10 Underrated Relationship Enhancing Bucket List Items

No matter how long you have been in a relationship with your partner, it can be hard to keep coming up with new ways to expand on your shared experiences together. Beyond your first date, a first meal together, first weekend away together, and so on …it's hard to keep coming up with new challenges to enjoy in each other's company!

The key to a healthy and long-lasting relationship is to develop open communication while nursing your partnership with positive elements. Opening up yourselves to one another in terms of vulnerability is a powerful way to establish intimacy and deepen your level of connection. What better way to achieve these practices than to take on new challenges together?

Here are 10 experiences you might have overlooked that you really need to try:

1. Write Each Other A Letter. The written word is incredibly powerful. It cannot be swiped and deleted from a screen. It can be treasured long after it has been received, more than any text message or e-mail. Take time to write a letter to one another, detailing your favorite part of your relationship, as well as dreams and ambitions for your relationship. Read them aloud to each other, or read them privately before coming back together.

2. Explore Non-Verbal Connection. If you want a rapid connection opportunity, then this is the one to go for. Find a space where you won't be disturbed and seat yourselves comfortably in front of each other. Then simply look into each other's eyes for a full 4 minute period. Eyes are the window to the soul. You'll be amazed at how many emotions are triggered.

3. Venture Out on a Pro Photoshoot.  Fed up of smartphone selfies? Or are you curious about how those Instagram couples appear to effortlessly collect travel photos? The secret is working with a professional. It's surprisingly affordable too! Rates start at $20/hour in some cities. Head outdoors for a location photoshoot together! Invest in a professional who will be able to guide you both. It will bring out the best in you, and the images you'll enjoy for years afterward. There's plenty of options, including on Airbnb Experiences.

4. Try A Couples Retreat.  We are used to being the leaders of our relationships with our partners. Hand over the steering wheel to a trusted guide to create an opportunity for other experiences of bonding together. Joining a couple's retreat is the perfect way to do this, and it could be a game-changer in your partnership. We offer you the ability to do this by yourself in-home or wherever you want! *Shameless Plug*

5. Recreate Your First Date. Bucket lists don't just have to focus on the unknown. Sometimes revisiting your past is a brilliant reconnection activity to help you reinvigorate past feelings and emotions. Recreate the moments you first share down to the most delicate details. Not only will it be a fun challenge, but it is a beautiful nod to the reasons you first fell for one another.

6. Travel Out Of Your Comfort Zone. Used to the apparent safety of tourist traps when you travel together? Bored of generically fancy hotel rooms? Switch up your experiences by picking out somewhere neither of you has been to before, and staying in a different type of accommodation to what you're used to. It could be the adventure you both need.

7. Take on An Extreme Challenge Together. Cross country runs, half marathons and athletics challenges are all fun ways to challenges yourselves while cheerleading one another. Forget about making personal bests or achieving record finding times. This is all about keeping each other going against the odds, which is a powerful parallel to your life together in many ways.

8. See A Relationship Coach. Relationships work best when they are tended to regularly. Don't leave therapy or coaching as a last resort - instead, embrace it as a method of checking in on the wellbeing of your partnership in order to keep it in healthy working order.

9. Take on A Creative Project.  Perhaps you live together, and you could start up a renovation project. Or maybe you have a patch of land in your yard that could be a fantastic allotment. Ever fancied painting a giant canvas? Find a creative project and pour yourselves into doing it together. Who knows where those creative energies will lead?

10. Disconnect To Let Yourselves Go.  Sometimes life can get too chaotic for us to be able to hear ourselves think, let alone each other. Tuck yourselves away in a tech-free, disturbance-free, screen-free space for a long weekend. Ideally, make it somewhere where you can connect with nature. The conversations you have together could change the course of your lives.

If you have been inspired to create additional items to add to this bucket list, then feel free to keep the list going. In the same way that your relationship will change and develop over time, this list may also do. There is a whole world out there to explore together, whenever you both feel ready to do so.

Don't lose sight of the fact that this list is a tool to help bring you closer together. If any of the activities you try out don't quite feel right, then pay attention to how you're both feeling and respond accordingly. This isn't an exercise in success or failure. It is a collective of suggestions to help you explore your relationship together in a journey of trial and error.

Keep it fun, keep it light-hearted, and enjoy the smaller moments of your time together. You chose to be with this person for excellent reasons, and they chose you for a whole other set of excellent reasons too. Celebrate your partnership by investing your time and energy into it. That, more than anything, is where authentic love really comes alive.

Enjoy creating memories together - and then once you're done, make a whole lot more!