by James Michael Sama
We all know what physical intimacy looks like. It’s the most obvious, direct, and primal showing of attraction. It’s visceral, passionate, and intense.
Physical intimacy, as I’ve argued often in the past, is a projection of emotional intimacy. Sure, we can share experiences with others that are strictly physical and don’t have an emotional component, but if we are seeking a deeper connection with someone — a connection that’s longer lasting, more fulfilling, and carries more depth…the physical projection is also going to be different.
Let’s, then, discuss the ways that emotional intimacy presents itself through physical actions that are less theatrical, obvious, and sexual.
1: You feel at peace in their presence.
We talk a lot about passion in relationships, but not quite enough about peace.
If we really step back and consider the amount of time we spend with our partner over the coming years and decades, what’s most of it going to look like?
Particularly for men, we think about the sexual experiences. Maintaining attraction and “spark” for the next 30, 40, or 50 years (maybe more).
In reality, though, that spark is going to be physically projected (wink wink) for a minuscule amount of time in comparison to the “normal” time that you spend together.
Let me say that in a more direct way:
The time you spend having sex with your partner is infinitesimally small next to the time that you just spend hanging around with them.
What, then, is even more important than the physical spicy time?
It’s the times that you’re just…existing together.
The times you’re on the couch watching a movie, or cuddling in bed, or sharing a Sunday morning coffee.
It’s the quiet dinners, the layovers in the airport, the glass of wine by the fire during a ski trip.
It’s the trips to the grocery store, the waiting room at the doctor’s office, watching the kids run around in the backyard.
Those are the moments where peace is found. Comfort. Certainty. Calmness.
The more time you spend together, the more important this feeling becomes. As we grow into older age together, the times spent being physically intimate with our partner may become less frequent, making the nonphysical times even more important.
It’s one thing to feel love or lust for your partner, but it’s a whole other thing to like them. If you can feel at ease, at peace simply existing in their presence, this is a positive sign that you’ve built a strong connection that needs no words nor actions in order to be understood. It just — is.
2: You both genuinely desire to understand each other.
Let’s be honest — understanding another person isn’t always easy.
Hell, understanding ourselves isn’t always easy.
What is easy, is throwing your hands up in the air and telling someone that they’re confusing, or that they don’t make any sense, or that you’re just too different from each other to make this work.
A real emotional connection, though — true emotional intimacy — doesn’t take the easy way out.
It really, genuinely, and truly wants to understand. It opens the mind, drops the judgment, and puts its own preconceived notions off to the side.
Our past, our upbringings, our morals and values all serve as a lens in our life. We see the world (and other people) through this lens that has been shaped by the life we’ve lived up until this point.
It’s very likely (in fact, nearly guaranteed) that the person you fall in love with is going to have a different lens than you. That means their fundamental reality is going to be different than yours.
Think about that for a second…
Every single person you’ll ever meet is going to be experiencing a different reality than you are.
It’s a strange, but salient thought. No two people live the same life, no two people share the same experiences in the same ways — even when they do share the same experience. They see it, feel it, and absorb it differently based on their neurological and biological realities.
When you’re working on combining your life with someone else’s, then…to build a life together as a couple, it requires you to open your mind to their ways of thinking and find the best ways to intertwine your two together.
Needless to say, you both need to come to the table with an equal amount of willingness to do this, or one person will feel overlooked, undervalued, and overrun.
That’s the easy thing to do. To stick to your guns, be certain that your way is the only right way, and dismiss anything different.
True intimacy, though, seeks to understand another person. It values, respects, and recognizes their viewpoints and values, and wants to learn from them.
Building intimacy is a collaborative effort, and both people must have their doors of understanding open for each other to freely pass through — otherwise the path will always remain blocked.
3: You reveal your deepest secrets, desires, fears, and thoughts to each other.
The nature of intimacy is connection, and connection can only be built through open and honest communication.
Understanding each other requires the open acceptance of our partner, but also the open sharing of ourselves. The divulging of thoughts, feelings, fantasies, insecurities, fears, and even secrets that are reserved for perhaps only this person in your life.
Now, it’s obvious that a deep and certain sense of trust is required in order to do this. I’d never suggest that you just run around pouring your heart out to every person that holds your hand or whispers sweet nothings in your ear — that’s a surefire way to get hurt or taken advantage of.
Revisit point #2, though, the desire and effort to learn about and understand each other.
During this process, you’ll see and feel your partner’s authenticity (or lack thereof) brought to the table.
You’ll see it in their face, in their actions, hear it in their words.
You’ll know, deep down, if they’re fully receiving you, or if what they’re hearing is creating distance. You’ll know if they’re sharing with you on the same level that you’re sharing with them.
If they are, that’s the space in which trust will be formed.
The more trust you build, the safer you’ll feel sharing these deep truths with them.
A lack of emotional intimacy has no desire to get this deep. You’ll just want to learn the surface level desires of each other and feel perfectly content in filling them — and that’s okay! That will bring you what you both need in that moment, in that phase of life, for the duration of that relationship.
If you want something that lasts forever, though, you need to go as deep as you go long (that sounded much more sexual than I intended it).
My point is this, if you just scratch the surface level of communication, your relationship will only last that long. It’ll be shallow, and it’ll be equally as short.
To go deep (emotionally), you’ll be driving a stake into the ground between you that is much stronger and more resilient. As a result, your relationship will be empowered to last proportionally as long, because the foundation will be more solid and deeply rooted.
4: You’re both HONEST about your compatibility.
“James…what?”
Here are common struggles I hear from my clients:
“I was holding on to hope.”
“Love conquers all…right?”
“If I love them we should be able to make it work, shouldn’t we?”
Here’s the truth of the matter that may actually surprise you to hear me say:
Love is NOT all you need.
That’s right, I said it. Love is not enough to make a relationship work in the long term.
You must have mutual respect, compatibility, forgiveness, compromise, shared values, beliefs, social and sexual needs, worldviews, visions of the future…
It is entirely possible that you can have two good people that aren’t right for each other.
Being emotionally intimate doesn’t mean turning a blind eye to the realities of life and just hoping things are going to work out because you love or like each other.
You’ve got to be honest about the realities of what it takes to build a full and rich life together. You’ve got to come together as a team and look through clear eyes at what life is going to demand of you, and you need to make a conscious decision to take on the challenges.
If you think I’m dragging the romance out of intimacy by saying this, I’d argue that it’s actually the exact opposite.
I believe that it enhances intimacy when you make the conscious decision to be with someone and to make things work. It’s a choice, an emotional and logical undertaking that you are entering into with deliberate intention.
For that reason, you’ll find ways to make it work. You’ve made the commitment, and will do whatever it takes to honor that commitment.
If it’s based solely on a feeling or emotion, it becomes flimsy when that feeling comes and goes. You’ll feel uncertain, doubtful, and curious about what (or who) else might be better suited for you.
The logical and pragmatic analyzing of your compatibility, though — the intentional creation of a connection between you — actually serves to strengthen your bond, because it is a bond that you’ve both chosen since you know it is right for you.
5: You take part in what is important to each other.
Anyone who knows me in “real life” knows that I’ve got a passion for exotic cars. Every weekend (when the weather allows), my friends and I get our cars together and drive to car shows, meets, cars and coffees, and track days. It’s one of a few passions that we all share, and largely how we met each other.
Rachel doesn’t share this interest. Cars aren’t her thing. She enjoys art, crafting, spending time with the kids, design, entrepreneurship, and creative endeavors.
What’s great about our relationship, though, is that she comes to the car shows. Our girls even put on motorsport gear and come walk around!
They talk about the cars, get excited about the pretty colors (our girls are 3 and 7), and get whatever they want from the food trucks. We make it a whole experience for them.
I also support Rachel’s artistic endeavors, share her creations, take her to art museums and galleries, and enjoy seeing her immerse herself in the work.
The point is this: You don’t have to share the same interests to partake in them. You do it because your partner loves them, and you love your partner.
You want to see them happy — it makes you happy to see them “in their zone.”
And, of course, they do it for you in return.
Here’s the key, though: You have to be genuine about it.
You can’t drag your feet, complaining the whole time, asking when it’s going to be over or when you’re going to leave.
By doing so, you’re taking what might be the one thing they really enjoy, and lofting a dark cloud over it, tainting the experience.
If your partner has a hobby or a space that is solely theirs, and they invite you into it, this is a showing of love and intimacy that is reserved specially for you.
They are giving you the honor of bringing you into their world, which is never something that should be taken for granted. It also means that they should appreciate and value the magnitude of the same honor when you invite them into your world, as well.
6: You leave space for the relationship to breathe and grow into.
Now would be a good time to give a reminder that not everything in a relationship needs to be shared, or intertwined.
For some, time to recharge and do their own thing is key.
We all need our independence, freedom, and to stay connected with our true selves, no matter how close we are with our partner.
I believe this is where a lot of people get stuck over the years. They immerse themselves so deeply into their relationship that they lose their own identity. They forget who they were before, and have no idea who they’d be if (heaven forbid) there ever came an “after.”
In no way am I saying that you should have one foot out of the relationship “just in case,” but what I am saying is that two people are happier, healthier, and can show up for each other more fully if they maintain their individuality.
Take point #5 for example. Rachel comes to some car shows, but not all car shows. Sometimes, those are “girls’ days” where she and our daughters go off and do something fun for them. There is a balance.
Some of us need alone time, some play video games, some knit, some go to the shooting range, some read books.
It doesn’t matter what “your thing” is, it just matters that you have the freedom and independence to maintain it.
That’s your recharge time. Everything (and everyone) needs to be recharged sometimes, or it’ll run out of battery and do nobody any good.
Now, of course, whatever “your thing” is must be appropriate within the boundaries of the relationship, which should go without saying, but I’m just getting ahead of the comments below that’ll say “WhAt If hE gOeS To tHe sTrIp cLuB?”
Obviously mutual respect is key — and never betraying the trust that you’ve worked so hard to build.
Having space for the relationship to grow into, though, is also key. Holding onto something too tightly will only suffocate it.
7: You are friends with each other.
“James, what? I thought we were talking about intimacy!”
The happiest intimate relationships are built on a foundation of friendship.
Now — gentlemen readers — don’t get this confused with being put into the “friend zone,” that apocalyptic abyss that makes you feel unwanted and unlovable. That is not what I’m talking about here.
What I am talking about is building a connection between you that transcends the primal, the romantic, the sexual.
I’m talking about just…liking each other.
Being friends.
Taking trips to the store together.
Laughing together.
Being silly and playful together.
Just existing in each other’s presence.
Life, as we established in point #1, is sometimes just about doing the menial everyday tasks together. If your entire relationship is based on a foundation of sexual attraction (for example), then you might dread sharing the “normal” experiences of life with this person.
Think about spending time with your best friend, though — you enjoy doing anything with them as long as you’re together. You can be your fullest self with them because they know everything about you and still love you.
You trust them, and they trust you.
You don’t have to put on an act for them, and if you did, they’d know it.
We should absolutely want (dare I say, need) the same level of friendship and connection with our intimate partner. True emotional intimacy doesn’t always need to be intimate to prove itself. It’s just…there, and you both know it.
8: There is NON-sexual touch.
We kicked things off by saying that physical intimacy is obvious to see. Kissing, and…well, we all know what it looks (and feels) like, so we’ll save the descriptors.
Emotional intimacy, though, wants to be close to another person just to feel their warmth and presence. It’s holding hands. It’s a hand on the leg during a car ride. It’s intertwined arms walking through the park. It’s a tight hug at the end of a long day. It’s the legs on the lap on the couch watching a movie.
Now, of course, not everyone is physically expressive. We all communicate our affection and love in different ways — but that does not negate the human need for touch. There is an inherent desire to be close to the person we care about, and emotional intimacy enhances that desire.
The physical connection I am talking about here is not for the purpose of initiating a sexual encounter, but instead, for the purpose of communicating the intimacy. The desire for closeness. The emotional connection that says “I want to be up against you.”
It’s rare that you see two people with a strong emotional connection acting like platonic friends around each other — and if you did — you’d probably wonder what they’re in an argument about.
9: You avoid doing the things that bother each other.
Obviously, an important part of expressing love is doing things that make your partner happy.
Another important part is not doing things that make them unhappy.
By now, you’ve learned enough about your partner to know what makes them feel insecure, what they disapprove of, or maybe even what they consider *gasp* cheating.
There’s no predicting what this will be for your partner, but that’s why they’re a special and unique person that you have the honor of loving (Right? …Right?!)
The point is this: Emotional intimacy is responsible for its own health and happiness. It must be maintained by those who enjoy it, and that means not doing anything to damage it.
If your partner is uncomfortable with some of the people you follow on social media, or your habit of mindlessly liking their photos, or the way you interact with others in public — change it. Change your actions, even if you don’t personally see anything wrong with them.
Start asking yourself what you’d gain by perpetuating the actions that you developed when you were single. Why are you holding onto them, even though you know they bother your partner? Is it ego? Resistance to change? Feeling like you’re sacrificing part of yourself for another person?
Odds are, you’re not really losing anything by changing these things, but you may lose a person you love by not changing them.
Now, let’s discuss the caveat here: You should never, ever change who you fundamentally are for someone else.
You shouldn’t sacrifice your values.
You shouldn’t change your beliefs.
You shouldn’t compromise your moral code.
You must create and maintain your identity above all else. Betraying yourself will always lead to resentment and further anguish down the road.
The ceasing of actions that bother your partner is not the same thing as changing who you are (at least, it shouldn’t be).
They can love you but not love certain things that you do.
Think of it as respect. Is the action you’re about to take respectful, or disrespectful to your partner’s wants and needs? The answer to that question should dictate what you do next…or what you don’t.
10: You’re each other’s go-to for the good AND the bad.
Who’s the first person you call when you win?
Who’s the first person you call when things go wrong?
Who can you count on to be your support system? Or your cheerleader? To be there in the stands rooting for you, or there on the sidelines waiting to comfort you?
Life is going to be full of ups and downs. Victories and defeats. Landing huge deals, and losing even bigger ones.
Pledging to be by someone’s side during the journey of life means making the commitment to be for them through it all. Not just standing by their side during the sunny days — anyone can do that — but also holding the umbrella over them during the rainy days.
Taking comfort and solace in the fact that our partner is…well…our partner helps us to build an even deeper connection and know that they’re not just with us for what we can bring to their lives, or because of our amazing achievements.
That easily begins to feel like a transactional relationship — imagine being with someone who distances themselves from you every time that you face a struggle or a challenge…you’d quickly begin to doubt their intentions and start to create emotional distance in order to protect yourself.
When you know, though, they’re always going to be there (and when you’re certain about providing them with the same), it only serves to strengthen your bond.
It shows that their love is for you, not for what you do, what you make, or what you achieve.
11: Your disagreements are calm and productive.
What’s better — avoiding conflict, or solving conflict?
“James, I thought we were talking about love…not conflict.”
HA!
You and I both know damn well that the two go hand-in-hand. When passions and emotions run high, when two people’s lives are being combined together, when big life decisions are being made — conflict is part of the journey.
No, it shouldn’t be frequent.
No, it shouldn’t be hurtful.
No, it should never, ever, ever be abusive.
It does, however, exist.
You’re going to disagree. It’s just part of the ride.
The question, then, is not if a disagreement happens, but how it happens.
Do you stay focused on the actual issue at hand, and pragmatically work through it together? Or do your emotions flare, you start pulling up grievances from the past, insulting each other, and saying hurtful things?
The two, obviously, are vastly different approaches to the same exact thing.
Emotional intimacy builds a healthy communication style over time. It becomes used to expressing thoughts and ideas with each other, and working through challenges. It “keeps the main thing the main thing,” as they say.
This means:
- They are willing and able to clearly communicate their challenges in calm and productive ways.
- They are willing to hear and listen to your challenges without judgment or overreaction.
In other words — healthy emotional intimacy remembers that it’s you and your partner against the problem, not you and your partner against each other.
12: You check in with each other consistently.
Emotional intimacy doesn’t just…work forever on its own.
The health of your emotional intimacy must be maintained with the same attention and love as your personal health.
Think of it as starting a fire on a cold winter’s night.
That fire must be tended to, stoked, paid attention to.
If you walk out of the room for too long, eventually, it will burn out.
If, however, you check on it consistently and add what it needs when it needs it, it will literally burn for as long as you choose for it to.
How can you expect emotional intimacy to keep burning if you don’t check on it regularly? If you don’t see what it needs, and then provide it?
I think a lot of people make the mistake of thinking that entering into a committed relationship is when the work ends. They figure that they’ve “gotten” the person, so they can stop putting in the effort that it took to “get” them.
In reality, just the opposite is true.
Entering into the relationship is when the real effort must begin.
The effort of showing this person that you’re willing to put in the work for the entirety of your relationship…even if that’s forever.
The effort of checking in to see what they need. To take honest and clear inventory of the relationship.
How are things going? What do you need more of? Less of? What’s working, what’s not? What needs are being filled, which aren’t?
If you took just a few minutes every week to check in with each other in a space that is free of judgment, free of emotional overreaction, free of excuses — just imagine how much you could enhance the health and well-being of your relationship…
Two people will only make that commitment to each other (and to themselves) if true emotional intimacy is present.
13: You keep the sexual spark and romance alive.
Alright, come on — we had to mention it eventually.
We all know that sexual energy and attraction is strong between two people who’ve built a healthy and stable emotional connection.
We have, after all, addressed that physical intimacy is a projection of emotional intimacy. When you feel this deep sense of love, safety, attraction, and trust with a person — you want to be physically intimate with them.
That is an experience you don’t share with anyone else, created by a connection you don’t share with anyone else.
The desire to keep the spark alive, to find new and creative ways to express yourself, to make sure that the obligations of life don’t get in the way (too often), to express and indulge in consensual fantasies, to have the clear understanding that being another person’s only monogamous sexual partner for the rest of their life is, in some ways, a responsibility…
It’s a responsibility to them, and to yourself. To honor that commitment, to stay faithful, to only have your needs met with them, and to make sure their needs are met with you.
Man, woman, non-binary, heterosexual, homosexual, it matters not. It only matters that a monogamous relationship requires two people to ensure their mutual fulfillment in ways that work for them. Strong and healthy emotional intimacy will happily and willfully be up to the challenge.
14: Their happiness becomes just as important as your own.
Emotional intimacy is more than the intertwining of your lives — it’s the intertwining of, well, your emotions.
This means that you share in their happiness, and share your strength to heal their pain.
It means that you are happy seeing them happy, and feel the sadness when they’re not.
Your emotions are tied together, which drives your actions and desire to support their happiness.
Notice I didn’t say to “make” them happy, because I’ll always believe that true happiness comes from within. It has to — no amount of external validation, or compliments, or even love (sorry) can create happiness in a person who doesn’t feel it for themselves.
You can, however, do everything you possibly can to express your love. To share in their happiness. To share yours with them. To build a life of love and fulfillment together that will lead to internal happiness being formed.
And when strong emotional intimacy exists, the desire to do that for them will be just as strong as the desire to do it for yourself. They are one in the same.
15: You show up as your truest and most authentic selves.
What is intimacy if not the space to be fully yourselves together?
To feel safe, trusting, trusted, authentic, vulnerable?
That is, I believe, the very core of it all. Building the same level of comfort alongside of another person that you have with yourself.
To feel at home when they’re next to you, no matter where you are.
To be able to take off the mask, shake off the weight of the world, remove the filters, drop the act in their presence.
To show your concerns, fears, vulnerabilities, insecurities.
Also to flourish freely, to grow, play, be vibrant, bright, and uncensored.
When you can do all of that with a person who can do all of it with you — you’ll know that you’re at home emotionally no matter where you are physically.
No feeling is truer than that.
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Vintage Dava 