According to Our Spreadsheet, Spontaneity is One of the Best Ways to Keep the Spark in a Relationship.

Going into our first attempt at long-distance, neither my boyfriend nor I thought spontaneity would be as important as it was. Instead, we discovered it, naturally, through our spreadsheet.

For context, we originally built the spreadsheet six months ago, long before my cross-country move, to track basic, practical metrics – call frequency, call length, visit cadence, how often the words “miss you” were uttered or texted. But once we started analyzing and categorizing the data, we noticed some fascinating patterns emerge.

Despite our best efforts to keep everything predictable, by week three of our long-distance journey, we noticed something odd: “Unplanned Interactions” correlated more strongly with positive outcomes in our daily surveys than the things we originally thought would matter most, such as “Careful Communication” and “Expectation Management.”

In other words, in terms of impact, spontaneity was a total standout.

Hoping to use these findings to boost our relationship, we decided to lock in. We optimized for spontaneity by setting strict guardrails. We agreed that all spontaneity in our relationship should occur between noon to 6pm Eastern, so as to account for the difference in our time zones and work schedules.

Furthermore, we realized that truly random behavior, such as sending a funny video or a photo of a dog we thought the other would find cute, could be hard to properly classify and track. Thus, a range of pre-selected behaviors was agreed upon.

In our shared calendar, my boyfriend blocked off time not just for “calls” but for “pre-call longing.” Meanwhile, I began taking advantage of the IOS update that allowed me to draft and schedule romantic messages to send sporadically throughout the week. And we both set aside designated time in our calendars on Valentine’s Day that would be most convenient to receive a surprise delivery (pink tulips for me, milk-chocolate-covered strawberries for him).

The improvement was clear within a handful of days, with both of us scoring higher across the most important KPIs, including “Bonding,” “Inside Jokes,” and “Things That Would Make Others Jealous Of Our Relationship.”

Now, some couples might find this intimidating, but it doesn’t have to be. Though we initially considered penalizing ourselves for unplanned or unlogged spontaneity, we ultimately decided against it. We agreed we didn’t want the spreadsheet to feel punitive. Instead, we wanted it to feel authentic, joyful, and, well, spontaneous.

And though we’re still in the initial stages of this whole long-distance thing, I think we can both say, with the qualitative and quantitative data to back us up, that this experiment has been a massive success.

Looking forward to Q2, we hope to work together to build a comprehensive program downloadable for a small maintenance fee so that you, too, can experience such joy.