Do something, anything to demolish indifference before someone you love becomes a roommate, an acquaintance, a stranger.

“When you love someone, the best thing you can offer is your presence. How can you love if you are not there?”

— Thich Nhat Hanh

Indifference is not caring what the other person thinks, feels, and does in a relationship. Everything may seem okay on the surface.

But it’s not.

I’ve learned indifference destroys relationships from my parents…

They watched something on TV every night. They made it sound like a healthy routine, but it’s the opposite.

I don’t want my boyfriend and me to be a couple who ignore each other while living, sitting, and sleeping next to each other. That happens when you turn on the TV and give your complete attention to your favorite actors and actresses on your favorite shows and ignore someone you love sitting next to you on the couch.

Coming home and turning the TV on every night for years destroyed my parent’s relationship.

As days, weeks, months, and years passed, indifference has crept into their home. They let it in. Passiveness followed the indifference. This routine was old, boring, and inactive conversations.

And dangerous.

They left the house and went through two completely different experiences. When they came home, “tell me about your day,” sounded like “let us bring back everything we fought this morning.”

Instead of sitting and talking about it, they watched something on TV or my mom went to the kitchen to talk to her dishes. There, the silence of her kitchen walls did not disturb her. She pretended her kitchen was lulling her into feeling like she was doing something for their relationship.

They danced with this deadly indifference as if it was the core keeping their relationship.

They still do this.

My parents look like they are in a good relationship.

But they are not.

Not really. Not when my mom does not know what is going on in her husband’s life. Not when my dad hears his wife has broken her leg through a kind neighbor asking how she is.

“Let us hurry and have lunch so we can watch our show.” They told their children. They made it sound like a form of complicity, but it’s the opposite. They were not connecting. They were sacrificing, coming together in the communion of a family meal for a flickering blue light.

Are you thinking about your relationship?

Do you remember the last time you and your partner snuggled together? Or is it hard to remember? Is it hard to bring up an image where you turned the TV off and made love on the couch or simply put your head on his shoulders, closed your eyes, and fell asleep while he was telling you about his day?

Has it been a day, a week, or a month since you have connected intimately with someone you love? Or has it been years?

Be careful.

You and your partner may have drifted off to sleep.

Think about it. Even when we argue, we communicate with the other person — we express our disappointment, hurt, or anger for some perceived slight or harm.

But when indifference creeps into our relationship, we shut off caring. We stop caring what the other person does or does not do, feel, or does not feel. In short, you don’t care what the other person feels or is going through.

You become indifferent.

And that’s the worst thing to be when you’re in a loving relationship.

Where are the kisses? The hugs? The late-night whispers? Why have they become unnecessary? Why have you let it go this far without having intense and long conversations with someone you love? Can you not see the dialogues you and your partner’s eyes spoke have become deadly quiet? Can you not see there are no more whispers, no more cuddles, no more I love you?

Don’t you see indifference is destroying your relationship?

If you don’t start taking care of your relationship, the gap becomes bigger and stronger.

We need something to bridge the gap.

Here are a few ideas:

Open your eyes to the dangerous signs of indifference.

Not spending time together, communicating less frequently, not wanting to spend time with your partner, not wanting to take care of your partner, not taking responsibility to build your relationship, distracting yourself with the TV and other activities to avoid facing your partner, etc.

These are a few signs indifference is building its strong foundation beneath your relationship. Before you do something about any of these signs, you need to be aware of them.

What you don’t acknowledge, you don’t mend.

That leads to…

Get back to a time when you could tell what her eyes are telling you. When she could hear your frown speaking volumes.

Being indifferent in our relationship might cost us. We need to build our relationship not just sometimes or when we feel like it but always.

Showing interest is one way of building our relationship.

You can improve your relationship by getting genuinely interested in your partner, his well-being, work, and activities. Show keen interest and encourage your partner to speak about things that concern him.

Do not let indifference destroy intimacy.

In your relationship, ask questions that will let your partner know you are interested in his activities. Talk. Push. Pull. Stretch. Strain. Wrestle. Trade the silence you have become ferociously skillful at to conversations. Get back to a time when you could tell what her eyes are telling you. Get back to a time when she could hear your frown speaking volumes.

I don’t know how to talk to my partner. It has been so long since we talked.

I hear you.

You don’t know how to talk to your partner. That is okay. You can work it out, together. Choosing to talk to each other is not for the squeamish or the faint of the heart. It requires action. An action you need to take to close the gap.

The next time indifference creeps behind your relationship, choose to seek one another. Talk with your significant other, even if you disagree. Communication is one of the key ingredients to a successful relationship. Successful couples don’t always agree, but they let each other know what’s going on in their lives, and how they’re feeling (especially when their partner does something that sparks a particular emotional response in the other person).

Do something, anything to demolish indifference before it makes its permanent residence in your relationship.

Because…

You don’t want to arrive at a place where you walk around feeling invisible — or for your partner to walk around feeling undesired.

Let us stop sacrificing, coming together in the communion of a family meal for a flickering blue light. It does not matter what happens behind the blue screen. What matters is talking to each other instead of giving your attention to a show that will suffer through a badly written season and the fate of your characters won’t be worth watching, anyway. Even if your characters are worth your time and attention, something is worthier.

Your love. Your relationship. Your connection.

Turn to look at your significant other. Go for a walk or snuggle or pull something out of the fridge and sit at your dining table and talk. Sit down next to each other without the TV on. Look at each other without your phones stealing your intimacy. Follow your partner when she goes to the kitchen. Be there when she prepares food. It does not matter you don’t know how to bridge this gap between the two of you. What matters is you turning to look at her, even if you don’t know what to say.

Do it now, before you look back and realize someone you love has become a roommate, an acquaintance, a stranger.