Written by: Susan Hum, Executive Contributor
Executive Contributors at Brainz Magazine are handpicked and invited to contribute because of their knowledge and valuable insight within their area of expertise.
Good relationships don’t “just happen”. One common statement many of my clients make about relationships is: “If I have to work at it and it doesn’t flow, 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 a positive attitude towards life to reduce stress and anxiety.
I’ve discovered, in the 20 years that I’ve been life and love coaching business leaders and busy professionals on their relationships, 5 simple steps that you can work on that will not only improve your relationships 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 feelings and needs. It also 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 thoughts and actions. Learning to treat yourself with kindness, caring, compassion, and acceptance instead of self-judgment is the work. Self-judgment will always make you feel unhappy and insecure, no matter how wonderfully your partner is treating you.
For example, when I got together with my now-husband and became an instant stepmom to a 3-year-old, I completely relinquished my very vibrant and colorful 10-year single life and dedicated all my minutes, hours, day, and 3 full years to be the best wife and best stepmom I can be while working a full-time corporate career of my own. I had ZERO social life and began feeling unfulfilled because I lost connection with the fun me. I started losing my sense of purpose. Nothing my poor husband did was enough. He would do everything I “demanded” to appease me but soon enough, I needed even more. Until one day, he asked me “Please tell me exactly what will make you happy?” I was stopped in my tracks. I couldn’t answer him. That’s when I decided to build my own social life outside of my family. I needed ME time.
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 unhappiness is the number one cause of relationship problems, learning how to self-care is vital to a good relationship.
TAKE ACCOUNTABILITY FOR YOUR ACTIONS
To take accountability is not the same as taking responsibility for yourself. When we look at being accountable, it involves an awareness of how we contribute towards the overall results of that relationship.
The one important thing to always remember is trust is earned, not demanded. The work is learning how to communicate consciously. Knowing when and how to take ownership of when things go wrong is the key, however, this takes a lot of self-awareness from both parties. The only way we can truly build trust and be honest at the same time is by being as honest as we can to ourselves.
At the beginning of my marriage, my husband would share every one of his thoughts and emotions with me as that is one of the core value systems we share: open communication. However, at times, when he would share his vulnerabilities, I would get upset with him for being “weak” and start telling him how to change. After I while I noticed he spoke less; I then accused him of being non-communicative. Then he was courageous enough to call me out and told me that he no longer felt respected or safe to be open because I was not listening. I was judging. He was simply sharing his truths. I should have been more compassionate and appreciated his openness and honesty. I took accountability for my contribution towards him shutting down.
Once we understand and acknowledge that our baggage is not caused by the current relationship and the triggers are simply a sign of something we need to work on personally, then we can step away from the emotions to engage in fair communications. Remember, the best communication requires both people to be more responsive, not reactive.
KINDNESS, COMPASSION, ACCEPTANCE
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 you 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 decide to learn about yourself and your partner and discover the deeper issues of the conflict, or you can try to win or to be right, through some form of controlling behavior. Control comes in many guises and these are some 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 as we steamroll another person’s freedom of expression. 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 or of losing the other - and the fear of engulfment or of losing oneself. When these fears get triggered, most people immediately protect themselves against these fears with their controlling behavior. We go into survival mode. But if you choose to learn about your fears instead of attempting to protect yourself, your fears will eventually heal. This is how we grow emotionally and spiritually, by learning instead of controlling.
DATE NIGHTS, FUN, AND PLAY
When people first start dating or fall in love, they make time for each other. Things are still uncertain but because our hearts are not invested 100%, we can still have fun. That’s what we call the “honeymoon period”. Then, especially after getting married, they get busy and the chase is gone. Both parties become comfortable. 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 quality time together.
We all know that all work no 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. Is it time to spice it up?? Stop taking everything so seriously and learn to see the light and funny side of life. Intimacy flourishes when there is a lightness of being, not when everything is heavy.
APPRECIATION INSTEAD OF COMPLAINTS
Positive energy flows between two people when there is an attitude of gratitude. Constant complaints create heavy, negative energy, which is not fun to be around. Practice being grateful and appreciative 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.
The greatest challenge in a relationship is knowing whether it is worth working on or it’s time to let it go and walk away. Knowing the cause of the problems goes a long way towards bringing you to more certainty because then you know what you need to work on. There is relationship expiry where both people are not aligned and where it is advisable to move towards a healthy uncoupling of the relationship, however, you will move closer towards certainty if you have worked on these steps before deciding to go separate ways.
If you and your partner agree to work together with these 5 steps, you will be amazed at the improvement in your relationship!
Susan Hum, Executive Contributor Brainz Magazine
Susan Hum, aka the LoveHacker, is a thought leader and self-mastery expert specialized in the area of love and relationships with a specific focus on emotional intelligence. Her own personal journey in forming a unique voice and unraveling her personal truth led Susan to achieve success in all pillars of life – family, career, financial freedom, and most importantly, love and incredible relationships.
Susan´s success in helping high achievers attract more love and passion into their lives has led her to work with some very prominent leaders in business, sports, music, and Hollywood. In 2020, she created the Steel Rose Movement, a conscious leadership platform for women with a mission to elevate love consciousness in the world by narrowing all divides in society, whether between women, genders, races, cultures, identity preferences, or personal beliefs.
