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Developing and maintaining successful and enduring relationships and marriages is one of the primary and most important challenges that we will face as adults. A lot of things may go right or wrong in our lives, but few are as critical to our happiness and well being than a happy relationship with a life partner.
Truly good relationships don’t just happen by accident. While it is not
uncommon for new relationships to be blissful and relatively problem free, when
some of the newness and excitement wears off, problems are likely to emerge
if we haven’t made an effort to nurture the relationship. Having a successful
relationship is not too dissimilar from any task. You have to identify the key
components of the task, acquire the skills, do the needed work and then follow
up to maintain the work you’ve accomplished. Below are a number of key
ingredients that many marriage counselors and psychologists would agree form
the basis for successful relationships. Using this list, do a brief assessment
of your current relationship and identify those areas in which you and/or your
partner may need to improve.
Friendship
Recent research has identified that the quality of the couple’s friendship
is very important. Being each others best friend, and making that friendship
an ongoing priority, can not only provide a couple with joyful companionship,
but can also help them weather the storms and crises they will undoubtedly face
over the years. Consider the marital friendship as the essential foundation
of the relationship. Ask yourself honestly whether you treat your partner as
well as you would another close friend, and if not, take steps to correct this.
Honesty and Trust
Other essential core ingredients are honesty and trust. It is very difficult
to risk being vulnerable, open and communicative with our partners if we cannot
be sure they will protect and honor our trust. Any behavior that undermines
the trust and honesty in the relationship also undermines its potential success.
Effective Communication Skills
Effective communication is much more than just talking back and forth. It includes
multiple skills such as listening closely so that you accurately receive your
partner’s message, not interrupting, trying to understand your partner’s
point of view even if you don’t agree with it, giving fair and supportive
feedback, expressing your feelings clearly and many other skills. Couples with
successful relationships have often had to learn good communication skills,
as they don't always come naturally.
Time commitment
Regardless of how busy a couple is, it is always possible to carve out some
time for the relationship. Couples who have difficulty doing so may need to
resort to a standing marital date night and regularly scheduled time to talk.
Showing Affection
It is important to show your partner ongoing affection, ideally on a daily basis.
Hold hands, touch, kiss when parting or greeting and say loving things to each
other. Being affectionate in small ways actually takes very little time and
effort but generally results in large payoffs in terms of the loving climate
it creates in the relationship.
Romance
Romantic behavior usually flows freely and easily in the beginning of relationships
but frequently wanes as time goes by. Generally, couples with successful relationships
have made the effort to continue romantic behaviors, in either little or big
ways, in order to keep adding new life to the relationship. Try to come up with
a few romantic surprises for your partner.
Conflict Resolution Skills
All couples have disagreements or arguments from time to time. The mere occurrence
of these is generally not the problem, unless they are occurring frequently.
Rather, the problem is how you go about disagreeing or arguing. Couples must
learn to express displeasure or disappointment without engaging in actions which
are known to gradually destroy relationships, such as name calling, belittling,
excessive sarcasm or other abusive behaviors. Another important part of resolving
conflict is letting it go once the argument or disagreement is over. Holding
on to grudges or somehow punishing your partner is totally unproductive. A little
bit of forgiveness can go a long way.
Show Appreciation
Let your partner know, on a daily basis, that you appreciate his efforts. This
is important to both genders, but especially to men. Men need and want to feel
that we recognize, value and appreciate the things they do for us, and they
definitely like to hear about it.
Keeping Your Sexual Relationship Alive
This is often the most difficult area for many couples. Sexual attraction and
energy is often at a high level in the early stages of a relationship. In order
for mutual sexual interest to continue, a couple must make the effort to keep
the sexual relationship interesting and exciting to both parties. One of the
first and most essential steps in doing so is learning to talk openly about
sexual early in the relationship. While this may feel awkward initially, with
practice a couple will become much more comfortable with conversations about
this sensitive and very important issue. Aside from talking, a couple may need
to agree on ways to improve the sexual relationship or add new life to it.
The above list of key ingredients is by no means exhaustive, but it may be
used as a quick tool to identify potential strengths and weaknesses in your
relationship. Few couples would be able to give themselves a great score in
all of these areas above. For each of the items listed there are a number of
resources couples can turn to including books and self-help manuals, audio tape
courses, marital retreats offered through churches, other marital workshops
or, if necessary, professional help from a minister, marriage counselor or psychologist
specializing in relationship issues. The important thing is for the couple to
acknowledge that they may have a problem and then address it early rather than
later after it has further eroded the relationship.