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By Margaret Paul, Ph.D.
Good relationships don’t just happen. I’ve heard many of
my clients state that, “If I have to work at it, then it’s
not the right relationship.” This is not a true statement,
any more than it’s true that you don’t have to work at
good physical health through exercise, eating well, and
stress reduction.
I’ve discovered, in the 35 years that I’ve been counseling
couples, 7 choices you can make that will not only improve
your relationship, but can turn a failing relationship
into a successful one.
TAKE RESPONSIBILITY FOR YOURSELF
This is the most important choice you can make to improve
your relationship. This means that you learn how to take
responsibility for your own feelings and needs. This means
that instead of trying to get your partner to make you
feel happy and secure, you learn how to do this for
yourself through your own thoughts and actions. This means
learning to treat yourself with kindness, caring,
compassion, and acceptance instead of self-judgment.
Self-judgment will always make you feel unhappy and
insecure, no matter how wonderfully your partner is
treating you.
For example, instead of getting angry at your partner for
your feelings of abandonment when he or she is late,
preoccupied and not listening to you, not turned on
sexually, and so on, you would explore your own feelings
of abandonment and discover how you might be abandoning
yourself.
When you learn how to take full, 100% responsibility for
yourself, then you stop blaming your partner for your
upsets. Since blaming one’s partner for one’s own
unhappiness is the number one cause of relationship
problems, learning how to take loving care of yourself is
vital to a good relationship.
Treat others the way you want to be treated. This is the
essence of a truly spiritual life. We all yearn to be
treated lovingly – with kindness, compassion,
understanding, and acceptance. We need to treat ourselves
this way, and we need to treat our partner and others this
way. Relationships flourish when both people treat each
other with kindness. While there are no guarantees, often
treating another with kindness brings kindness in return.
If your partner is consistently angry, judgmental,
uncaring and unkind, then you need to focus on what would
be loving to yourself rather than reverting to anger,
blame, judgment, withdrawal, resistance, or compliance.
Kindness to others does not mean sacrificing yourself.
Always remember that taking responsibility for yourself
rather than blaming others is the most important thing you
can do. If you are consistently kind to yourself and your
partner, and your partner is consistently angry, blaming,
withdrawn and unavailable, then you either have to accept
a distant relationship, or you need to leave the
relationship. You cannot make your partner change – you
can only change yourself.
LEARNING INSTEAD OF CONTROLLING
When conflict occurs, you always have two choices
regarding how to handle the conflict: you can open to
learning about yourself and your partner and discover the
deeper issues of the conflict, or you can try to win, or
at least not lose, through some form of controlling
behavior. We’ve all learning many overt and subtle ways of
trying to control others into behaving the way we want:
anger, blame, judgment, niceness, compliance, caretaking,
resistance, withdrawal of love, explaining, teaching,
defending, lying, denying, and so on. All the ways we try
to control create even more conflict. Remembering to learn
instead of control is a vital part of improving your
relationship.
For example, most people have two major fears that become
activated in relationships: the fear of abandonment – of
losing the other - and the fear of engulfment – of losing
oneself. When these fears get activated, most people
immediately protect themselves against these fears with
their controlling behavior. But if you chose to learn
about your fears instead of attempt to control your
partner, your fear would eventually heal. This is how we
grow emotionally and spiritually – by learning instead of
controlling.
CREATE DATE TIMES
When people first fall in love, they make time for each
other. Then, especially after getting married, they get
busy. Relationships need time to thrive. It is vitally
important to set aside specific times to be together – to
talk, play, make love. Intimacy cannot be maintained
without time together.
Positive energy flows between two people when there is an “attitude of gratitude.” Constant complaints creates a
heavy, negative energy, which is not fun to be around.
Practice being grateful for what you have rather than
focusing on what you don’t have. Complaints create stress,
while gratitude creates inner peace, so gratitude creates
not only emotional and relationship health, but physical
health as well.
We all know that “work without play makes Jack a dull
boy.” Work without play makes for dull relationships as
well. Relationships flourish when people laugh together,
play together, and when humor is a part of everyday life.
Stop taking everything so seriously and learn to see the
funny side of life. Intimacy flourishes when there is
lightness of being, not when everything is heavy.
A wonderful way of creating intimacy is to do service
projects together. Giving to others fills the heart and
creates deep satisfaction in the soul. Doing service moves
you out of yourself and your own problems and supports a
broader, more spiritual view of life.
If you and your partner agree to thesechoices, you will
be amazed at the improvement in your relationship!
Margaret Paul, Ph.D. is the best-selling author and
co-author of eight books, including "Do I Have To Give Up
Me To Be Loved By You?" She is the co-creator of a
powerful self-help, 6-step emotional and spiritual healing
process called Inner Bonding. Learn Inner Bonding now!
Visit her web site for a FREE Inner Bonding course:
http://www.innerbonding.com or
mailto:margaret@innerbonding.com
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