Spring brings a renewed focus on love and marriage. You can become more frustrated, irritated, and sad if you’re single without a significant partner. If you’re single, do you find yourself longing for a partner to “make your dreams come true?” For those of you who are coupled, you can boost your love, intimacy, and passion to experience exhilarating love 365 days a year.

Here are 5 strategies to help you jump-start your love today and every day to enjoy your ultimate relationship with yourself and that special romantic person.

1. Celebrate the EXTRAordinary™ you!

First acknowledge and show yourself love by romancing yourself. Do you indulge on that long awaited gift or a day at the spa? Do you ever write a love note to yourself? Perhaps, you just need that long luxurious nap to recharge or a massage to feed your skin’s need for touch. Today take the time to:

• Put yourself first, knowing how important you are in meeting your own needs and wants.
• List the qualities you like and admire about yourself to remind you how loved you are to yourself and others.
• Afterwards, write a love letter to yourself that you are cherished.
• Take out the “love note” anytime you want to feel more uniquely loved.

When you feel this way and ACT on Love™, you automatically raise your energy and level of attraction. Not only that, you find yourself happier as you are taking charge of meeting your own needs rather than demanding or wishing that from a partner.

2. Tell and show whomever you love, how special he or she is.

Love is a verb and can be shown in action through words and gestures. Each day let the people around you know how are important they are to you through recognition, compliments, appreciation of their unique qualities and efforts, giving simple gifts that can be made or bought, touching through hugs, kisses, or a shoulder rub, spending time to laugh, talk, and connect through activities, and spontaneously doing thoughtful tasks that eases the day for the lucky recipient. Don’t just save these loving gestures for special occasions, demonstrate these acts of love multiple times daily in various ways.

3. Take charge of your life – Give your partner what you desire!

Think of being in a relationship and how you would want to be treated by your lover. Whatever it is that you desire, practice the law of reciprocity with the idea of being the first to give. If you want your partner to be romantic, then don’t let him or her guess what that will look like and feel like for you. Instead create the romantic day or evening exactly the way you would like to experience it. If you want more physical contact, then touch your partner in various ways both sexual and nonsexual. If you want more compliments and acknowledgements, be direct and express your needs and be the model of what you’d like to receive. Whining, nagging and pressuring don’t work. Remember you are manifesting being irresistible!

4. Make a list of why this special person in your life is so cherished by you.
Keep warm feelings in your heart each and every day.
Keep this list handy to affirm how treasured your partner is to you and read this as a reminder of the many qualities you appreciate, love, and admire about this individual. Keep warm feelings in your heart each and every day. On those days when irritation and impatience get in the way of your loving your partner, the qualities you love about your beloved can help you to get back into conscious loving™ to get you back to a calmer state to view his actions or statements with a “loving eye,” to give him the benefit of doubt.

5. Start a list of gratitude and write 5 things that you are grateful for each day.
This practice brings your awareness to all the good in your life. Your gratitude might be about the beautiful sunrise that greeted you upon awakening, being able run or walk faster or longer, feeling the embrace of loved ones, hearing words of appreciation of how valued you are at work, school, or home, the sense of satisfaction and fulfillment of a completed task, or even the unconditional love that you might receive from your furry pet. As you begin to look for blessings in your day, you become happier with a greater sense of well being which radiates to all those around you…Shining your magnetic love to make you even more attractive to the universe, and especially to those fortunate enough to closely share your space.

I’d love to hear your success stories and personal strategies for upping your love with your special partner and others who are important in your life. Yes, you can take control of your life to ensure 365 days of love in thought and action!

Written by Dr. Mamiko and originally published at smartfem.com

Do you wish you had a magic wand in which you can awaken the love inside your partner and keep your love alive and vibrant? Your wish is my command and these following easy steps can quickly reinvigorate your love and passion. It starts with YOU, creating your best self by loving yourself and in giving to others what you want.

1. Love yourself. When you love yourself, you become irresistible to both men and women. Take conscious steps to accept and affirm YOU and avoid criticism and judgment. When you can be tender to yourself, you can be gentle and more loving with others.

2. Remember how you met and what attracted you to each other. Tell your partner the special qualities that piqued your interest to want to know him more or her.

3. Think back and discuss when you each knew that you were meant for each other. What was it about your partner that was so endearing that you wanted to marry or have a deeper committed relationship together? Think about the special endearing terms you used to call and describe your sweetheart and use them now.

4. Create your own wedding vows: Vow to tell each other a compliment, acknowledgment, or gratitude each day. Start each day with some variation of “I love you.”

5. Write down what you like, respect, admire, and love about each other. Keep this in a special place so that you and your partner can admire and be reminded of your affection for each other.

6. When you have disagreements, promise to discuss and work out a mutually agreeable outcome. Compromise and strive to create win-win scenarios for each of you.

7. Hug, kiss, snuggle, and touch each other physically each day. Act like a puppy that is at long last reunited with his owner at the end of he day; that’s

exactly how you want to act and feel.

8. Give a gift of love. This can be something that is made or bought. A note of love, a poem, a bouquet of flowers, homemade cookies are all considered gifts of love.

9. Spontaneously perform acts of love and kindness that help your partner. Taking out the garbage, helping to care for the home and yard, and taking a favorite beverage to your partner are all ACTions that help make life and everyday functions easier.

10. Add a romantic twist. When in search of new ideas to get your juices and mojo going, go to the library or bookstore and check out books suggesting ways to enliven romance, create intrigue, and seduce your partner.

11. Have fun…Plan an event or ACTivity to look forward to daily. Laugh and smile together daily. These can be simple activities ranging from reading together, relaxing on the patio after dinner, watching a sunrise or sunset and making out, playing board games, and exercising or taking a class together. The more you can smile and laugh, the more it stimulates fun and love.

12. Remember LOVE IS A VERB! The more you can ACT on Love™, the more love grows and deepens creating that circle of affection and passion.

These twelve proven strategies for growing and keeping love have been personally tested by my husband and me in our over 40 years of marriage plus my work with couples throughout my career as a coach, psychologist, and individual and couples therapist. When you feel EXTRAordinary™ and you show your partner that he or she is EXTRAordinary™, you’ll find amazing and ultimate love. I’d love to know your strategies for creating and keeping forever love.

When you have been dating someone for an extended period, or perhaps even living together, there comes a time to step up your relationship.  Do you initiate the discussion? Or do you stand by, waiting for your love interest to take the reins of your life together?

First you begin to build up resentment about your relationship.

In the ideal world, this is a topic that mutually comes to the forefront of your minds as the synergy of your relationship evolves.  However, this rarely happens, making it crucial that you be the one to initiate.  “Why me?” you ask.  If you don’t initiate, you begin to act and respond in several ways.  First you begin to build up resentment about your relationship.   When this happens, you begin to become more critical of your partner and begin to withdraw emotionally and physically.

Secondly, you might be experiencing anxiety about “another one who doesn’t commit and will probably leave you.”  When anxiety hits, it’s easy to feel insecure about yourself, jealous, and suspicious.  You might then go on an even more uncomfortable, suspicious path trying to check emails, voicemails, or where your partner has been…or you become the doormat, the “people-pleaser,” trying to guess at what will make your loved one happy and fall in love with you.  You then become co-dependent making his life your life, and become obsessed about what he’s thinking, feeling, and doing.

Here are some ways to figure out if he’s the one for you and if you should step up your commitment:

• Are you really falling for this guy?
• Be truthful about your real feelings and motives.  Are you really falling for this guy? Or are you feeling so unworthy and desperate that you must cling to anyone who pays attention to you or stays with you?  Do you truly like, love,  and respect your partner?
• Do you have mutual interests and are you compatible? Do you find yourselves excited to see each other, and that your conversations are intimate so that you are able to be your true self? Or do you find yourself lonely and feeling unimportant, often left out while he gathers with his friends or prioritizes work too much?
• Does he bring out the best in you and ,make you feel precious? Does he make you laugh and feel playful? Are you a great listener and supporter, spontaneously showing verbal and physical affection, and feeling comfortable pursuing your own activities, privately or with others?

If you answered yes to the above, then it’s time for a heart-to-heart talk where you can share your feelings and desire.

• Start with a message that lets him know the qualities you find attractive in him and why he’s so special to you.  Then let him know you want to have a deeper level of commitment (dating each other exclusively, moving in together, engagement, or marriage) and what that looks like and feels like for you.  Don’t do this after making love,  talking in the bedroom, or your lover’s home.  Otherwise, you might be confusing your feelings about having sex rather than the person that you want to possibly spend your life with.  Instead pick a neutral public territory such as a restaurant, park, beach, or even sitting in the car admiring a scenic view or sunset.
• Give him time to respond.  He may need to think it over, because he may enjoy keeping the relationship as is. By allowing your partner the chance to explore his feelings and to come up with how he is feeling towards you and envision going forward, you are allowing him freedom and letting go of control.  He will respect you and have even deeper feelings for you.
• Once you have the discussion, then back off talking about commitment.  Nothing turns someone off quicker than repeatedly discussing a topic without any clear resolution. Your partner begins to be less enthusiastic about getting together or deepening your relationship.  Instead focus on having fun and making your time together so special that he can’t get enough of you and wants you in his life!
• This creates a win-win scenario
• When you both are on the same page and mutually wanting to experience a deeper level of relationship commitment and intimacy, you can then discuss ways that serve both of your needs.  This creates a win-win scenario in which you both are working together to bring out your love.

If you partner is truly noncommittal, it might be time to move on.  This way you can make way for a new partner who is possibly more appreciative and loving towards you to emerge. It’s better to be in no relationship than a bad relationship. After all, you don’t need to settle – you deserve the best!

This was originally in Smartfem  Sept 8, 2014.