Ep 110: How to Share More Deeply With Your Partner: Simple Ways to Build Emotional Intimacy

2 Dec

By Charlotte Cummings | Feel Better Podcast

How to Share More Deeply (and Stop Having “Supermarket Checkout” Chats with Your Partner)

If your “How was your day?” sounds like the exchange you have with a supermarket checkout operator—“Good…busy…fine”—you’re not alone. Most couples start out sharing richly, then life piles on: kids, work, logistics… and depth quietly drains away.

Deep sharing isn’t fluffy. It’s how we create intimacy (in-to-me-see): letting our partner see what’s true inside—thoughts, emotions, hopes, fears. When we don’t, we drift. When we do, connection snaps back into place.

Here’s a practical guide to make deeper sharing doable (not awkward), even in busy seasons.

Make Depth Easier: Simple Setup That Changes Everything

1) Positioning matters.
Don’t try to connect while one of you is chopping onions and the other is packing lunches. Sit. Face each other. Even 10 minutes on the couch after the rush changes the quality of the conversation.

2) Pick your moment.
Most people need a “landing” window after work or kid bedtime. Save deeper chats for later in the evening when nervous systems aren’t spiking. Quick hug first (20 seconds if you can—the biochem actually helps).

3) Give it a container.
Agree to try “deeper sharing” twice a week for 2–4 weeks. (Wednesday + Sunday? School-sport nights are often calmer.) The routine lowers the weirdness and builds the habit.

Make Like a Therapist (Without Feeling Cheesy)

Think of your role as curious question-asker. Try to “empty the clip” of gentle, open questions before you share your own take.

“What was the best moment in your day?”
“What felt hard about that?”
“What feeling did that bring up?”
“What are you hoping happens next?”
“What’s your worst-case and best-case here?”
“Is there a way I could support you with that?”

Yes, at first it might feel a bit “therapist-y.” You’ll get used to it. People love feeling understood.

Pro tip: After you’ve listened, ask, “How understood do you feel, 1–10?” It’s playful accountability and teaches you what lands.

Two Conversations to Start Using Tonight

1) Upgrade “How Was Your Day?”

Start with a story: “What happened today that’s worth telling?”
Drop a level: “How was that for you?”
Name the feeling: “Did that tap frustration, doubt, pride?”
Connect dots: “This sounds like that dynamic with [X]—does it feel similar?”
Offer help (only if asked): “Is there anything you’d like from me around this?”

2) The “Let Me In” Chat (Big Picture)

“Between now and the end of the year, what are your top 2 goals?”
“What’s your keyword for next year?”
“What’s going well in our life you want more of? What needs tweaking?”
“How could I support you—encouragement, reminders, time, or accountability?”
Habit swap: “I’ll drop this one thing if you drop that one thing—deal?”

Add a 3-Minute Gratitude Practice (That Isn’t Bland)

Before bed, each share three specific gratitudes—no generic “my health/kids/job.”

“When I walked at lunch, I felt my shoulders drop and my brain clear. Loved that.”
“When you took the bins out unasked, I felt seen—like we’re a team.”

Specific beats vague. You’ll learn what lights each other up.

Avoid the Two Biggest Connection Killers

Problem-solving mode.
Assume the goal is to understand, not fix. Ask, “Do you want ideas or just a listen?”
Timing it badly.
If it’s 5:40 p.m. and someone’s hangry—park it. Connection has a better chance later.

A 10-Day Micro-Challenge

Days 1–3: Sit together for 10 minutes after 8 p.m. Ask three open questions about the day.
Days 4–6: Add the understood (1–10) check at the end.
Days 7–10: Do one Let Me In chat + one gratitude night.

Notice: better tone, quicker repair after friction, more “on the same team” energy.

Quick Scripts (Steal These)

“I want to understand this properly—can I ask a few more questions?”
“Hearing that, I imagine you felt [overwhelmed/deflated/excited]. Did I get that right?”
“On support—would you prefer time, encouragement, or accountability?”
“Do you feel more understood now than when we sat down?”

Deep sharing isn’t about hours of heavy talk. It’s about short, well-timed, curious conversations where you let your partner see inside. Do that a couple of times a week and “fine/busy/okay” gives way to real intimacy—fast.

Want a lightweight way to reset your connection at home?
My audio course Give Me Ten Minutes gives you one 10-minute listen each and a guided discussion each week—covering vision, conflict loops, love in practice, triggers, and communication. There’s a flexible $35/week option.
👉 Learn more at charlottecummings.nz

If you try the 10-Day Micro-Challenge, I’d love to hear how it goes. Send me a note!

Well welcome along to this episode and I always know that an episode is going to have value for some people because it has come up often in the counselling room for me lately and this is one of those topics.
So today I'm going to be sharing all about how to share more deeply, especially in the context of an intimate relationship. How do you actually get beyond that thing that we usually do with a checkout operator when they ask us how our day was and we say good or fine or okay or busy? How do we not do that in our relationships? How do you get to a place where you can share more deeply about what is going on and get beyond that surface level? Now I think one of the things that is really interesting is that couples have this close relationship that has usually included a whole lot of sharing and good, deeper, meaningful conversations in the early stages of relationship and then our lives get buried under the life admin and to-do lists and the day-to-day grind and we stop doing that deeper sharing and it is a really important thing to include in your relationship if you want to have a good, strong sense of connection with one another and avoid that inevitable drift that seems to happen with a lot of couples. One of the things I find really interesting is if you think about how you catch up and share with your friends, you likely make a set time for that to happen.
So you arrange to go and get a drink or coffee or lunch or go and visit them, go for a walk, whatever that looks like and you've set this time aside to talk. You know that you're there for one another, you know the purpose of that time is to connect with each other and to share an update on what's going on in your lives, to listen to one another and enjoy that time of connection. Now so often in our relationships, especially in certain stages of life around having kids or when there's work busyness or other things going on, we lose that intentionality about time to share.
So some of the problem here is our busy lives, stages in relationships, but another part of the problem is that we don't have great ideas around how to do this sharing more deeply thing and for a lot of people, there's a real awkwardness in this space. So when we catch up with our friends, we're giving them our attention and our time, we're asking questions, we're openly listening to them and most friendships, our friends don't necessarily expect us to offer them some kind of conclusion or solution, we're openly listening, we might share ideas with them, but it is an exchange of kind of this is what's happening for me, this is how I am, these are the things I'm struggling with, this is what is going on for me internally at the moment, this is how I'm feeling and it is a real shame to not have that included within our relationships and I know that there are a lot of relationships that would improve if we knew how to do this sharing more deeply thing with one another. I've told this story before on the podcast, but it bears repeating.
Once upon a time, I went and did some relationship therapy training early on in my career and there was this incredibly cheesy facilitator. Now she said something that at the time I just about snorted with laughter around or maybe fell off my chair, but she said something about relationships and the word intimacy. She said intimacy is like in to me see.
How do we let people see inside of us, see what it is we're feeling and thinking and how we are, that is what really creates intimacy in relationships. Now at the time I thought that that was really funny and I thought I just don't even know how I'm going to be able to pay attention during this training, this lady is a bit too cuckoo for me, but over time that has really stuck with me and it's something I've shared with a lot of couples I've worked with. If we want intimacy, closeness and connection in our relationship, it is about letting another person see inside of us, see what is going on for us mentally and emotionally.
So today what I'm going to do with this episode is share some general tips and tricks when it comes to how to share more deeply, especially in the context of a relationship. And then I'm going to talk about a couple of examples. So particularly when you're asking your partner about their day, how might that look if you were trying to do that, kind of shifting into that higher gear and being able to engage more deeply with them.
And then I'm going to step back from those day to day, how was your day conversations and talk about how do we have those deeper conversations about how are you, what is going on in your life, what is it that I can support you with? So we're going to have a how was your day version of an example on there and a let me in chat version of an example. So here we go. Here are some of my top tips when it comes to thinking about how you set yourself up to share more deeply with a partner.
The first is think about your body language and your positioning. One of the things that I think doesn't work particularly well is we try and have conversations, especially when our lives are busy, try and have those conversations on the go. So we might not be sitting down together, we might be doing other things, we might be pottering around, we might be asking how someone's day is while they're kind of also making dinner or doing something else.
We don't have that time of intentionally sitting down together. Now this doesn't necessarily need to be something that happens every day or that happens with a huge intensity to it, but I'd challenge you to think about where in your day you actually sit down or have some connection with your partner. If life looks like a really busy day at work, coming home and doing all the things that need to be done, maybe putting the kids to bed and then throwing Netflix on, where is the point within your day where you actually have that time that invites connection with one another, that invites some of those deeper chats? So maybe there could be a pause between the busyness of the day and the Netflix.
Maybe there could be some nights a week where you're having these conversations, but definitely think about that positioning. How often are we there together reflecting that we are open to hearing from one another and making space for those good quality chats? My next tip is make like a therapist. So one of the things that I do with my clients is I give them a demo.
If an issue within their relationship is wanting to share more deeply with one another, I will take a question and really see how far I can run with that with the person and do, I guess, a little bit of a role play or a demo of what I mean by asking lots and lots of questions. So one of the things you can kind of channel in that time is make like a therapist. Do something that puts you in that kind of mindset of, like, I'm the one here who's asking lots of questions, I'm going to try and see how many questions I can ask to my partner in this moment, I'm going to see how much I can squeeze out of this story.
How can I get to a point where I think there's actually no more questions that I can ask about this? I already really understand whatever it is that is going on. Now I recognize that that is a little bit tough because sometimes we have to get through a barrier of feeling like our questions are cheesy. I've had to get through that as a therapist too.
You know, asking someone, and then how did you feel when that happened, can feel like an ultra cheesy thing to do in conversation. And maybe you'll giggle about it. Maybe it will feel a little bit odd at first, but everyone likes to be asked about what is going on in their world.
People like to be able to share. So see how far you can extend those questions and put your therapist hat on. Think about that mindset of, I'm going to be a professional question asker here, and this is not one question and done, this is seeing if I can fully explore whatever it is that is being shared with me.
And it's definitely super helpful if you can do that for each other. So if you can have this time where you offer one person that experience of being really thoroughly listened to and having the opportunity to have that deep conversation, and then kind of switching over and the other person having the opportunity to talk about their day. Now that doesn't necessarily need to all be in the same time and setting, but it is something that is great to take some turn taking around.
Now if you're wanting to break a habit around not sharing very deeply in your relationship, I would encourage you to set yourself a little bit of a challenge to do this for a set period of time, and to say perhaps, okay, over the next two weeks or month, we're going to really try and make an effort to share more deeply with one another. We're going to push the reset button on this part of our relationship, and we're going to schedule what this looks like. So okay, on a Wednesday night and a Sunday night, we're going to try and have those deeper conversations.
Make something of a concrete goal out of this for a set period of time, and it will set you up for more success ongoingly when it comes to being able to share more deeply with each other. But if you can get that time and space set aside, really make an effort around this for a set period of time, it will help you going forward to learn how to do this more naturally and without the need for that scaffolding of set times that you're giving this a go. Now something else that I say to couples in counseling is, you know, I don't expect you to do things differently all the time.
Sometimes you're going to ask each other how your day was, and the other person is going to say, okay, and that is fine, but sometimes you're wanting to have those deeper conversations, and you're wanting to make sure that it's not all the time, that the answer is just fine and busy, that some of the time you're having some more intentional, deep dive conversations so that you can share in understanding one another, that the burdens of the day or whatever's going on for you, the things that worry you, the things that excite you, the things you're working towards are shared between you. And so often for couples, this just takes a bit of breaking the ice around learning to do this differently, but you don't actually have to do it differently all the time. I even say this to couples with things like fighting.
When I'm working with you, I don't expect you to do all of your fights differently. I just want you to do a couple of them differently with the rules and the things that we've talked about, and it's the same when it comes to sharing. You don't need to do this differently all the time.
I absolutely get it that there are busy days where you're just going to say to one another, yeah, it was a busy day, and then you're going to get on with your routine or relaxing or whatever the rest of your life looks like for that time. But setting yourself a bit of a challenge to do this differently for a period of time will definitely set you up well to be able to do this easier into the future. The other thing that can be super helpful is to think about having a gratitude practice together.
Now, a piece of homework that I see a lot of couples counseling clients if we're working on this issue is having a gratitude practice before they go to bed, sharing with one another three things that they are grateful for. Now, my twist on this is I encourage people to challenge themselves to always share something different and to share as explicitly and specifically as they can. So instead of saying, I'm grateful for my health today, you might say, when I went for a walk today, I really enjoyed the experience of just being able to go out and enjoy that space and move my body.
I felt really at ease within my body today. And then another day, you might be able to say when it comes to appreciating your health, that you had some time of relaxation and you really enjoyed that moment to rest and have some time within your body that felt downregulating, that was relaxed and settled. If you can share really, really specific gratitude points, that is so helpful.
And even some of our relationship-related things can be really helpful to include there. So instead of saying, I really appreciate it today when you took out the rubbish, you could say, I really enjoyed feeling like a team and feeling like you were seeing me, you were aware of what was going on in our house and our family. Thank you so much for doing that.
I feel really seen when you do those things. So being able to have those moments of gratitude and actually really mixing them up. It's not really OK.
It's not really sharing deeply to say, you know, today I'm grateful for my kids or my health or my job or my whatever it is. Get really specific. What did you enjoy in your day? And we know that that is a real mood boost for our own mental health and well-being.
And that's lovely to share in the context of our relationship. You also get a lot of insight around a person, around what it is they appreciate and what it is that is connecting most for them by hearing what they are grateful for. I had this great tip when I was first married from someone who said, just remember that a husband doesn't actually arrive home from work until 20 minutes after his body walks in the door.
And that was slightly gendered advice, because sometimes I think that that can be true of a wife or a woman as well. And I think we can just apply that to human beings in general. But I think that when it comes to appreciating how it feels to transition from our busy day into back in our home life, perhaps into the context of our family, it is something that takes quite a bit of mental energy to transition from one space, from one set of tasks to another.
Now, some people have a little bit of an advantage with this if they have a commute time perhaps, or they've had some time to switch off or call someone or listen to music or a podcast on their way home. But for all of us, we need some soft transition time. And I really encourage you if you're wanting to work on sharing more deeply with your spouse to save those questions about how are you until later in the evening.
If your life looks like being apart for the day and then coming back together, make that coming back together a moment of connection where you perhaps have a hug. Don't forget to try and make it 20 seconds or longer if you really want the biochemical benefits of that. But you have a moment of connection and you save your questions for later, for when you're on the couch together, for when you're sitting down with that cup of tea at the end of the evening or whatever your routine and ritual looks like.
But think about timing. It's probably not at 5.40 p.m. The other thing that can be a barrier to people sharing deeply with one another in relationship is if one person is inclined towards solutions. So whenever they listen to someone sharing, they think they must be asking for my help here or their brain is naturally inclined towards thinking about solutions and so they want to share those things.
It is really important that we recognize that sharing with one another isn't actually all about coming up with answers or ways forward or solutions. We want to make space to just hear each other, where the purpose of that sharing is just to share, to let someone see into us, to tell them what it is we've been experiencing throughout our day or what it is we're struggling with or working on. The objective of that time is to share, is to come to knowing one another, is to understand each other and to offer that compassion and understanding to one another.
So consider the objective of sharing to be known, to understand your partner and to have that experience of connection together. It is not about problem solving. It's not about offloading in a way that you then have to carry their stuff.
It is just a moment and an opportunity to hold something together and to come to understand what is happening for them. Now if you're wanting to really push the boat out and working on sharing more deeply with your partner, one of the things that you can do is share with each other how understood you feel after you have shared with them whatever it is that you share. So I sometimes do this in couples therapy where I get one person to share and the other person to ask some questions and then I get the person who has shared to give a sense of how well understood they feel by their partner.
So is that, okay, I feel 6 out of 10 understood by you now. I kind of feel like you get it but you could kind of do a little bit more work in this space. Or is it 10 out of 10, gosh those questions were good.
I really appreciated this and I feel like you totally get what is going on for me here. So it is not a bad idea if you're wanting to get really good at this to experiment with having a little bit of a rating system with your partner. I've even done something before with a particular couple where I asked them to use the worm and rating one another through the conversation.
Now you might have seen that thing on election night where they have a worm. The audience is rating how well that politician is doing at responding to a question they've been asked about a policy or something. It's like an election build up thing that often happens.
And so the worm is, that wasn't very good to, oh that was really great. And you get a gauge of how the audience is receiving what it is that is being said or done in that moment. Now the worm can be super helpful in relationship conversations too.
So it might be actually these questions aren't really doing it for me or like wow I really enjoyed that question. So if you're wanting the extra for experts in this space consider some way of rating or reflecting back to your partner how well understood you feel from their efforts in that conversation. Okay so let's talk about the how was your day conversation.
So when you ask your partner what happened today? How was your day? There are definitely a whole lot of other questions that you can ask. One is what was the best moment for you today? Was there something that you enjoyed within this day? Try and make the questions as open as you can and really invite them to reflect and to have that space to actually think back because so often our day goes so quickly our minds haven't even necessarily caught up with what has been going on. So what was the best moment when you look back on the day or what happened in your day? Ask them to tell you the detail of the story and then really drop into how was that for you when that situation played out with that person or how is it for you that this person has been like that with you for the last little while or it sounds like with that project or that thing that you're working on that there's been this barrier with that.
What's the most frustrating thing for you about that? So really trying to kind of dive into that next layer of questions. Some other really great questions are what feelings did that push for you when that happened or how was it for you when that person did or said that? What happened within you in that moment? So I know that these sound like real therapist questions but they're a really good opportunity to dive deeper not just into the narrative of what happened within a day but into how your partner felt about what was going on. What's it like for you that this is continuing or how cool is it for you that this is happening? What's that adding to your life that this thing is going really well? How are you feeling? What is it that's feeling energising about you or what's it like for you that this part of your world is going really well for you at the moment? What are the other benefits of that for other parts of your life and our life together? So really just trying to draw whatever gold you can out of the conversation.
Don't be afraid to ask someone how they feel. Don't be afraid to ask them how that relates to other things within their life and to really drop down in your questions. You can even ask questions about predictions.
You know, what do you think will happen next with that? When that happens is there something that I could do to support you? What are you excited about with this? Or is there anything you're fearful about here? What do you think the worst case scenario here is and what do you think the best case scenario is here? Sometimes as well when we know our partner really well, we can also join some dots between experiences. So you might be able to say something in response to something they have said about their day. Will you help join the dots? Look, I know that that would be really hard for you because I can see how that would push those feelings of failure for you.
Or I know that that would be difficult for you to tolerate because of that other experience that you had that was really hard. Or I can see how there's a dynamic with that person that kind of is a little bit familiar to that other relationship that was a bit of a struggle in your life. You know, those questions and that level of understanding of seeing into your partner can be a really rich source of connection in your relationship.
So I encourage you to get past the cheesy factor, ask the questions and see how that goes with one another and whether you end up actually enjoying some deeper connection as a result of being able to ask those questions. Push the boat out and try and really seek to understand what is happening for your partner. Now, I think it's also really good to have a let me in conversation.
For my husband and I, this happens best when we go out for dinner together. We were able to have those stepping back conversations. How do we think we're going at the moment? What is it that we're most frustrated by in our parenting? What is it that we're celebrating that we've done really well? What are the achievements that are behind us from this last chunk of time? So we can talk together as a couple and share our own perspectives within that reflection on how life is going.
But also you want to have some let me into you conversations around that. So it might be saying, I'm really interested, what are your goals at the moment? What are the top things that you think, you know, between now and the end of the year you want to achieve? Or over next year, is there something that is standing out to you that you'd really like to do? Or what do you think your keyword might be for 2026? Really kind of inviting those open conversations where there's a reflection around the bigger picture. As a spouse as well, it can be really great to ask some questions about how you can support them.
Gosh, that sounds really important and meaningful for you. What can I do that would help that? Or if I was to encourage you in there, what is it that I would say? Is there anything that you need from me in terms of a bit of a push or some accountability with that thing that you would really like to see happen? Sometimes it can be helpful to ask really specific questions about certain areas. So you might say, you know, when it comes to your health or when it comes to health for both of us next year, what is it that we would like to see happen? And how do we support one another in that? So a really great thing that you can do is a bit of a habit swap.
So what is it that they are doing that's annoying you? What are you doing that's annoying them? And can you make an agreement that if I'm not doing that and you're not doing that, then we'll have a sense that that's worth it for us. That is a reasonable trade. So you can have a bit of fun with this.
But asking for that really kind of light feedback, but meaningful feedback about how your life is going together is really important chat for couples to be able to have. You know, I hear so often from couples that there's not necessarily anything wrong in their relationship, but that it has drifted, that it's not feeling very satisfying, that it's not feeling connected, that things aren't kind of quite gelling like they used to. And if you think back, we do so much better sharing with one another in the early stages of our relationship.
And that can change so quickly and can kind of sneak up on us. So I really encourage you to see the value of sharing deeply with one another and to really try some new and different things in this space. Give yourself a push with this because I'm sure that it is going to reward you and going to feel really good in your relationship.
Okay, so I just want to interject here with a little plug for my online course, Give Me Ten Minutes. So I set up Give Me Ten Minutes, recognising that for so many couples, they couldn't actually make it to counselling, even if they wanted to. Either there were financial barriers, they couldn't decide who to see, the job logistics made it just too tough to make it to regular appointments, or they were juggling other things in their life like kids or illness or living rurally, whatever.
There are heaps of barriers to couples getting help and I wanted to help reduce those. So I come to you with the very best of my advice gleaned over 20 years as a counsellor. I've helped lots of couples reset their relationship and this is me packaging it all up in a way that you can use from the comfort of your own home.
So each of you listens to a 10-minute audio each week and then you go away and have some time to digest that and come back together using my discussion guide to have a conversation about what you learnt from that week's audio. We work out what's wrong in your relationship, why conflict is repeating, how it is you want to feel in your relationship, your vision for the relationship, how you show up and show love to one another, how you reset your communication and understanding some of your deepest triggers and emotional needs. It is absolute gold and it has got so much great feedback from the couples who have been through it already.
Now there is also a $35 a week option if you need that to be a little bit more financially accessible. So I really encourage you to check out GiveMe10Minutes at charlottecummings.nz. Okay, so that's it for today's episode about sharing more deeply with one another. Remember your relationship is so much more valuable than a supermarket checkout operator level chit chat about how you are.
Think about your positioning with one another. Set yourself a little challenge when it comes to resetting how deeply you communicate with one another. Make like a therapist and ask some really good questions.
Think about rating the extent to which you have understood one another through the conversation. Consider your timing so that that is happening at the right point of the day. Start a gratitude practice together if you need some help to understand one another more deeply.
And remember that listening is about being able to offer compassion and understanding. Sharing deeply is about understanding one another and we do it from that purpose rather than problem solving in our lives. I hope today has been a good challenge when it comes to thinking about how deeply you share within your relationship and I can't wait to hear your stories.