Relationship success
Love alone is not enough. Even people who swear they love their partners, can behave in ways that pretty much ensure their relationships will fail. While the following ‘rules’ cannot guarantee a lasting and rewarding relationship, they will certainly help contribute to it.
- Treat your partner the way you would like them to treat you. Give them what you want to receive—respect, consideration, support, kindness, co-operation, patience, tolerance, understanding.
- Don’t take your partner or the relationship for granted. After the excitement of the falling-in-love stage things calm down and we become more complacent. We no longer pay as much attention to each other or make as much effort. We no longer worry so much about losing each other. When family responsibilities grow we can even come to feel that we ‘have’ the other and that they are locked into the relationship and would never leave. Take time to remind yourself of what you have and how you would feel if you lost it.
- Make the relationship a top priority. Life makes so many demands on us that the relationship can slip on our list of priorities.
- Don’t try to change them. Trying to change someone implies that they are not good enough. Accept what you cannot change. Love the real person not an idealized, imaginary version of them or a ‘potential’ them. Accept your partner’s imperfections (as you expect them to accept yours) and don’t make unreasonable demands or expect perfection. The longer we spend with someone the better we get to know their less pleasing qualities. Familiarity can breed contempt. But the perfect human being does not exist. Love them for who they are not who you want them to be.
- Try to meet your partner’s needs. Their needs may not be the same as yours. By trying to understand and do what you can to satisfy their needs you prove how much you care.
- Be flexible. Life changes, people change, we change. Adapt to changing circumstances and the person your partner continues to evolve into. Don’t expect your partner to stay exactly the same as the day you met.
- Value yourself. Don’t be overly dependent or a submissive doormat. Don’t see your partner as completing you (as though you weren’t already whole) or supplying something you lack. Don’t depend on your partner for your self-worth.
- Communicate. Don’t expect your partner to read you mind and don’t think that you can read theirs. Tell, ask, listen, negotiate.
- Share - problems, time, fun, do things together, create good times, share bad times. Remember you are a partnership and work as a team. Make sure you also share power so that neither dominates in all things.
- Be a friend. Provide companionship, be considerate and kind, give support, understanding, encouragement. Have their best interests at heart.
- Be honest. Outright lies aren’t the only form of dishonesty. Don’t hide significant parts of your life or yourself from your partner. Don’t do things behind their backs. Don’t break promises.
- Be loyal. Infidelity is not the only way to betray a partner. Don’t run them down to other people, don’t flirt or play at making them jealous.
- Accept your separateness and differences. No matter how close you are, no one ‘owns’ anyone else. No one is a carbon copy of someone else. Excessive possessiveness, jealousy, and controlling behaviours drive people away. Partners are not possessions or extensions of each other. They have the right to do, be, think and feel things what the other doesn’t or even doesn’t necessarily approve of.
- See your partner as your equal. Many people believe they are superior to their partners. We all have different strengths and weaknesses and most of us see our own strengths clearer than others’ and others’ weaknesses clearer than our own. Some men for example, still assume they are superior to their female partner simply because they are physically bigger and stronger. No matter what their qualities, everyone has equal worth. Equality and mutual respect are essential for a satisfying relationship.
- You don’t have to be right all the time. If you are always right your partner must always be wrong. Even if you win the argument or get your way, you eventually pay the price of your partner’s resentment. Compromise. Saying ‘You could be right’ to your partner goes a long way to promoting relationship success. Or as Ogden Nash would say ‘When you’re wrong admit it/ Whenever you are right, shut up!’
- Think! Most of us act and react automatically most of the time. Think about what you are doing and how you are behaving and reacting. Is it likely to have a positive impact on your partner and relationship, or not? If not, then consciously work at changing your responses.
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