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What Does A Healthy Relationship Look Like?

A healthy relationship is one where it is safe to tell the truth. It is safe because neither of us hold the other one responsible for our own personal happiness or success. Therefore we don't feel easily insulted or threatened by what the other one thinks or does, by their opinions or choices.

In a healthy relationship, we feel at ease; we trust that our partner not only accepts us as we are, but we trust them to take complete responsibility for their own thoughts and feelings.

Because neither of us holds the other one responsible for our happiness/unhappiness, we are not easily irritable or critical towards the other. We treat each other with the same respect we have come to give ourselves. Rather than on insisting we be always right, we opt for harmony & peace between us. We focus more on what is right about our relationship and less on how unjustly we've been treated because we know that what we focus on increases.

When we release each other from the responsibility of “making us happy” (an impossible job) we take fewer things personally. We are not so quick to judge them harshly and more apt to follow our judgments in to where we've judged ourselves similarly.

We speak our thoughts and opinions openly, without hesitation, and without insisting that our partner agree. Instead we are able to appreciate the spice our differences bring to the relationship.

We are able to comfortably allow our partner to be the individual they are, distinct and separate from us. We see them as someone who has consented to live their life alongside of ours, not joined at the hip to us, and we are far too involved in our own life to have the time or desire to try and monitor and control theirs.

Instead we see our role in their life as that of empathetic listener and staunch supporter of what they decide is best for them rather than as someone who plans and decides their next move.

Therefore we revel in each others company; we laugh easily together, we talk openly and frankly, we support each other in the things we each love, but do not hesitate to take care of ourselves, for instance, by taking space when we need to introspect, rest or explore our own interests.

Our greatest desire for our partner is not that they meet our needs adequately, but that they meet their own fully, because we know that when we both do that the relationship flourishes.

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