Healthy Relationships

It takes two people to create a healthy relationship. Relationships can be the most transformative journey throughout our lifetime.  It is a process of learning about ourselves, increasing self-esteem, healing wounds, learning how to understand and listen to others all the while learning the sometimes challenging lessons of love.

There are some fundamentals for healthy and satisfying relationships. Unfortunately most of us grew up not learning or seeing the essentials demonstrated by our caregivers.

Make yourself happy then share it with a partner.  Accept yourself, respect yourself, take good care of yourself and continue to find new ways to make yourself happy today. If you are not happy before you are in a relationship, your relationship will not change that. Your partner cannot fulfill all your needs; it puts unfair pressure on another.  Take control yourself.

Reach agreements and follow through, if your partner repeatedly makes excuses or give you reasons why they failed to keep their promises, you should reconsider this relationship. Keeping promises builds trust and safety and shows respect for yourself and your partner.

Communicate, Communicate, and Communicate

Stephen Covey said it well, “First strive to understand, then to be understood”. Allow for different points of view and communicate without blame, criticism or judgments. Listen with kindness, not to just hear, but to understand and implement, no one is right and no one is wrong. The saying goes, “would you rather be right or happy”??

Be very clear about acceptable and unacceptable behaviors and attitudes.  Everyone needs love, intimacy, affection and validation, expecting your partner to fulfill all these needs is giving them responsibility for your happiness and is simply unfair, use your circle of friends for some of theses needs. Your partner is not responsible to fill your deficits from childhood that was your parent’s job, if you are feeling deprived, empty, and lonely, work with a professional to sort out your part of the relationship.

Forgiveness

Forgiveness is a process and a decision of letting go of the past and staying in the present. Forgiveness is not bringing up the past when talking about a current issue; it is about talking through your thoughts and feelings with your partner to learn from the experience, so as not to repeat it in the future.  If you are repeating the same issues and conversations, you are either not forgiving or need to improve your conflict resolution skills together.

The healthiest relationships have been created; they did not start out that way. Using a professional to help you navigate through the challenging parts is a healthy decision for the present and future health of your relationship.