A shining smile is a great indicator of happiness and satisfaction. But getting that kind of smile is easy. It takes just gargling mouthwash and brushing your teeth. If you have time and a few dollars to spare, you may also the assistance of a good personal or family dentist. That’s all you need to brighten or straighten a smile, but that won’t take you all the way.
A smile doesn’t say much if it does not radiate, and it will only radiate if it is rooted in genuine happiness. Fortunately, the path to true happiness is parsimonious and straightforward. It may not seem that way at first. Sometimes a path is so deceptively simple that it just gets overlooked. We are wired to believe that more complex solutions bring in more compelling results, but this is rarely the case.
In fact, research has shown that the greatest source of joy is almost exactly what you’d expect: stable, affectionate companionship. Long-term research psychological research has always pointed to high-quality relationships as a strong predictor of both good health and happiness. This can be any type of relationship: friendship, familial, romantic. In this article, we’ll focus more on the importance of romance.
While the quality of a relationship is not always related to how long it lasts, logic tells us that fulfilling relationships often last the longest. Instead of asking how we can make our love last, maybe it would be better to ask how we can improve our relationships? The answers are simple, but they sure demand a whole deal of commitment and focus.
Learn your partner’s love language.
Even if you are in an intimate committed relationship, the two of you are still separate individuals with different preferences and styles. One point of divergence is in the way that you express your love and care for the other. This is not really a problem; it only becomes one if one partner or both partners assess the other’s actions from their own perspective alone.
Sociologist Terry Hatkoff from the California State University identified at least six different forms of love–therefore six different love languages–that are typically present in modern-day couples. If, for example, the man is a romantic type while the woman is an unselfish type, they most likely ‘speak’ in different ways.
For example, the man might shower the partner with flowers and chocolates and want to cuddle all the time. The woman, on the other hand, may prefer ‘speak’ through her actions. Maybe she prefers to focus on meeting the comfort needs of her partner, taking satisfaction and showing affection through care. Both partners have to understand each other’s viewpoint so that they know that even if they do not receive the exact things that they give, what they get is still love.
Take sex seriously.
While generally people who have sex are no happier than their sexually inactive counterparts, couples who have sex more often tend to report more satisfaction than those who have too little sex. This is true across cultures.
With that in mind, it will work to the couple’s benefit if they take sex very seriously. If both of them are working, they might want to create a schedule for it. If they have fantasies that they want to act on, they should be willing to communicate. The partnership is an expectedly intimate one; and now that we know that sex plays an important role in it, the partners should exert effort not to feel awkward when talking about sex.
If a partner feels anxious their sexual performance, it might help if it’s going to be brought up in a heart-to-heart conversation. There are studies that show that those who have high sexual performance anxiety have higher chances of cheating on their partners.
