Teaching Your Partner How to Meet Your Needs

It may seem unromantic, but in a truthful relationship, you need to teach your partner how to meet your needs, as well as learn from them how to meet theirs.  It would be a whole lot easier if your partner could just intuit what you need from them, and then give it to you.  You may feel vulnerable asking for something that you want, and just wish that you didn’t have to, thinking that your partner should just know these things about you.  Maybe you’d be more excited in bed if your partner would only know to bring you flowers first.  Perhaps you’d be more willing to spend quality time in the evenings, if only you could have an hour alone after work.

Sometimes, it may feel easier to silently demand that your partner read your mind, and then you become angry and disappointed when they fail to do so.  You may start to focus on just how boneheaded you think your partner is for not guessing your needs, rather than on your own fear of asking for something and potentially having your desires thwarted.  The irony is that your desires are guaranteed to be thwarted if you treat your partner like a bonehead.  Another temptation is to then discuss your partner’s shortcomings with all of your friends, who will then sympathize with you. The problem with this strategy is that, when all the dust settles, your partner still has no idea what you need.

Of course, it would be wonderful if your partner were psychic and magically knew what to do for you when you are stressed, what romantic gestures hit the nail on the head, and what turns you on in bed- all without you ever saying a word.  To me, more romantic than that is knowing that your partner cares to hear what you want, and makes an effort to give it to you.  It is deeply touching when you make yourself vulnerable and take the risk of sharing your desire with the one you love.  Depth and meaning grow into the relationship from taking this sort of risk with each other.