How to have a good relationship

Having a good relationship is something we all desire and is not easy to get. Why is it so hard to get and what can we do to improve our possibilities of having such a relationship?
We all come into our adult relationships with a lot of baggage from our childhoods. We have hopes and dreams for our own lives and we want to be loved, understood, and supported by the person we are closest to, usually our life partner. But, things get in the way of that happening. We feel our partner does not understand us or we feel we can’t ask for what we want or we feel scared of asking or fearful about rejection, etc. Sometimes, we just want our partner to understand what we want without our saying anything! And, when they don’t do what we want we may feel very disappointed.
The baggage from our childhood has a lot to do with things not going well in our adult lives. If we wanted our mother or father to understand us or to empathize with us about things that happened to us when we were children and they didn’t, we are left with a hunger for someone to really be there for us in the present. Often, we hope that someone will know what we want without us having to say what it is that we want. For relationships to go well, we need to learn is to speak up on our own behalf, no matter how embarrassing that might be.
For example…One Sunday, I woke up with my mind filled with emails I needed to write and other things I needed to do. It was obvious that my husband wanted me to stay in bed with him. I struggled with what to do in this situation. The “good girl” inside of me is still strong and made me think that I should stay in bed with him. But, my own personal truth was that I wanted to do some work. I noticed how tight my body was. Tight with the restriction I was putting on myself. Noticing this, I said to my husband that I wanted to get some work down. To my surprise, he supported me taking care of my work. The great ending to this story is that after I had completed some work, I felt so relieved and happy that I was able to go back to bad and snuggle with my husband for a while, which made both of us happy.
By taking the risk of displeasing my husband to take care of my own needs, I changed our dynamic. Learning to speak up on one’s behalf is an important skill for a successful marriage.
And, for a marriage to work, another important skill to learn is to listen to our partners and really hear what they are saying. When there are lots of problems of communication in a marriage, it is helpful to turn to a marriage counselor for help.