Good relationships can make a huge difference in your quality of life. Everyone wants to have friends and loved ones that they can call on when they need support, or share good news and enjoyable life experiences. If you’re looking to find new relationships or improve the ones you already have, here are a few tips to create meaningful and healthy relationships that last.
Be Happy
Find happiness within yourself. Don’t look at someone outside of you to fill any voids. This would just put a strain on the relationship and cause problems. Be positive and send out a good vibration and you will attract other happy and positive people to you. They will be drawn to your mood and upbeat attitude and want to be part of your circle.
Work Together
Good relationships are built on spending quality time together. An excellent way to get to know someone is to explore each other’s interests. Introduce the people in your life to the things that are most important to you and be open-minded to learning more about what they love.
You should also learn to work together to fix any problems, from the simple to the complex. When you start to do this you can reform your relationship and build a stronger bond instead of being at odds and devolving into an argument. Start small and soon a household issue, or home repairs like solar panel hail damage, will be an opportunity to show your strengths and work as a team, instead of becoming the source of an argument.
Value Honesty and Trust
You want the people you spend time with to be trustworthy and honest in your conversations and interactions. When you value these qualities you should practice them yourself and expect your friends and family members to do the same. You can accomplish this by communicating effectively and building a solid foundation together.
Enforce Boundaries
Every relationship will have times of trial, but in order to keep your relationship healthy, you need to set boundaries and make sure you stick to them. If someone is crossing your boundaries by demanding too much of you or treating you badly, then you need to stand up for yourself. Make an effort to resolve the situation, but if someone repeatedly crosses your boundaries and takes advantage of you, then you need to recognize when a relationship can be fixed, how much effort you’re willing to put forth, and when you need to end the relationship and move on.
Learn To Listen
One of the most important aspects of growing meaningful and healthy relationships is learning to listen and be empathetic to the other person. Be present in your conversations. Put down your phone and don’t give in to other distractions. Give them your full attention as you will expect them to give you the same in return.
Make an Effort
If you want your friends to show up for you, then you have to show up for them. Your relationships should be an equal give-and-take, which means you need to initiate conversations and requests to do things together and respond to the invitations that are extended to you. Be dependable and someone to count on. When you make an effort to nurture your relationship, they will thrive and evolve into something wonderful for both of you.
Show Your Genuine Self
You can’t make a truly meaningful connection if you hide who you really are. With the people who are most important to you, you should be able to show your true self flaws and all. No one is perfect, so it’s important that you recognize this and are comfortable in your own skin.
When you become a little more aware of your actions and behaviors, you can start to make small changes and add in some behaviors that will help you to build healthy and wonderfully deep relationships. Take a look at the current bonds you have and see if there’s anything that you could do better. Now that you’ve read these tips, you have some good starting places to look into and use as a jumping-off point to start a conversation and better interactions.