Date Night Ideas That You Haven't Tried Yet
Obviously, I am not a psychologist. I’m not an anything but a gal who likes to read and learn ways to live more deeply in love so this post is only for sweet, fun, recreational times with your cutie pie and not any sort of official advice - love you! ❤️
Have you ever seen that movie, Date Night? It is about fifteen years old at this point so if you haven’t, don’t drop what you’re doing. I myself haven’t seen it in at least a decade and we all know how early lost 2000’s comedies can age so I will paint you a word picture instead.
There’s this scene at the beginning where a long married couple played by Tina Fey and Steve Carell get home from a long day of work. Fatigued and ready to become one with the couch, they remember it’s date night. They pull themselves together hastily and repeat their regular date night ritual: the same meal, at the same restaurant, on the same night; that they have done for seemingly many years.
The table and the restaurant are clunky. The meal and the atmosphere aren’t stimulating them. The conversation keeps losing steam. And it’s not for lack of trying! These two people have busy lives and stressful jobs and children and every week they still want to come together and pay attention to their mutual love. There’s an innocence and vulnerability to their bid to woo each other again.
It’s both touching and relatable. They clearly love each other so much, enjoying the fun and rapport that comes with so many years of partnership. But it’s also clear the ritual is boxing them in. The pattern no longer serves the goal of date night: to give them time and space to come together and feel close.
One Small Change Can Ripple Throughout Your Whole Relationship
When you think of “date night” ideas, whether you have a standing date night with your partner or whether you have a partner right now, what comes up? Probably a meal. Maybe a movie. Perhaps a drink somewhere. These are classics and classics for a reason. They’re fun, enjoyable, and readily available. But it’s good to switch it up a little! And I think it’s really romantic to just try something new, big or small.
The perfect date night for me is a tall order. I want it to be relaxing, so I don’t want it to be too complex to plan. I want it to be affordable, since I want to do it fairly often. I want it to be romantic but not stuffy. Depending on the week I might want it to be familiar or novel. Most of all, I want it to genuinely strengthen my partner’s and my sense of connection, not just tick off a box that we did something just the two of us this week.
Before I even met my partner, I read this book, Happy Together: Using the Science of Positive Psychology to Build Love That Lasts, and it kinda changed my life! The authors are a married couple who both happen to be positive psychologists, a type of psychology that aims to understand the patterns of behavior that make humans their happiest. They spent decades researching and practicing various rituals, exercises, and behaviors that led to a clear but not sterile method for maintaining the enjoyment of love over time.
I know it doesn’t sound like the hottest book you’ve ever heard of. But passion is a delicate, necessary resource. Feeding it, protecting it, restarting it; these are all relationship skills that can be really hard. The idea that they’re just innate instincts feels false and unhelpful. Love starts as a noun and continues as a verb. This book is about the actions you can take to feel the love. Suzann and James offer very accessible practices we can all start incorporating right now. What a wonderful promise: to be able to love easier, more freely, and more effectively today.
This book is a huge foundation to my relationship so I came up with some date night ideas around the central concepts! Some of them may seem a bit dull or downright terrible but I have tried them all. I practice what I preach! These have some magic. After these date nights my partner and I just feel so close, so hopeful, so appreciative of our life together. It’s the best feeling in the world.
I think there’s this really damaging concept that pervades dating and relating that love simply doesn’t last. I hate that. I don’t have a lot of years under my belt but I don’t care what anyone says or thinks. I will do whatever is in my power to reject that belief. To instead believe that love has no limits, can always be reborn, and can transform even the darkest of nights in our lives. I just don’t see the point in thinking otherwise.
To that end, with a little creativity and an open mind, date night is so magical. It can ignite that elation of a first kiss, the intensity of new love. I hope these ideas refresh and restore your date night ritual and remind you that love is too important to take for granted.
Stroll Down Memory Lane: Relationship Portfolio
I’m going to paraphrase so you don’t have to endure too much science summarizing. But basically James and Suzann include a bunch of research that showed that couples who talk about happy memories they share, who tell the story of their relationship to each other in a positive light, are often much happier and have longer lasting, more satisfying relationships.
So once a month, you could add to a relationship portfolio. Throughout the month, take pictures, save receipts, make little drawings, and whatever else you can do to capture little moments that are otherwise forgotten.
Then on a day you put on the calendar together, you can dump everything out on the kitchen table, order a pizza, and put it all together in a scrapbook or just simply going through a box you’ve been putting all of the bits and bobs in. You could even make the first date shopping for a cute scrapbook or box together. Go all out with the creativity if it’s fun to you! Get little stickers and one of those little bluetooth phone photo printers.
Go slowly and don’t be too precious about it. All you really need to benefit from the exercise is to spend some time talking positively about the time you share together. Make a really elaborate keepsake or just make a list.
And if you’d like some guidance, you could use this couple’s memory journal I made, which has easy prompts to help you savor the best parts of your month and set a good tone for the month to come. It can be filled out digitally or printed as a lovely keepsake for each year of your union.
Step Out of Your Comfort Zone: Pick a New Joint Hobby
This one’s pretty straightforward. It’s good for couples to play. To explore new activities, sensations, and ideas together. Like children, trying something new without judgement or expectation is how we expand our capacity to feel and think.
Pick a new hobby. I have a list of suggestions below but as the quote says, it’s best to pick something you are both interested in and that won’t incite agitation or competition.
Joint Hobby Ideas:
Play through a video game campaign together, trading back and forth.
Take up a sport like tennis or pickle ball.
Explore the hiking trails in your area or even take up camping together.
Learn to cook your favorite cuisine together.
Play chess or do the crossword as a couple.
Take an art class like pottery or painting.
Have an SSR (silent sustained reading) hour where you sit together and share some snacks and read your own books.
My favorite aspects about this idea is that it gives you a go to so that you always have an idea you’re excited about when date night comes around. It’s also such a gratifying feeling when you look up after a couple of months or even a year and realize that you’ve both gotten better at the hobby and helped each other to do so.
Rubber Band Bounce Back: Have a Solo Date Night Then Meet Up
We all have (or have been) that girlfriend who meets a prince charming and then kind of falls off the face of the earth. I call this the “BFDND”, boyfriend do not disturb mode. You’re so in love (or so tortured by love depending on the person), you have so many things on your to do list, you have work and to grocery shop and to exercise and sleep and to see friends. The things you like to do on your own and the people you used to fill your time with start fading slowly.
It happens! Doing everything you want to do in a day is really difficult. But it’s easy to default our free time to time with our paramour when we’re in a relationship. And easy to forget that our relationships get richer and easier the more we are allowed to be ourselves and pursue our own passions. A little time apart just simply reduces irritability and negativity between long term lovers.
I also think spending time apart reminds us gives us space to think of our partner fondly, to miss them. So this date night is for the people who keep missing that yoga class or forgetting their college friend was in town. Set up a couple hours for yourself on date night, either alone or with a friend. Then meet up for dinner or drinks with your partner after and tell them all about it. This also means your conversation at the table won’t be stuck in the same topics it usually is like work or family.
Positivity Pays You Back: Pay Your Bills Together
This one might be giving you hives as you read this. Or maybe you already do this and it’s the worst part of your month. But it is an undeniable fact that money is the number one thing couples fight about. It makes sense to make the concerted effort to develop a mutually positive ritual around it.
The main way we engage with our money is paying our bills. It is rarely if ever a ritual talked about positively. My partner and I pay our bills on date night as well as do our taxes and it has absolutely transformed our attitude towards money, spending, working, and making financial decisions together.
It’s not enough to just pay the bills and call it quits all drained and cranky. We make a fun night of it and pack it full of our favorite things. We go to Whole Foods and we get a nice bottle of wine. We pick up our favorite takeout. We come home, throw the bottle in the fridge, and have a nice dinner, each resolving to talk about pleasant, comforting things. Then we take a little walk to digest and come home to sit down in our office and go through each of our bills. We talk about any discrepancies or changes in our income and spending. We plan for the future and redistribute responsibilities as needed. None of this is a radical practice but these elements are key:
DON’T drink the wine before the bill paying. Alcohol sleepies and bills are the perfect recipe for couples disaster.
DO talk about each service you are paying for with a statement of gratitude. For instance:
“I’m so glad I got that tooth pulled this month. I’m happy it’s over and that my mouth feels so relieved.”
“The electricity bill was a bit higher but it’s been very nice to feel cool in our house during the heat wave recently.”
DO reward yourself with the wine once all the bills are done!
Every payment from a water bill to a broken sink. Talk about how grateful you are to be able to pay it. If you can’t pay some bills, talk about how nice you would feel if you could pay it or come up with ideas that might help you pay it. Speak gently and go slowly, finding solutions together where they’re needed.
Is this really hard? Sometimes! But with time, we found that we actually look forward to paying our bills. We have less strife around money and talk about it more easily. It might feel stupid at first but give it a couple of tries and I can bet on positive results.
Then you get to drink the wine!
