We’re always looking to make sure our relationships are good for us and for our loved ones, and this post is all about healthy relationship advice for you and your partner.
In an age where everyone and their mother has the “best” advice on what your relationship should like, it’s easy to forget that our relationships are allowed to grow and change as much as we do. The longer we’re with someone the more our connection with them might look different, and that’s terrifying.
For those of us with anxiety, it’s even harder. We tell ourselves our relationships are “just fine,” but we struggle when others tell us our relationship should look different. The bottom line is you might be in an abusive relationship as you read this, and I’d have no idea.
But, if you’re one of those people who is happy and healthy with a partner who is also happy and healthy, this post will remind you that the most important part of any healthy relationship is making it work for both you and your partner.
This post is all about healthy relationship advice to help keep you and your relationships on track.
BEST HEALTHY RELATIONSHIP ADVICE:
1. Communicate with your partner
Communication is the foundation of every healthy relationship. From day one, you want to establish a clear, open line of communication with your partner because only through communication can all other problems be solved.
Everyone needs to feel heard by their partner because being heard and seen are the most basic needs of any person. Sure, you don’t have to be heard and seen to live, but, when we’re talking healthy relationships that add to the quality of life, we’re certainly talking beyond fundamental needs.
Therefore, we need to focus on building healthy communication with our partners. All problems that arise in relationships can be fixed through communication.
Now, I won’t lie and say the outcome of every conversation will leave both parties happy or still in a relationship. But, open communication, no matter how uncomfortable, keeps resentment from forming.
Bringing issues into the open is the most important part of any relationship because they are constantly evolving. It’s natural for people to grow out of certain habits they used to have so that they need to reevaluate a relationship.
Communication keeps these kinds of feelings and discomfort out in the open to make sure the relationship evolves with the people instead of making people miserable.
To make sure you have a great, open communication with your partner, consider telling them something that might upset them. Maybe you wrecked their car, need to cancel an important plan, or want to consider ending the relationship.
Each of those scenarios probably make your stomach turn, which is normal and expected. And yet, you should feel little to no apprehension about talking those issues over with your partner because trust (or can work on) your communication.
2. Spend quality time with your partner
Whether you live with your partner or have a long-distance partner, you need to make special time for them. Chances are, if you are in a long-distance relationship, you already understand the importance of making time.
The busier you get, the less time will just happen to pop up. Especially if your life is changing because of jobs, moves, or kids. Be intentional about planning time for you and your partner to spend together.
Quality time can be as simple as you watching a show with only them. It can be a little more extravagant if you want to plan out a date in advance and get an experience for the both of you to complete together (I personally love the idea of a pasta-making class).
While everyone can have a different love language, quality time is still a hallmark of healthy relationships. What’s even better? Setting the intention to spend quality time together.
From, creating a calendar invite on your phone to texting your partner that the two of you are watching a show from 7-8pm tonight, you’ll be surprised by how romantic planning out quality time can be.
Always listen to your partner when they tell you what their needs are, but, when in doubt, spend time with them because there’s no substitute for time with your partner.
3. Be Comfortable with Alone Time
Everyone has a different take on this, and it might differ based on personality types. However, no matter what kind of relationship you’re in, you need to spend time with yourself.
The more complex part of this, and the one some will disagree with, is that your partner won’t meet all your needs even if you communicate them perfectly.
Part of doing the whole “relationship thing” is to know when your partner can meet your needs and when you need to find other ways of meeting your needs.
How much you enjoy alone time and how frequently you need to it to stay mentally healthy will change based on how much you like to be around people. Still, every relationship needs to have two people who like to be on their own as much as they like to be around their partner.
Being Alone is Important and Necessary
Whether you can stand being apart from your significant other or not, you have to recognize there will be situations in which being alone is necessary. The most basic examples are work, visiting with different friend groups, and having different interests.
There will be times when you or your partner needs to be alone, so you might as well be comfortable with it. If COVID has taught us anything, it’s that being alone can sometimes be instrumental for our mental health as much as feeling the love of our partner.
While your partner might fulfill many of your needs, you have to remember that you are your top priority. Only you will truly value yourself above others because you are the only person living your life.
Don’t be afraid to still spend time with yourself and let your partner spend time on their own because alone time is crucial to any health relationship. Remember: we need to spend as much time on ourselves and our wellbeing as we do with our relationship.
4. Work on yourself
Whether you’re single or not, you should never stop working on yourself. The bottom line is everyone has trauma and issues they need to work through because we’re humans, raised by humans, and humans are inherently fallible.
None of us really knows the right way to go about life, so we’re all trying our best. So, this is bound to leave us with trauma from when our parents or loved ones raised us the way they thought was best—no matter how much we agree with that.
Therefore, we all need to do the work of better understanding ourselves, how to become better, happier people, and how we can become better partners. To be clear, doing “the work” should be first and foremost about making you the happiest possible version of you.
When we’re in relationships, it’s natural to have those intentions bleed into the rest of our lives, especially because we want to be the best version of ourselves for the people we care about.
The more we learn about why we are they way we are and what our needs are, the more we can show up to our relationships. That’s why the best relationship advice is to keep working on yourself (or start working on yourself). Plus, we can use that great communication we’ve developed to be open about what we’re learning and how we can build a better relationship for the both of us.
5. Check your expectations
Take the social media and movies out of your relationship. We’ve all grown up watching shows and movies in which people have these incredible, unrealistic relationships.
While it’s totally fine to want the best for yourself and develop of an understanding of what healthy looks like, it’s also really important to keep unrealistic expectations out of very real relationships.
Clearly, unhealthy relationships exist and, without seeing other examples of good relationships, you might not know what to look for. In this case, it’s perfectly fine to look outside of your relationship for signs that you’re on the right track.
But, the catch is making sure you’re looking for red flags for the right reasons. You don’t want to search for problems that don’t exist in your relationship. Not to mention the amount of unhealthy relationships out there that make you think your relationship isn’t “good” enough.
Expectations can be good and they can come from a solid, useful place. But, they can also do a lot of harm if we let these dramatic shows and movies we’ve grown up with make us think there’s only one way for a relationship to be perfect.
