Written by Justin Osborn

Guest Contributor

 

Relationships are a big part of our lives. We’re born into a family, we grow up having friends and coworkers, and, eventually, we may fall in love. Our existence as humans is defined by the relationships we have or had. We all have parents, so most of us grow up in a parental relationship. 

Of course, not all relationships we have are good or healthy. There are many toxic relationships. And that’s mostly because we don’t know what a healthy relationship looks like.

Sometimes, it’s all about what kind of flaws you’re able to accept and the compromises you are willing to make. But certain crucial aspects are required if you desire a healthy relationship.

Honesty

Honesty is mandatory when it comes to healthy relationships. Even if the truth can be hard to swallow most of the time, it’s crucial to say it. If you consider that you can’t face the truth, you should take more time to accept it – lying will never be a good option.

If you start a relationship with a lie, maybe you’ll never gain that person’s trust ever again, and you’ll never know if the one you like will ever love you for who you are, so it’s not worth it. 

But, most importantly, you have to be honest with yourself, because if you lie to yourself implicitly, you’ll lie to your partner. Lies are the root of many toxic relationships.

Trust & Loyalty

Honesty is also mandatory for creating trust between the two of you since no one trusts a liar. Again, to develop a trustworthy relationship, you have to trust yourself first. 

If you have trust issues, you’ll have to deal with them before you venture into a new relationship. Otherwise, if you bring your problems right into it eventually, you’ll hurt someone you care about.

If you don’t trust each other, toxic feelings like jealousy and envy will rule your relationship and turn it into a nightmare. Trust yourself and your partner, and never doubt each other. Unless, of course, they have given you a legitimate reason. 

Moreover, trust depends on loyalty; you can’t trust someone who isn’t able to be loyal, who says they love you but is sleeping with other people behind your back too – that’s not love. You have to be faithful and honest to trust each other genuinely. Relationship means commitment, after all.

Communication

Nothing perfect, legal, healthy, and prosperous can be achieved without proper communication. Not in the business world and not in your private life. I mean, how many mixed-up stories you heard about yourself because of poor communication?

One day you relate something to someone, and the next day you find out things about you that you never knew before. And precisely the same happens in many relationships. 

If you communicate poorly, you leave a lot of space for meaning, tone, gestures, and even text interpretations, which most of the time lead to conflicts because you misunderstand each other.

Independence

Dependence of any sort is neither good nor healthy. So, why to depend on someone isn’t called yet one of the biggest reasons why relationships don’t work? Independence is mandatory for a healthy relationship because at the end of the day and life when we close our eyes, all we have is ourselves.

Therefore, you should have your own life. You should focus on yourself – on becoming a better version of yourself – and only then on the relationship. If you are not at a good place and you always put your needs on hold for someone else, how can you have a healthy relationship?

Respect

Name one healthy relationship which is not based on respect, and I can guarantee you that it’s all a façade that can be easily spotted if you pay attention. If you don’t respect your partner’s decisions and opinions, and you do whatever you like despite how you make your partner feel, how you can even name each other partners? 

Equality

If you don’t believe that your lover is at least your equal, why are you even with that person if you consider them way below you? Relationships are all about equality and equity. Even if you are better at something, remember that your lover can do things that you never will. 

Which is O.K.; you complete each other, and you make a great team together. There’s no need to make one of you the boss.

Responsibility

No relationships are perfect, so don’t expect yours to be. But what matters the most when you have a disagreement is to be mature enough to take responsibility for your actions; no one fights without reason. Both of you are responsible for what happened, though sometimes one party is more at fault than the other. 

Compassion

Compassion can play a significant role in a relationship as it acts like the glue that will make the relationship stick forever. After all, it is not about the problems that appear in a relationship; it is about how you overcome them together. 

To have compassion means to have deep care, understanding, and the desire to help to overcome your partner’s struggles – to genuinely support your partner in hard times. Therefore, there’s nothing healthier than being compassionate lovers, since you’ll be able to make it work no matter how dark the days turn.

Conclusion

We all want to be in a relationship, if not in a romantic way, then at least in a platonic way because we could all use a friend sometimes. But if that relationship isn’t healthy and you can’t make it so, there shouldn’t be a relationship because you’ll only harm each other. 

Relationships are about love and compassion, and if you don’t treat it accordingly, it can turn into something toxic.

Not everyone we like is a match for us, and that’s O.K. because you should wait until you find someone you can build a healthy relationship with. Remember that even the healthiest relationships can have their downs and turn into something toxic, but it’s all about how you manage to overcome it; real love endures even in the darkest times.

Justin Osborne is a writer at A-writer.com and Assignment Masters service, he loves to share his thoughts and opinions about education, writing and blogging with other people on different blogs and forums. Currently, he is working as a content marketer at top essay writing service review. This article is neither sponsored nor paid and any views or services expressed in it are by the author and not those of the Stony Brook Independent.