You can sleep next to someone every night and still feel a thousand miles apart. And the sad truth? That’s more common than not. Most couples don’t drift because they stop loving each other—they drift because they stop knowing how to speak and listen in a way that keeps trust alive.
We assume love will carry the weight. That if the feelings are strong enough, everything else will work itself out. But love without honest, grounded communication is like trying to build a house with no foundation. Eventually, it cracks under pressure.
In this article, I’ll show you the exact shift in how you speak—and more importantly, how you listen—that can bring your relationship into deeper alignment. If you’ve ever felt like they are closed off, distant, or hard to reach, this is where you begin.
Because intimacy doesn’t grow by accident. It grows when you learn how to hold space, speak truth, and become the person they can trust to meet them in the deep.
**I’ll refer to your partner as ‘she’ for simplicity, but this applies across the board.
In an intimate relationship, communication is everything. I’m talking about real communication: open, honest sharing and active listening. Partners need to be able to share absolutely anything with each other, and then trust that the other person will listen to them with an open heart and without an agenda.
Unfortunately, the vast majority of people are not effective communicators. Even those people who are persuasive speakers often lack the skills necessary to communicate effectively with their own intimate partner. This is because the goal is quite different and misunderstood.
The goal of communication within a relationship goes beyond simply conveying your own thoughts and ideas to the other person in a way that is understandable. Equally as important is listening to and understanding our partners thoughts and ideas—and this listening is an active process. It means thoughtful questioning and an earnest desire to know them more deeply.
And that kind of communication doesn’t happen by accident—it has to be intentionally created. It begins with the space you build between you.
How to Build a Space Where Truth Can Be Shared
Before we can have an open and honest conversation with our intimate partner, we have to prepare the space first. What is the intention? If it’s to share honestly with each other, then we have to feel safe first and foremost. This is not the place for criticism, condemnation, mockery or humiliation.
If one partner feels cornered or under attack, it is unlikely that they will continue to share openly and honestly. Understand that there is a vast difference between sharing how one of her particular behaviors has been making you feel, and criticizing her for behaving that way in the first place.
The first way is an open conversation about emotions and experiences, while the latter is a judgement on her behaviors.
We have to enter this space devoted to open and honest sharing without a personal agenda. This is key and where most people fail. Trying to fulfill some personal agenda while coming under the guise of an open and honest conversation is the antithesis of trust.
Of course, sometimes the entire purpose of a specific conversation with your intimate partner will have the goal of altering behaviors. This is fine, so long as it is clear and open. “This behavior of yours makes me feel like this when you do it, and I would really like see how we can shift things.”
What does not work well—in the context of deepening trust and intimacy—is keeping your personal agenda hidden while trying to get something you want from her. This is not trustworthy behavior, nor does it engender a feeling a safety between you both.
Women are accustomed to most men telling them what they want to hear or some other half truth with a hidden goal in mind. You’re called to show up differently—because if you don’t, you’ll slip into the same patterns that broke trust in the first place.
Men are also accustomed to women telling them one thing just so they can receive another, especially those men who have accrued wealth, status, or power. In both cases, what is happening is not communication, but manipulation. Love does not manipulate. Love invites, fills the space, and inspires.
If you want to grow more love between you both—more intimacy and trust—you must arrive to conversations with the goal of sharing openly and honestly with each other. If you have other motives or agendas, speak them, and allow your partner to witness you, your desires, and what you seek. This type of raw truth is what builds the foundation for deep trust and intimacy.
But even truth, if it’s not received with presence, can fall flat. That’s why listening is just as essential as speaking.
Listening Is the Work
As well, there must be an agreement between each other that you will both listen—and not just listen, but actively listen. The goal is not to simply hear her words, but to fully process and understand the meaning and emotions behind the words.
Remaining quiet while she speaks until it is your turn, just to say exactly what you’ve been thinking about during her turn, is not listening. It actually shows a blatant disregard for her thoughts, emotions, and the trust that she has given you to share openly and honestly.
In this type of conversation, you have to let go. Release the agenda. Release the need to communicate your ideas perfectly. Release everything.
Notice what’s happening in your body as you listen. Stay with it. Breathe. That’s how you stay in the moment with her, instead of reacting from old fear.
When your partner speaks, surrender to it. Be fully present with her. Pay attention to the words she is saying and her body mannerisms. Maintain eye contact, lean in.
Try to feel the underlying emotions behind the message, and to understand her position. When she is done speaking, restate what she’s said and/or asking open-ended questions to clarify anything you didn’t fully understand.
The goal of this type of communication is to understand each other more and more. Our wants, needs, pains, traumas, sensitivities, etc. Actively listening to your partner with clear intent to understand is how you can tease out those parts of her that might feel insecure or vulnerable.
And once that space is open—once both of you are truly listening—then it’s time to speak the truth that’s been waiting to be shared.
Hiding the Truth Blocks Intimacy
Now is the time to share. Whatever it is—a hard truth or a difficult question—it is better to bring it into the light.
Is there a certain behavior of hers that is affecting you negatively? Share it. Allow her to ask you questions. Then, ask her questions. Did she mention a behavior of yours that is making her feel a certain way? Listen to her. Ask her questions about it. Share about your experiences and thoughts about it.
Like this we go, step by step, uncovering all parts of ourselves together with our partner. It’s not uncommon to discover that the behavior that infuriated me is the result of some experiences from her past, and the reason it triggers me is because of experiences from my past. This clarity can only come from sharing the experience.
Holding on to something that is begging to be shared poisons an intimate relationship. If your partner has done something that hurt you, and you choose not to share this, you allow resentment and other negative emotions to build up.
Beyond this, it prevents deeper intimacy from developing. Trust is the bedrock of intimacy, and more trust will almost always result in more intimacy. Sure, she might trust you with her life. But does she trust you with her love? Does she trust you with the deepest darkest fears lurking inside of her? Does she trust you to do whatever it takes, whatever the cost, in the name of love?
We must be comfortable sharing things with our partner. Everything. Even those parts of us deep inside that feel insecure and vulnerable. Especially those parts.
Some truths, no matter how softly whispered, will always hurt. The more a truth hurts, the more necessary it is to share it. The pain caused to someone by sharing your truth is not your responsibility. It is theirs. Your responsibility is to share it.
And not just to share it, but to live it. Truth is known by living it. Let your life reflect the truths you speak—otherwise they create more confusion than clarity. And don’t convince yourself that one thing is true just as an excuse to share it. Share openly, honestly, and with a heart full of love—that is enough.
The Ocean Beneath the Surface
When you communicate effectively in this way, you open yourself to the possibility of truly understanding your partner in a deeper way; in a way that very few others understand her. What makes her tick? Why does she do this? Why does she do that? What are her traumas or sensitivities? Why does it make her feel this way when I do that?
This understanding of each other, combined with open and honest communication, is what grows into trust, and trust is the entry ticket into the deeper waters.
The world of intimacy and pleasure is a vast and deep ocean with many treasures to be found at various depths. However, without a profound understanding of your intimate partner you will only ever find the secrets of the shallow waters.
As trust between partners grows, so too does the potential for intimacy and pleasure. Trust can grow infinitely, and therefore so too can intimacy and pleasure.
When lovers are truly present with each other—unguarded, breathing the same breath, fully surrendered to the moment—something deeper becomes possible.
Does she trust you then? Not just to hold her body, but to hold her fear, her resistance, her deepest truth?
This is what creates the space for her to open—not because you demanded it, but because you gave her a reason to feel completely safe. That kind of trust dissolves walls. It invites her into the sacred depths of surrender. It’s not something you take. It’s something she gives—freely, fully—because you’ve shown her you’re worthy of it.
When the space between you finally closes, and you lie beside each other fully known and fully loved—that’s when intimacy becomes something sacred.
Most partners never reach the level of trust required for this. But they could. And so can you. It all begins with communication.
If you’re ready to build a relationship that thrives on truth, start tonight. Create the space. Listen deeply. Speak what’s real. That’s the foundation.
