3 Things You Can Do Right Now to Reconnect

by Lauren & Anne Purcell

“Even though we were completely silent, we were sharing something,” Kristin recalls. “It was a funny, intimate, completely unusual way to connect.” The idea here isn’t necessarily to pick something romantic— Kristin and Richard were reading John Grisham, not love sonnets.

You can mind-meld over anything you’re both into: travel guides, parenting books, memoirs, mysteries. If mismatched reading speeds make things frustrating, simply buy two copies of the same book: Once, at the beach, we passed a couple sitting side by side in their striped chairs, each engrossed in Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince.

Doze a` deux.

If a nap re-energizes you, it can do the same for your relationship. And it’s not just because it gives you a chance to cuddle (or to take other advantage of your proximal horizontality). Napping together is like synchronizing your watches: You reset your internal clocks and wake up in tune with each other. An example: Lauren is usually too type A to “waste” daylight hours sleeping.

On a typical Sunday afternoon, while her boyfriend took a siesta, she’d go for a run. But afterward, with Tim rejuvenated and Lauren winding down, their evening together felt disjointed. When they made it a dual snooze, it was a whole different story. They woke up with the same energy level and a connection that lasted the rest of the day.