Finding Relationship Help

Perhaps this is the third time this week you’ve butted heads with your boss about how to load paper in the photocopier. Or maybe the thought of spending Sunday dinner at your parents’ place—and answering their pointed questions about your personal life—is sending you into paroxysms.

Of course, there’s no such thing as the perfect relationship: Even happy and healthy relationships contain some degree of struggle. But we can strive to improve the troubled relationships in our own lives—the key is to embrace the challenge and make an honest effort to understand the person with which we need to reconnect. Using tips from the experts, you can create a useful blueprint to help during your first 30 days of improving any relationship.

Stay Versus Walk Away

All troubled relationships aren’t created equally: Bickering with your spouse about an upturned toilet seat is a far cry from nursing yet another bruise after a physical altercation.

If you’re a victim of abuse, or are involved with someone with severe drug or alcohol addiction or violent, untreated mental illness, your focus should be on self-preservation. Please seek the outreach and self-help groups within your community that can assist you.

On the other hand, many weakened relationships of a non-violent and more stable nature are worth improving.

Placing Yourself Under a Microscope

Relationships are composed of two individuals with differing backgrounds, thoughts, beliefs and expectations. Presumably, each personality shares equal responsibility to make that connection; acknowledging this prevents you from blaming the other person or taking complete responsibility for the failure, or even success, of the relationship.

However, understanding others requires an honest understanding of ourselves, and most experts agree that self-examination—which often takes days and weeks—is the crucial first step in the process of improving relationships. For some, counseling is an excellent resource that aids in self-reflection.

Ernest* couldn’t understand why dysfunctional women kept entering his life. Then he realized all three of his failed marriages had one factor in common: him. “I felt horrible that I wasn’t the kind of person who could sustain a committed relationship,” says Ernest, who admitted his own degree of culpability after a period of reflection. “I had to finally admit that something in me needed fixing. I couldn’t blame the problems on them completely.”

Through counseling, Ernest discovered his unresolved anger towards his father and he spent several months working through his pent-up resentment. “Since the counseling and self-help work, all of my relationships have improved,” he explains. “I’m a better co-worker, a better father and a better friend.”

Once Ernest dove into a period of self-reflection, he created a vision for marriage—and is still married to wife number four.

Great Expectations

After soul searching, the next step is to examine what you’d like to receive from this relationship, as well as what isn’t working. What do you love about this relationship? How does it affirm you? What do you want to improve, and what do you need?

Discovering what you need can provide you with a general road map for relationship recovery. When he turned 18, Norm began to ask questions about his relationship with his father. “Where is this relationships going? Where do I want it to go? What things need to happen for it to end up where I want it?” Once he answered those questions for himself, he scheduled a time to meet with his father to develop a plan to improve their relationship.

During their conversation, Norm and his father discovered they didn’t want a traditional parent-child relationship. They decided to foster a man-to-man relationship. By communicating and defining the type of relationship they desired, Norm and his father experienced positive changes in their everyday interaction.

Connecting Through Communication

Practicing positive communication techniques during the first 30 days can help you see your “adversary” in a different light. When it comes to scheduling talk time, choose a time upon which you both can agree. “Often one person may be in the mood to clear the air, but the other may need some preparation or down time,” explains Brigitte Sumner, relationship expert, coach and author. Choosing a mutually agreeable time sets the mood for positive interaction.

During discussions, it’s important to resist the urge to object when the other person says something disagreeable or points out our flaws. “Stop before you object, take a deep breath and smile instead,” Sumner suggests. “Listen, listen, listen. And when you think you’ve listened enough, listen some more.”

It’s easy to react in anger and elevate the discussion to the status of argument when feelings are running hot. It’s important to follow some ground rules for communication: Don’t talk over each other, no name-calling and don’t put each other down.

Recalling past grievances is a common mistake when communicating, but it’s essential to resist lingering resentments and vendettas. You must decide that you won’t hold on to the anger any longer, in order to move forward.


Making the Connection

Soon after making the commitment to improve a relationship, you may encounter roadblocks. “There are certain facts of life that we cannot change, unavoidable ‘givens’ of human life and of relationships, especially,” says David Richo, author of The Five Things We Cannot Change and the Happiness We Find by Embracing Them. One of these five constants is that things do not always go according to plan.

You may be fully committed to change, but when the other person refuses to cooperate or compromise, the process becomes much more difficult. Experts concede that trying to improve a relationship with a resistant person is a difficult feat. “Many people only want to change if their partner changes, as well. That way it becomes bartering,” explains Sumner. “They are not prepared to change if their partner does not want to change first. It then becomes the proverbial chicken-and-egg situation.”

If your encounter resistance, you may feel frustration because your expectations are not being met. The expectation of immediate change is unrealistic. However, you may be surprised to find that even your most stubborn adversaries are willing to meet you in the middle.

Practice Makes Perfect

Everyone slips up. You may feel goofy fawning over your spouse. You may roll your eyes behind your boss’ back. You may snipe at your mother for prying into your love life. But when it comes to opening the lines of communication, a steadfast earnestness pays off.

Indeed, new methods of communication may seem odd at first, but they work over time. It may take more than 30 days to repair your relationship, but laying a stable foundation makes for future success.

* Names have been changed