Remember, in addition to this quick relationship advice blurb, you always have the option of professional marriage counseling and couples therapy. Not all problems must end in divorce if both partners are willing to push through it.
1. Your relationship worries cause more problems.
Worries exist to give form to our uneasiness; a feeling that arises when you feel that something is not right. The most important thing to note about worry and uneasiness is that both are based on how you –feel-. How one feel’s may not be 100% true or logical; thus the actions you might take to relieve or solve your worry may be damaging or illogical. In short, don’t try to solve relationship worries on your own or without having given good neutral thought upon them. If you try to prove or “expose” an answer, you will most likely be doing more harm than good unless you are 110% sure. Just quietly and calmly express your worries when you have some private time together and talk it through before taking action.
2. Whenever you get involved, things fall to pieces
Remember that trip to Disney World that the two of you planned, and then you cancelled at the last second without giving a concrete reason? How about something as simple as going out to dinner together with some friends and you cancelled or decided not to go because of excuse X or because you didn’t like person Y. Lets go even further… Making dinner between the two of you becomes a battlefield because there is no compromise on what to cook, or a constant argument breaks out and only one person ends up cooking or take-out eventually gets ordered. Whether it is a lack of willingness to compromise, negative outlook toward activities, or a general dislike of outside variables tied to your significant other…try to avoid being the puzzle piece that doesn’t fit unless you have a damn good reason for being rebellious.
3. You feel that you are trying too hard to make this work.
Relationships should never fall under the “Working to make this work” category… Even worse if you find yourself feeling that you are “Trying Too Hard” to make it work. If a relationship doesn’t work, it is either a problem with one of the persons, a problem with the environment, problem with the situation, or a problem with the couple themselves. “Trying Too Hard” usually has a negative effect on anything and everything whether it is the situation or the person; it has a high chance of alienating or falsely leading others and you are more likely to “burnout” or cut yourself far too short… Once again, compromise is a key player to successful relationships.
4. You don’t feel satisfied with your relationship and express it continually.
The Short: No one likes a constant complainer, especially for long-term concepts as sacred as a relationship and potentially, marriage.
The Long: If you do feel dissatisfied in your relationship, there are much better ways than to go about it than to undermine yourself via constant complaints or annoying others attached or associated to you. A serious “Relationship Talk”, (Although scary for both parties at first) generally goes well if both parties want to see this through or just straight up explain your position and feelings to your significant other but keep your calm. Be serious about it; crying, begging, yelling and any other outburst type of action forces attention away from your future situation and brings focus only to avoiding current shallow problem... and it’s generally a major turnoff/deal breaker for repairing or strengthening healthy relationships.
5. You aren’t satisfied with his/her gifts.
Gifts are one of the many signs of affection/friendship one can give to another. This one is more of a personal feeling than one that has a possible solution. One can feel negatively towards a $100 gift and also negatively towards a hand-me-down gift, no matter the cost or description of the item. There is also the possibility of maybe you aren’t good at receiving gifts or affection? The only time this should be of concern is if your partner is just giving you gifts without thinking about you. General rule of thumb is to be thankful of all gifts given to you, especially those that would do better in your possession than the giver. If your significant other is giving you a serious gift, it would do you well to think on it than to dismiss it quickly or negatively. Behaving negatively towards a positive action teaches to not do that positive action again… and you don’t want to do that.
6. You aren’t satisfied with her/her showings of affection.
Once again, this is more personal than something that has a possible solution, but that doesn’t make this feeling(or lack of) any less destructive towards a relationship. Everyone has different ways of showing affection; don’t count on it being the exact same way that you like receiving it. Some examples of affection involve food, massages, conversation, gifts, companionship, company, idea/ideal sharing, hugging, “farting contests”, gaming together, ass-slaps, singing together, wrestling, playfighting… anything! Looking at the (short) list above, it is possible for you and your partner to disagree on at least one of the above, but that doesn’t mean your relationship is doomed because there is an affection conflict. While it is possible to forcibly re-direct a person’s interest to deliver affection in a different way I would highly recommend against it. If there is something you dislike, let them know and then follow up by stating something you would like and work together to curb each-other that way.
7. Emotions generally sour when you get involved.
Sometimes you just bring an aura of negativity or social destruction with you everywhere you go. Sometimes it’s just being far too easy to insult or take offense. Sometimes it’s just your friends that need to watch what they say around you or your significant other needing to take caution around you to avoid your field of landmines… This is never good for anybody, especially for both friendships and relationships; where the fewer your landmines, the easier it can be for the two of you. Spend more time dancing together through each-other's problems than dancing around each-other's problems.
8. You don’t feel like doing anything for your significant other
Also known as “Burnout” or “Relationship Apathy/Complacency”, both can occur from negative or positive feelings successively. It is ok to have lulls, breaks or downtimes between activities with your significant other. Actually, it is vital that there is some downtime to avoid Burnout or Complacency… The flipside of this is to avoid there being so much downtime that you no longer feel like doing anything with them because you got comfortable not doing anything. And vice versa, doing too much to the point that you feel too tired to do things or they become common place and expected, thus dropping their significance. This number goes for both partners together and as individuals as well.
9. You feel dependent and constantly feel the need to be with him/her.
Now this one is a mixed bag because like #5 and #6 this can be a personal issue for someone whose personal feeling falls under this category. For some, a relationship means constantly being with that person and doing everything together. This can be misinterpreted as being “Needy”, “Clingy” or other similar words… Generally a negative; made doubly worse if your “Clinginess” stems from making sure you are keeping your significant other in line. Give some space to the two of you and go do something on your own or invite your significant other to whatever you’re doing and don’t feel bad if they decline… and don’t feel obligated to say yes to everything that they want to do either. Compromise!
10. You demand more attention while sharing interests.
Oh hey, another sign/reason that involves that C word again… Compromise! Ideally you would like to share interests and activities 50/50 with each-other. 40/60 is ok too, but when you are reaching into the 20/80s or one side constantly demands/suggests activities while declining their partner’s activities/ideas, things tend to slide downwards causing Apathy and Burnout. The gray area here involves a partner that doesn’t really have many interests to share or activities they would like to do, by which an 80/20 would be ok to do but do not demand they do anything… Always give them the choice of denying your activity and do not feel sad if they do unless it is something extremely important. (There is a major different between canceling dinner plans because you don’t feel like eating, and cancelling Disney World or a Cruise because you don’t feel like going.)
The greatest thing about relationship problems is that they can be worked out as long as both parties are willing to change. The keyword between solving all problems is Compromise and Understanding. A good luck to all.
If I've posted incorrect information or if you have a suggestion, please leave a comment below.
Don't Forget to like comment and share :)
ConversionConversion EmoticonEmoticon