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10+ Tips to Create your Best Relationship Ever
A Dynamic Guide for Couples (and Singles!)
1. Self Love
2. Respect
3. Play
4. Safety, Trust, and Intimacy
5. Allies in Growth
6. Communication
7. Deep Listening
8. “I am Grateful For … I Forgive You For”
9. Shared Vision
10. Love, Tenderness, and Laughter
11. Be In the Now
1. Self Love
Relationships with others are an extension of our relationship with ourself. To create a better love relationship with our partner, the first and consistent step (it never goes out of fashion) is to pay close attention to how we care for ourself.
The more you appreciate yourself; the more you believe in yourself; the more you value your inner self, your gifts and your particular attributes – the more open you will be to loving and being loved. When we are critical of ourself, we close ourself off from access to love. We create thick walls, endeavoring to hide our perceived shortfalls from the one we love. This runs contrary to our desire to love and be loved.
So the first step in creating a wonderful love relationship with our partner is to create a wonderful love relationship with ourself.
Notice how you speak about yourself.
Notice how you speak to yourself.
What is your attitude towards ‘you’?
If it is at all derogatory, impatient or unkind, then your relationship with you needs repair. Be gentle with yourself. Lower your expectations. Celebrate your accomplishments, your gifts and your skills. Be your own best ally. Turn your self ‘enemy’ into a self ‘cheerleader’. Love yourself more … and you’ll open your ‘pores’ to receive your partner’s love and affection.
2. Respect
The cornerstone of all great relationships is respect. If you have chosen a partner whom you don’t respect, then either you have compromised your ideals, or you aren’t perceiving their winning traits.
Let go of blame. No one but you is responsible for your happiness and for your life. If your chosen partner isn’t someone whom you can fully respect, you have two choices. Stay and be miserable. Or leave. Letting go of blame may surprise you with a third option. If the seed of respectability in your partner has been masked by your blame, then you may begin to witness a ‘glow’ in your partner that will draw you to fall in love with her/him.
Respect yourself. This is a key aspect of Self Love. If you punish yourself with useless guilt, blame and shame, you aren’t making yourself available for love.
What have you done wrong? Either fix it or forgive yourself – and move on. You only ever live in the ‘now’. Blame and regret hook you into the never-ending past. Let go the hook. Float into the now. Here you will find your power, your clarity, and your true love.
3. Play
When we first meet our partner, no matter what age we are, we behave like pubescent teenagers. We flirt. We dance around each other, heightening the electric spark which will infuse our love.
Keeping a relationship young and alive has everything to do with play. Play is more than making time to go out together on dates – to dinner, movies, sports and other leisure activities. Play is play.
What ‘lightens you and your partner up’? Is it playing teasingly competitive games? Is it having snowball fights? Is it playing ‘tag’? Is it tickling each other? Is it playing board games? Is it creating something fun together – cooking, baking or building a craft?
Play is what keeps us all young – and so it inherently is what keeps a relationship young. Adults tend to become more and more serious. Our happiness and health take a nose dive as a result – as does our most precious intimate relationship.
Make a decision together with your partner to explore new ways to play. Lighten your spirits! Rediscover the spark in each other – over and over again.
4. Safety, Trust, and Intimacy
Play widens and deepens the terrain in which we connect with our loved one. It opens up the space in which we explore each other.
Healthy relationships are built on trust. Trust allows for ecstatic intimacy. All this requires safety as its base.
5. Allies in Growth
Safety naturally arises when we are allies. Most relationships falter when people inadvertently become each other’s critics and thus enemies. Without the conscious awareness to choose an alternate path, most people become disheartened and afraid when they witness their partner’s ‘weaker side’. Rather than ‘holding loving space’ for their partner to grow and strengthen themselves, they attack.
The most direct path to becoming each other’s ally – and thus creating an unshakeable foundation of safety in your relationship – is this:
a). Become conscious of what your and your partner’s areas of greatest challenge are – Trust? Organization? Fitness? Discipline? Desire? Self Love? Confidence? Or something else?
b). Notice your tendency to attack – to undermine – your partner when he/she is in the midst of this area of challenge.
c). Discipline yourself. Rather than attacking – through words, glares or actions – simply ‘hold space’. Hold in your heart and mind an air of compassion. Love them the more for their challenge. Hold a loving ‘container’ in which they can grow. They will trust you all the more, increasing profoundly their experience of safety. This safety will naturally lead to greater intimacy.
6. Communication
Communication is the constant thread that links us. We each have different styles – which is the source of much miscommunication and confusion in relationships. Familiarizing yourself with systems such as the Enneagram and Numerology can assist you in identifying your and your partner’s predominant communication styles.
Most of our communication is actually non-verbal – it is expressed through our tone of voice, our body language and simply through the ‘dance’ of energy between us. Consider this: A smile or a hug is worth a thousand words. (Which is why physical intimacy is such a cornerstone in building and nurturing a healthy relationship.)
Here are a few communication tips:
a). When a challenge or a tension arises between partners, it is the role of the first person who notices it to draw it to the attention of both people.
b). All irritations need to be addressed. Very seldom does a tension resolve itself. Challenges which go unaddressed tend to grow in proportion, attracting other challenges to them. As soon as you notice something niggling at you, find a time to speak with your partner. ‘Nip it in the bud.’
7. Deep Listening
What we say is often not what we actually mean. Deep beneath the surface layers of our words lies our true message.
How do we listen to our partner’s deep meaning?
We listen with our whole body. We relax into our body, take deeper breaths, and attune to the energy of their entire being. When we do this, we drop down inside ourselves into compassion. We ‘bypass’ our own fear, and we awaken to who they are in the moment, what they are expressing, what they most want, what they are asking for.
Deep listening involves so much more than our ears. When we listen solely with our ears, we listen in a conditioned way. We listen through our filters, our resentments, our assumptions and our own fears.
When we ‘Deep Listen’, our being is recognizing another’s being.
This creates more trust. As we ‘receive’ our partner in a more holistic way, they feel safer and more completely accepted by us. This deepens our intimacy – as they naturally offer more of themselves to us.
8. “I am Grateful For … I Forgive You For”
This is one of the most effective and relationship-transforming practices that my husband brought into the fledgling stages of our relationship. It goes like this …
As you lie in bed at night – or sitting together on the sofa if you prefer – sense together (each evening has a different ‘flow’) who will speak first – and who will listen.
The speaker takes a moment to relax his or her body, letting its weight fall heavily into the sofa or the bed. Taking a few deep breaths, he or she then vocalizes 5 things that “I am grateful for” pertaining to his or her partner. Then he or she vocalizes 5 things that “I forgive you for”. During this, the partner remains silent and deeply listens – without response or reaction.
Then the roles reverse. The listener becomes the speaker, and vice versa.
What develops – through this practice – is an opportunity to express and to receive reflections of how deeply we enrich each other’s lives (“I am grateful for”). Plus it is an opportunity to express in a safe environment what we wish was different in our partner’s way of being and living (“I forgive you for”). In silence as the listener, we have the tremendous opportunity of simply hearing what someone close to us desires we do or be differently.
My husband and I practiced this for approximately two years at the beginning of our relationship. We built such a foundation of love and respect and clear communication through this simple practice. Nothing was out of bounds to communicate or to hear. Our relationship is so incredibly honest and trusting as a result of this.
9. Shared Vision
The ideal relationship is one in which we are complements to each other – we each bring unique experiences, viewpoints and desires to our shared relationship.
The best relationships are ones in which a ‘Shared Vision’ grows. This Vision might include a homestead which nourishes both people and fosters greater depth in the relationship. A philanthropic project which gives both people – together – an experience of deep sharing with others. A company or business which is a vehicle for both people to share their passionate attributes. A hobby or travel destination which inspires both people and supports them to grow deeper in their love.
A Shared Vision can be anything. It is simply this – a desire which both people share to create something meaningful together.
This ‘Shared Vision’ becomes a magnet which draws both people deeper into themselves and simultaneously closer together. It brings out the best in them.
This ‘Shared Vision’ – just like the relationship itself – develops a life of its own. This … is what makes a relationship so magnificent.
10. Love, Tenderness, and Laughter
No matter how robust two people are. No matter how athletic they are. No matter how much worldly responsibility they share. … It is vital that Tenderness and Laughter be given a room in every relationship.
Love is borne of Tenderness and Laughter. Like play, it is in this energy field that we let down our guards, soften our underbellies, and expose our most precious elements to our partner.
Taking vacations together is one of the best – and easiest – ways to access Tenderness and Laughter.
It’s essential, too, to create the space / time for Tenderness and Laughter in our day-to-day at-home lives.
A simple way to ensure its presence is to hold an intention to find at least one moment in every day to say a genuine “I Love You” to your partner. Not a rote one – words that are hollow. A genuine one. This may require you to slow down, let go of judgment and blame, and listen to them deeply.
What drew you to your partner initially? Is that quality or attribute still there? What has blossomed since you met? What is special or unique about them?
Your not perceiving their greatest assets is not because they don’t have them. It may simply be that you’ve become – temporarily – preoccupied with your own pain or frustration to notice them.
Slow down. Take a deep breath. And remember what you love most about your partner. Then say … “I love you” … from the depth of your belly, and the fullness of your heart.
… And notice how your relationship deepens and widens … how much more bliss flows in.
11. Be In the Now
Most relationships crumble because one or both partners become snagged in the past. Blame, un-communicated challenges, and resentment are the primary causes of this.
If your relationship breaks down, it will likely be that one of these three have existed.
If you have chosen your partner as someone whom you can Respect, Play with, be an Ally in Growth with, Share a Vision with, and Trust, then your relationship will last blissfully long – as long as you both are growing concurrently.
All relationships end. They naturally end when the benefit of our being together has run its full course.
Most relationships end ‘unnecessarily’. They end because one or both people built up resentment rather than taking responsibility for communicating something that was irritating them. Or they end because one or both people weren’t Self Loving and therefore weren’t open to truly giving and receiving love.
Your relationship blossoming into one of unparalleled bliss is completely within your ability.
Take a deep breath.
Go back to when you first met. Skip forward in time, picking up everything about your partner and about being together that still nourishes you. And let everything else go.
This is who you are as a relationship now. Nothing else matters. Drop it.
Be the love and joy and appreciation that you are now.
Practice this regularly – every six months at least.
This will ‘refresh’ your relationship – just like cleaning a chalk board or refreshing your computer screen.
Your relationship is so precious. Practice this frequently. Keep training your mind to experience your relationship In The Now.
© 2008 Ariole K. Alei, Co-Founder of Veraxis Coaching and Training, ArioleAlei
Email your Questions to colin@veraxis.net
Subject: Relationship Questions.