If you are in a long distance relationship, you will know that you need a lot of material to keep the conversation going. Long distance couples do not have the luxury of cuddling up and silently enjoying each other’s company through a phone or
video call. When you connect with your partner across a vast distance, you always need to have something to say.
Should you be looking for some help to
avoid running out of things to say to your partner, then you have come to the right place. According to a professor of psychology at New York State University, there are as many as
36 questions you can ask someone if you are interested in getting to know them better in an intimate way. Not only that, asking these questions might help you fall in love too.
Dr. Aron is well-known for his work on intimacy and interpersonal relationships. He argues that the best way for a couple to get close to each other is by sharing – asking questions and answering them. You can finish asking these questions within 45 minutes and instantly start to feel the effect. However, if you are living far away from your partner, you know that 45 minutes’ worth of material is simply not quite enough.
The good news is someone else has written an electronic book based on Dr. Aron’s work, and the book has a whopping 1,000 questions you can ask your partner. The author of the e-book is Michael Webb, a world-renowned relationship writer. His book for couples,
1000 Questions for Couples will help any long distance couple maintain the flame, stay in love, and even become more in love with each other.
This book will get the conversation going in no time and have you talking with your partner all through the night. Bear in mind that while the conversation will be flowing, it may not be an easy one. However, if you want to improve your relationship, it is an important conversation to have. Reading this book will help you set the right foot forward. Below is a quick review of the most important lessons you can learn from Webb’s
1000 Questions for Couples.
1000 Questions for Couples Book Review
An established expert with a proven track record
Michael Webb has dedicated more than 20 years to helping couples achieve a long and successful relationship. Webb has written many best-selling
books about relationships and has been featured in major newspapers in the United States, popular magazines like
Cosmopolitan, and even went on the Oprah Winfrey show before.
Webb has heard many stories about how relationships and marriages have broken up simply because the couples did not talk about certain crucial details until it was too late. If there is something very important about yourself that you think will have an impact on your partner, it is always better to let them know sooner rather than later. For example, Webb once said that a woman who was married for a few months only just found out that her husband did not want kids. Another man told Webb that he could not get over the fact that his wife of a few years never told him that she had been in prison until just then.
From these testimonies, Webb argues that the world would have fewer breakups and divorces if only couples knew about their partner’s beliefs and thoughts before committing themselves to the relationship. Therefore, he wrote the book
1000 Questions for Couples to help couples get to know each other more.
Being in a long distance relationship you are unable to experience physical intimacy as often as normal couples do, so use these questions to get closer to your partner mentally and emotionally. You might even achieve a better and more profound connection this way.
Rejuvenate your Skype sessions
It is very easy to fall back on the routine questions when you do your daily Skype calls with your partner. While it is important to ask questions about their daily life like how was work, and if they have had a nice day, it is also not the most exciting nor unexpected questions to get.
Sometimes you can
spice up your calls a bit by asking some questions from the
1000 Questions for Couples book. The book is especially useful if you have doubts about your partner, you do not feel secure in the relationship, or you are simply not good at expressing yourself. Asking your partner some of these questions will help you gain insights that you can use to decide what to do about the relationship.
I am not saying that you should stop asking the usual questions whenever you Skype your partner from now on. Instead, these questions can complement your usual conversation and bring it to a whole new level. You can start your regular Skype session with small talk and then move on to these heavier and more serious questions.
The 1,000 questions are segmented into 22 groups. Each group has a distinct purpose and goal you want to achieve like questions about feelings, moral beliefs, the future, and even thoughts on being a parent. Of course, no book promoting intimacy between couples will leave out a section about sex. It is one of the most integral parts of any relationship yet could be a difficult one to talk about, especially for couples who live thousands of miles away from each other.
The sharing game
One of the best things about these 1,000 questions is that there are many ways you can use them, so you can customize a set of questions to fit your own personal situation. If you have only just begun dating your partner and do not know them that well yet, you might not want to start with the questions on marriage. A good category to start with is the “favorites” questions, which you can ask to get to know your partner’s preferences. Other great categories to start with for couples in a new relationship are the “hobbies” and “vacations” questions, which are fun and safe to ask in almost any circumstances.
Keep in mind that you are not trying to interrogate your partner so do not speed through all 1,000 questions in one conversation. Pace it according to how the conversation is going, and you may want to go into lengthy discussions about your partner’s answers. If you do not get to talk to your partner every day, you could even email your partner some questions each time and have a written conversation. The good thing about this is that you can always refer back to certain answers whenever you want to.
The key here is that you should try to ask each and every question, even when some of them might be uncomfortable. Those are perhaps the most important ones and getting them answered will help avoid issues that might creep up as your relationship develops. Asking uncomfortable questions can help couples discuss serious issues with each other and break down communication barriers. An unwillingness to talk about certain serious subjects could cause problems later on. So make sure that you leave no stone unturned. Even when you feel that some questions might not apply to you personally, your partner could potentially shed some insights or even lead the conversation to something interesting.
As time goes by, people change and so do their points of view. As your partner gains more life experiences, he or she will likely develop different answers to the same questions after some time. So keep that in mind, and you can ask the same questions again a few years later. It might be enlightening to know how you or your partner have changed over the years.
Getting to know yourself
While it is true that the 1,000 questions were designed to get to know your partner better, they can also be very useful in getting to know yourself. Some of the questions that really got me thinking are:
- What is your biggest fear and how does it stop you from doing the things you want to do?
- If you and your partner got a pet together but then break up at a later time, who should get the pet and why?
- If your partner wants to change their looks significantly, like getting a new hairstyle or change their facial hair, would you prefer that they discuss it with you before doing it?
- Have you ever had depression episodes which affected your everyday life significantly? If yes, do you know why it happened and what did you do to overcome it?
- Have you ever been physically or emotionally abused before? If yes, did you manage to get over it yet and have you sought any counseling before?
- Are you OK with us going on separate vacations even when we have limited income and time?
- What are your thoughts on becoming an organ donor? Would you do it?
- Do you think the religion of someone has an impact on whether you think you could date them seriously? Will differences in religious beliefs cause problems or will it help improve the relationship?
- What is the biggest lie you have told and why did you do it?
- What are your main goals in life right now and how does our relationship fit into the big picture?
- Where would you like to get a vacation home if you can have it anywhere in the world?
- If you do not have to work for a year and could still get paid, what would you spend your time on?
- Is there anything in particular that I have done to make you think about whether you love me?
- Are there any family traditions you have while you were growing up and would you want your children to carry on the traditions?
- Would it be possible for you to uproot yourself to another continent far away for love or for a career boost?
- If you inherited a hundred thousand dollars but you must invest it for 12 years before you could use the money, what will you do?
- What are your thoughts on having kids? Do you believe that you might think differently in the future?
- Should a woman take her husband’s family name after they get married? What about a joined last name? Why do you think that?
- Do you believe more in pleasuring yourself or your partner more during sex? What is your reason for thinking that way?
The conclusion
I believe that people who work through the
1000 Questions for Couples material together as a couple will strongly benefit from it. Drawing from my own personal experience of sharing these 1,000 questions with my husband, not only did we discover areas in our relationship that we need to work on, but we also became closer to each other.
1000 Questions for Couples is a fantastic resource for couples who are in a long distance relationship. When you purchase the book, you will also get a free email course that lasts for 300 days. Both you and your partner will receive daily emails with questions. This way, it is like you are going through the course together and you can go at it at your own pace, depending on your schedules. You do not necessarily have to respond to the questions via email only and can talk about it during your phone conversations or Skype sessions.
Apart from the free email course, you will also get two more resources to help you improve and spice up your relationship when you buy the
1000 Questions for Couples e-book. The book is only $67, and it comes with a money-back guarantee, so there is no risk for you in case you do not like the book. All you need to do is send the book back electronically, and you will receive a full refund.
So are you prepared to take your relationship to the next level? Get the
1000 Questions for Couples e-book now and identify the parts of your relationship that need improvement. Going through the entire course together will draw you and your partner closer. It is perfect for long distance couples because you can complete the course together through email and other communication platforms at your own pace. Should you discover that your partner is not who you think they are, well, that is not necessarily a bad thing. At least you will know that he or she might not be the right person for you before you spend even more time and effort on the relationship!
