Relationship Truths

More from Renat­ta Paries’ What It Takes

This week I pon­dered the many lessons and con­cepts my clients and I have learned dur­ing my coach­ing career. Before long, I had com­piled a use­ful list of impor­tant and valu­able rela­tion­ship truths. If you apply any one of these truths, you are cer­tain to see an imme­di­ate improve­ment in the qual­i­ty of your rela­tion­ships. Please take what applies to you and incor­po­rate it into your life to cre­ate a rela­tion­ship you cherish. 

• It’s your job to edu­cate your part­ner about how to treat you so you feel loved.
• Com­mu­ni­ca­tion does­n’t mean talk­ing. It means sharing.
• Infi­deli­ty is the surest way to destroy a relationship.
• Gen­eros­i­ty is rarely about mon­ey or things. It’s most­ly about heart.
• Until you resolve your past, you are not free to have a future.
• What peo­ple do to you is rarely about you and is almost always about their unre­solved past. Don’t take it personally.
• Until you real­ize that a great rela­tion­ship is cre­at­ed by who you are, you won’t have one.
• Until you love your­self enough to take care of your needs, no one else will.
• If you feel emp­ty, a rela­tion­ship will most like­ly make you feel even emptier.
• Com­pas­sion for your part­ner goes a long way in get­ting what you want.
• Sex­u­al inti­ma­cy has very lit­tle to do with attrac­tive­ness and every­thing to do with emo­tion­al inti­ma­cy and trust.
• Women rarely appre­ci­ate mon­ey and assis­tance as a sub­sti­tute for emo­tion­al intimacy.
• If your part­ner con­tin­u­ous­ly says, “There is noth­ing wrong with me. Our prob­lems are all your fault,” get help.
• This is not a dress rehearsal—this is your life and your rela­tion­ships in progress. Start cre­at­ing your life the way you want it to be today.
• You are not your par­ents. There is no rea­son your rela­tion­ship or life should look like theirs.
• It’s much eas­i­er to be your­self than to be what you think oth­ers want you to be.
• Even when some­one loves you more than life itself, they will still look out for their inter­ests first.
• Being a peo­ple-pleas­er is not an effec­tive way to cre­ate good rela­tion­ships. It is an effec­tive way to get tak­en advan­tage of.
• If you always take care of some­one, you take away their pow­er. They will resent you for it.
• Sup­port­ing men finan­cial­ly takes away their self-esteem. Give them moral sup­port instead.
• The best rela­tion­ships are partnerships.
• If you get to be right most of the time and make your part­ner take all of the blame, you will end up alone.
• A rela­tion­ship with a foun­da­tion of dis­hon­esty is like a house of cards.
• Grass only looks green­er on the oth­er side.
• You may secret­ly won­der if there isn’t a bet­ter part­ner out there. This is your mind’s way of com­mu­ni­cat­ing that you are dan­ger­ous­ly close to real inti­ma­cy with your cur­rent partner.
• If your part­ner says he is will­ing to grow and change, don’t test him. Sup­port him in his commitment.
• Emo­tion­al matu­ri­ty is know­ing when you are over­re­act­ing. Stop and take care of your needs so you can get back in balance.
• What you think you want is often not what you real­ly want, but rather a side­ways plot to get your needs met.
• If you ask, very often you will receive.
• Com­mu­ni­ca­tion means two-way under­stand­ing, not one-way accusing.

© Rinat­ta Paries, 1998–2002.