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How To Act Affectionately In Your Marriage
- December 31, 2022
- Posted by: Marcel Sanchez
- Category: Building a Healthy Marriage Marriage Training Relationships
What emotions are evoked within your soul when the phrase physical affection comes to mind?
For some, it stimulates positive memories at family gatherings, celebrations with friends, and special times with their spouse.
For others, it brings back painful and uncomfortable memories of neglect, abandonment, or abuse.
What about you?
What memories does the word physical affection stimulate in you?
What emotions does it evoke?
We’ve been working through the character of humility and how it serves to stimulate affection in your marriage.
Physical Affection is Vital in Your Marriage
Let’s stop and review what we’ve covered so far.
Affection is First Inward
Think Affectionately in Your Marriage
Stop Speaking in Unaffectionate Ways to Your Spouse
Start Speaking Affectionately With Your Spouse
Grace Changes Everything in Your Marriage
Grace Changes How You Speak With Your Spouse
In this progression of humility in action, we’ve addressed filtering our thoughts, checking our motives, and being intentional with our words.
Now we move on to another important component—physical affection.
Physical affection in a marriage is vital. Your marriage won’t thrive without it.
At this point, you might look at your family history and reflect.
“I never saw my parents kiss one another at home.”
“I never saw my parents hold hands in public.”
“My family greeted one another by nodding their head.”
“My brothers were too rough, so I never let them near me.”
“My previous relationship was physically abusive.”
“I’m not a ‘touchy person’ at all.”
I understand your concern, but physical affection remains an essential part of building a healthy marriage with your spouse.
It always has and it always will.
I want you to notice the pattern we’ve been unpacking throughout our study.
Your first responsibility is to align your soul—thoughts, motives, and feelings—with God’s Word.
Second, you need to stop speaking in unaffectionate ways to your spouse.
Third, be intentional about speaking affectionately with your spouse.
Fourth, generously apply grace in every conversation and action.
Let’s explore how you can leverage physical touch—in a way that is thoughtful, loving, and pleasurable—to make your marriage thrive.
Be Thoughtful As You Touch Your Spouse
When you eat at a nice restaurant with your spouse, there’s often a measure of flexibility in what you can order to satisfy your preferences.
You can add a salad, remove a vegetable, or substitute one of your sides.
This personalized approach may come at a higher cost.
You willingly pay this higher cost because it’s the right fit for your taste buds.
What does this have to do with increasing affection in your marriage?
To help you, notice how the Apostle Paul challenged the church at Rome with these words:
Romans 12:10, NLT
Love each other with genuine affection and take delight in honoring each other.
Romans 12:10, ESV
Love one another with brotherly affection. Outdo one another in showing honor.
Romans 12:10, CSB
Love one another deeply as brothers and sisters. Take the lead in honoring one another.
Thoughtfulness in the context of physical touch has to do with genuinely loving your spouse.
But how?
In a way that is meaningful and personalized to their needs and desires.
Thoughtfulness focuses first on what brings your spouse pleasure.
Loving thoughtfulness prioritizes the needs of your spouse—spiritual, emotional, and physical—ahead of your needs.
When you love your spouse, their needs are considered first not second.
Two words prove to be helpful: Consideration and Pleasure.
Consideration
What types of physical affection make your spouse feel uncomfortable?
What types of physical affection have they asked you to stop?
What types of physical affection bring up past trauma in their lives?
Pleasurable
What types of physical affection does your spouse specifically ask for?
What types of physical affection does your spouse ask you to repeat?
What types of physical affection genuinely make your spouse feel loved?
There are many ways to express love to your spouse through physical touch.
The key is to ask them directly what they enjoy and what they don’t enjoy.
There’s a key principle here: Relational intimacy precedes physical intimacy
There must be curiosity when it comes to understanding your spouse.
When you’re relationally intimate, you first understand your spouse spiritually and emotionally before engaging them with physical affection.
This is a work in progress.
I don’t always get this right and neither will you or your spouse.
Relational Intimacy Precedes Physical Intimacy
A Daily Mystery
That’s the beauty of marriage. It’s a mystery to be explored every day.
Recently, have you been thoughtful as you’ve touched your spouse?
Are you considerate of what your spouse needs and desires?
Are you seeking to maximize their physical pleasure or only your own?
If we asked your spouse about your responses, would they agree or disagree?
Let’s return to what couples search for online to get the conversation started.
How to touch your partner romantically
How to touch your spouse romantically
How to touch your wife romantically
How to touch your husband romantically
How to be affectionate in a relationship
How to show your partner more affection
How to show affection to your partner
How to be affectionate in your marriage
How to get comfortable with physical touch in marriage
How to have physical touch in a relationship
How to make your marriage successful
How to improve physical touch in your marriage relationship
Personal Application
What would you and your spouse type into YouTube’s search bar?
As we stated earlier: Relational intimacy precedes physical intimacy.
As you continue to work on the relational side of your marriage, physical affection and intimacy will have a much greater capacity to thrive.
Don’t neglect physical affection in your marriage.
It’s not enough to tell your spouse about your love; they must see it and feel it every day.
Coach Marcel
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