ask yourself. Do I want to make time with the love of my life? To have more connection moments to have more moments in 2024 have more mega moments of love. Are we ready to be sparked?