Project Materials

How to Maintain Interesting and Lasting Relationships

A good relationship can be one of the most interesting things that a person can experience, but when a relationship begins to experience friction and it begins to get rough, it can become a very unpleasant experience. Maintaining a great relationship with special ones to us or with a partner requires some level of maturity, skill and tolerance. The first thing you want to be sure of is if you really want the relationship to be sustained, wanting to sustain a healthy relationship or even one that is experiencing friction will be the motivating factor to make you look for the right strategies and tips you can learn and apply. Below are great tips to help you establish and maintain a great relationship.

Have Self-Love

No one can truly love or appreciate another person when he/she has not first loved and appreciated himself/herself. Self-love will make you to see yourself as someone who is loveable as well, a person who has a healthy self-love will not act too needy in a relationship to the point of suggesting that he/she is insecure. A healthy self-love means that to a good extent, even if you are on your own, you can be happy and confident. I don’t mean narcissistic attitude where you are totally engrossed in yourself and live in a delusion of assumed greatness or egocentrism. When you love and appreciate yourself, your personality, nature, background and lifestyle in a healthy way, then it will be easy for you to love someone else in a healthy way.

Work on Yourself

There is no one without imperfections, faults, weaknesses and the likes. Though you love and appreciate yourself, you must not be blind to your weaknesses and deficiencies. You should try to be aware of your lapses. There are many things that keep a relationship going, if you are lacking in some of the important aspects of character that keep a relationship, then you will need to work on it. For example, if you have an anger problem, it can easily destroy any kind of relationship, so you must first be aware of this, identify it as a problem, something you can work on and begin to work on it.

Share Some Personal Information

To create a level of intimacy in your relationship, you should be willing to share information with each other. Don’t keep listening to the other person telling you everything about himself or herself without you bringing him/her into your own world also. Share some basic information within the scope of the trust built between you two. As much as you want to share secrets and the likes, be careful not to share things that you consider highly confidential, at least while you are still getting to know each other.

Be Open

Allow some level of vulnerability. What makes people crawl into their shells and not want to expose too much is the fact that they don’t want to be vulnerable and the root of such a thing is lack of trust, like when you are not sure if this person is going to betray or disappoint you. While you may want to keep necessary boundaries and take precautions, it gets to a point you should be more open, trust more and allow yourself to be vulnerable. Vulnerability grows intimacy.

Allow the Process

Understand that every good thing takes time, as well as a good relationship. Don’t be in a hurry to make it work or get so engrossed all in a day. Give it the time it needs to build and be willing to put in necessary effort. Allowing the time needed to solidify any relationship will give you time to observe, consider and think on different things involved before becoming seriously committed to the relationship. If you notice unnecessary pressure from the other party, you should try to calm things down and not get carried away with emotions or whatever.

Give as Much as You Expect

Selfishness in a relationship will eventually kill the relationship when the other person gets to discover it’s all about you and not them. You should be ready to sacrifice as much as you want the other person to sacrifice for you. Make sure your expectations from the relationship is matched by your contributions or what you are ready to contribute to the relationship.

Communicate

Communication is the fuel of any relationship, where communication is lacking, the relationship will soon die if nothing is done to salvage the situation.  Talk with each other, talk about your past, present, future. Talk about ideas, dreams, plans and the likes. Ask how the day went? Ask what’s on his/her mind? Communicate. Talk. Chat. Even when there is a geographical distance, ensure there is no communication gap, call and message. When there is problem, each party should be ready to talk about it and get it solved in an amicable manner.

Meet Core Needs

Try to understand your partner’s core needs. Everyone has a core need, what they really want. You need to know what he/she really wants. What’s their heart searching for? What vacuum is left in their lives that makes them feel empty? What can you do to meet those needs? Be deliberate about finding out ways you could feel those spaces. That will mean much more to the other person than a whole lot of gifts and lines.

Build Trust

Every relationship thrives on trust. If you don’t trust a person, there’s limit to how far you can go with the person. You cannot build a healthy relationship with someone you don’t trust. You should endeavour to build trust in the other person’s heart. Be true to little promises that you make, don’t go back on things you said you’d do, and if reasons beyond what you can handle make you unable to fulfil your promises, try to give clear explanation. Don’t hide explanation where you know the other person needs some light even if he/she does not ask for it.

Do Interesting Things Together

One of the ways you can create more fun and interesting memories in your relationship is to have good fun. You could decide to visit an amusement park, play games together, visit friends, etc.

Appreciate Differences

Two people cannot be the same, while your basic values should agree, expecting that you will act, talk and think the same way is totally unrealistic and not even good for a healthy relationship. Don’t expect to always like the same things or have the same opinions. Instead of looking at the differences from a wrong perspective, you should rather try to appreciate good disparities and see how your differences can agree or be used as advantage.

Do Meaningful Things Together

One of the ways good relationship can be fostered is to have something meaningful and value-adding that you both do together. It should not be that every time is all about casual talk, playing and whiling away time, ensure that there are value adding activities that you do together.

Give Necessary Space

Don’t turn the relationship to a burden where you keep demanding the other person’s attention every time. Give some space as needed. Have good time with other people too and improve your social life while allowing a little space for some time for each other.