What does a 1 AM message, a radio show contest and a yellow legal pad have to do with coming up with fun date night ideas?

Find out in this episode, where I share three actionable steps to help you reignite your connection through fun and meaningful date nights. 

I talk about the importance of regular date nights, dispel myths about them being time-consuming or expensive and introduce the steps: 

1. Collect.
2. Choose.
3. Calendar. 

And you’ll find out what those three weird items I mentioned at the beginning have to do with coming up with fun date night ideas.

By following these steps, you can prioritize your relationship, add excitement and create a deeper connection. 

Come join the Couples Playhouse community for more ideas and resources. You can join at playdatesforcouples.com/playhouse.

So what does a 1:00 AM message, a radio contest and a yellow legal pad have to do with coming up with fun date night ideas? Well, basically everything! And we'll talk about each of these things throughout the episode as we go into the three steps.

So, hey, if we haven't met yet, I'm Leanne and I'm an intimacy and relationship coach. I love creating content about date nights or play dates, connection and communication to help you go from feeling like disconnected roommates to connected romantic partners again and to help you bring fun and play into your relationship.

So, what does a 1:00 AM message, a radio contest and a yellow legal pad have to do with date night ideas?

Well, did you know that only half of couples have date nights? And so about half don't. There are lots of reasons why they don't, but feeling like date nights are supposed to be these fancy, time consuming, potentially expensive, out of the home things is a big one and boredom with the same-old, same-old is another one.

So date nights don't happen at all, or they only rarely happen from time to time. Yet they're actually a really simple way to create connection in your relationship.

Speaking of connection, it was so interesting. That word - connection - came up over and over again as I talked to people about what was missing in their relationship and what they wanted more than anything.

What I was hearing was that in all the busyness of life, everything else became the priority but your relationship. And your relationship and date nights kind of fell by the wayside. Or they involve vegging out in front of the TV on your devices trying to decompress from the busy day or week. There's disconnection rather than connection and you have no clue how to get that connection back again.

Now, it is normal in long-term relationships for things to change over time and it's normal to not have the same spark you had at the beginning. Life and kids and work and all the things happen. But there are simple ways that you can intentionally bring connection, romance and intimacy back into your relationship.

And date nights are one way to do this. And they do not have to be the time consuming, expensive, gotta get dressed up things that so many people think they are, or the boring things.

Okay, so the three steps I'm gonna share will help you use date nights to create a deeper connection with your partner, even if you're busy, even if you feel like you've tried stuff before that didn't work and even if you're not sure where to start.

So here are the three steps and they all start with a letter C to make them easy to remember. And this is where the 1:00 AM message, the radio contest and the yellow legal pad come in.

So step one is collect.

When do you get your ideas and insights in general? I don't know about you, but I get them when I go for a drive, when I'm in the shower, when I go out in nature and of course in the middle of the night. I keep a pad of paper and a pen beside me because inevitably I have to write shit down during the night. And this is what happened not too long ago when I woke up with an idea for a series of videos based on our date nights and I ended up messaging my partner at 1:00 AM about it.

So we had our couple meeting ... not at 1:00 AM! ... and brainstormed ideas for the date nights. And this is the first step - creating a collection or a brain dump of date night ideas that feel good to both of you. You don't need to have a middle of the night inspiration first either!

I recommend a couple meeting each month where you talk about a variety of things, including ideas and plans for date nights for the upcoming month. In our last meeting, we talked about what's good, what's not good, finances, family and the date night ideas. The meeting itself helps to create connection, make your relationship a priority and stimulate conversation as well.

When you plan, start wherever you're at. But I do recommend working up to planning ideas in the main categories of intimacy, which are emotional (for example, playing a questions game together), physical but nonsexual (for example, exploring different types of nonsexual touch), sexual (for example, trying out a new toy in the bedroom) and self intimacy, surprisingly perhaps (for example, time alone out in nature to connect with yourself).

The activities that you come up with can take any length of time from simple, short ideas that can create a lot of meaning to much longer things. And they don't have to involve going out of the house all the time and they don't have to involve spending money either.

So a few of the ideas that we came up with were blindfolded cooking, going to see the Northern Lights at Elk Island which is a place local to us here and window shopping on White Avenue, which is a really cool avenue in our city with cool shops.

So to support you, check out the Couples Playhouse community that I created to provide you with ideas, reviews of date nights and other resources. You can join at playdatesforcouples.com/playhouse and the link will also be in the show notes.

So step two is choose.

Now, my partner is a knows-all-the-trivia kind of person and somehow he has the skill of being able to get through to radio stations for contests. And this time was no different. He answered whatever the question was and won free movie passes. So one of the ideas that we added to our list during our last meeting was to use those movie passes. And that is the second step, choosing a month of date night options ahead of time at your monthly meeting from your collection of ideas.

So step one was collect, step two was choose and step three is calendar. So that they actually happen, step three is to write them down and ideally, put them in your calendar.

In our last meeting, we brainstormed and planned out three months of date night ideas on a yellow legal pad. Planning and scheduling might feel like a boring, not exciting thing to do, but it makes it way more likely that your date nights will actually happen. And studies have even shown this. And someone once said, "If it's not scheduled, it doesn't exist." So this is true because life takes over, circumstances dictate things and even emotions derail the ideas you had in your head. So whether you physically write things down on paper or you use a digital way of taking notes later, put the date night ideas into your calendar in advance for the month. Maybe you each put them into your own calendars, or maybe you have a joint or shared calendar and you add them there.

So there you have it. Three steps to fun date nights that create deeper connection in your relationship even if you're busy.

The reason that they're fun is because you'll have a collection of ideas to choose from that feel good to you. And you can keep adding to that so you don't end up doing the boring, same-old, same-old all the time.

They create a deeper connection because they establish a context of intentionally focusing on your relationship and this can lead to healthier relationships, increased closeness, more meaningful communication, fun, romance, commitment and reduced stress.

And it works even if you're busy because it's pretty simple. It's not about adding in a ton of stuff. It's about adding in a few things that make your relationship a priority and your meetings and date nights don't need to take a ton of time.

So take it one little step at a time. Set that first monthly meeting to do a brain dump of ideas. Choose a few and schedule them for the upcoming month.

Now listen to the next episode to learn the real reason why so many couples don't have date nights and what you can do instead. Come join the Couples Playhouse for more date night ideas and resources and the link is below in the show notes. I'd really love to see you over there.

And follow the podcast so you don't miss any upcoming episodes to help you create an awesome relationship with your partner. Thanks for listening and see you in the next one!