Ingredients for a Successful Relationship by Tim O'Donohue @ Relationshipstore.org
Ingredients for a Successful Relationship
As you enter your new relationship or explore your current one, it is important to know what will make this relationship work and last in a loving and respectful way. There are many ways to breakdown the ingredients of a successful relationship, this article will look at some of these ingredients and why are they important.
Love—of course love can be defined in various ways and is somewhat subjective to each person and their particular relationship. However, we all know we want love in our relationship. Specifically we want to feel loved and we want our partner to feel loved. This is a given.
2. Communication—can take many forms in a relationship; it’s not just about sharing about your day or talking about deep emotional issues. It also has to do with understanding your partner’s communication style, respecting it and finding a way to work your two styles together.
3. Trust- is imperative in a successful relationship. This is true on many levels, not just the issue of faithfulness and infidelity. It is important that you both be able to trust that your partner will be there for you and do what they say they will do. Sometimes trust issues can precede the relationship, and traumas from past relationships in which trust was broken can affect the current relationship in a harmful way. Be honest with each other and take a serious look at your own trust issues: how much is due to your partner? How much is due to your own insecurity? Don’t punish your partner for your own insecurities, instead tell them you want to work on this and ask for their help.
4. Friendship-Having a partner you can truly call your friend can also be important in a long term relationship. Physical attraction is important but is only part of the equation. Being with someone you can share things with, have conversation and enjoy experiences with, can lead to a deeper and more meaningful relationship. If you don’t consider your partner a friend, ask yourself why not? The answers may be interesting. Is it something you can work on? Together?
5. Understanding—The well known psychologist, John Gottman, would joke about how sometimes people think that when they point out all the things they want their partner to change, that somehow their partner will respond by saying ‘oh thank you, thank you for pointing out all my inadequacies’. In reality, this is seldom if ever the reaction. We often try to change our partner, when in fact they can only change themselves. Understanding can be far more effective. Understand first that your partner is different than you, that they see many things differently—this does not make them wrong. Try to understand and show them understanding whether you agree or not. Our partner is far more receptive to us ‘making suggestions’ if they feel understood first. Beyond this, knowing that our partner understands us and all our vulnerabilities and yet still accepts us, can be a very great feeling in a relationship. If you want to feel this, start by making your partner feel the same.
6. Collaboration-Working together—I have always been struck by the fact that couples seem to use their strengths against each other in a relationship instead of joining them together in a more effective pathway to happiness. As a couple, you are also a team. Remember that you both want the same things: to feel loved, to have success, to be happy. Work together by acknowledging your different styles and fitting them together to reach a desired outcome.
7. Humor-Life can be very difficult and unfair, if we cannot take the time to find humor, we may be overcome with stress. Sometimes couples share ‘their humor’, which are things that only they find funny, sometimes people enjoy a different type of humor than their partner. Either way, it is possible and maybe necessary to find humor in occasions and share a laugh. The humor should never be at the expense of our partner (eg. Mocking each other’s shortcomings) unless of course both of you agree this is ok. The risk here is that you may trigger your partner into anger. Humor should never produce anger, in fact it works best the other way around. The next time you are in an angry heated discussion about something relatively unimportant (e.g. You left your towel on the floor…again), if you have the presence of mind to break the tension with some humor, you may end the argument in a happy way. Be careful not to use humor to avoid talking about difficult topics; avoiding will cause more anger in our partner. Try to make your partner forget their anger and laugh by using ‘their’ type of humor.
8. Common goals-If we do not talk about and identify our goals it makes it less likely that we will reach them. In fact, writing them down can be even more powerful. Sometimes we think our goals are the same as our partner's and then find out differently. Having a discussion about goals and shared goals can be a very connecting and empowering exercise for the two of you. All of your goals do not have to be the same, in fact having some individual goals that are different than each other can be a good thing. You can support each other toward your individual goals, while working together on your shared goals. Goals can be about every area of your life: family, social, work, financial, vacation, spiritual, health etc. Set them, and work together to achieve them.
9. Healthy conflict resolution-Learning to resolve conflict in a healthy way is a vital part of a successful relationship. Conflict is not a negative in a relationship unless it happens too often or is handled in an unhealthy way. Remember, most disagreements end in either a compromise, agree to disagree, one of you gets your way or the issue is not addressed fully or resolved. Of these options, only the last needs to be avoided. Otherwise, knowing that we are aiming to either find a compromise, find agreement or agree to disagree can be a healthy guideline before discussion. Compromise will be a resolution that will leave both of you a little (or a lot) dissatisfied, but will be a ‘middle ground’ and fair resolution to a conflict where your opinions are far apart. It is possible that one of you may persuade the other; this is different than proving you are right. Having a calm exchange of ideas can help. Do not yell, blame, bring up the past, name call or criticize. In some disagreements which do not require a decision to be made (eg political arguments), an ‘agree to disagree’ can be the healthiest way to go.
10. Intimacy-last but not least, intimacy is a vital part of a healthy relationship. This includes sex but not only sex. Intimacy may include many actions that show love and kindness to our partner. Things we do to, for or with our partner that bring us closer, fall in the category of intimacy. Buying flowers, rubbing feet or backs, sitting close, sharing a smile can all be intimate. Intimate actions in which we do something for our partner that lets them know we are thinking about them leads to feelings of love and safety. When couples struggle in this area, they are often focused solely on sex. This is a mistake, because increasing the intentionality and number of intimate actions, you invariably increase the likelihood of sex. Get to know what each of you likes and dislikes in this area. Sometimes it’s a difficult topic to bring up for several reasons, but it is important that you do in order to produce a reality that is more rewarding for both of you. Sometimes, in the beginning of a relationship it seems unnecessary to focus on this area because there are no problems. However, it’s important to start early to establish healthy behaviors and routines.
There are many ingredients to a successful relationship. Focusing on these 10 to begin with will be a healthy catalyst for your relationship.-- Relationshipstore.org