Keeping romance and love alive in a relationship is a challenge for most couples. Instead, many couples get caught in a vicious cycle of guilt, estrangement, and disappointment. The traits of the couple that had been so endearing at the beginning of their relationship are forgotten. However, all is not lost. With commitment and good will, both of you can learn the skills necessary to get your relationship back on track.
Attachment is considered innate in the matrix of our mammalian brain to ensure the survival of human beings. It is impossible for us NOT to join. If we have no one to cling to, we will feel unhappy or even sick. Therefore, it makes sense that the most stressful event in anyone’s life is the loss of a loved one, whether this loss occurs through illness, separation, divorce, or death. The grievance for breaking the bond of attachment and for being left behind is enormous. This is often expressed through feelings of depression, anger, frustration, sadness, hurt, despair, guilt, and shame at having failed.
Most people strongly guard against these painful feelings. The way they protect themselves is by falling asleep, withdrawing, eating, drinking, working or exercising excessively. Therefore, when attachment bonds, such as marriage, friendship, or other close relationships, are disrupted and threatened, a myriad of conflicting emotions can be experienced.
It is crucial that partners in such a relationship address their ‘discomfort’ immediately to ensure that their bond remains secure. If that doesn’t happen, or the relationship issues are only partially addressed and not resolved, a ‘grudge savings account’ is opened, from which both parties take withdrawals during subsequent conflicts.
Although most people long for love and a partner who gives them a sense of belonging, security, and purpose, it’s surprising how many people confess how much they protect themselves from love. The most mentioned fear is the fear of being rejected, abandoned, ridiculed, hurt or exploited. Many people are afraid of putting themselves in a position of vulnerability and closely guard their hearts. Fear of love can even be so pervasive that people convincingly tell themselves that they don’t need love.
Because we are wired to connect with others, form social connections, and be part of social networks, longing for and at the same time being afraid of love is a dilemma that people commonly face. Therefore, people need help not only when they are overwhelmed by pain or adversity, but also when they find love. Some relationships go through years of destructive cycles of criticism, complaining, attacking, violence, defensiveness, and withdrawal, as well as blockage, withholding, and avoidance. Often, one of the partners feels that she is right and fosters the fantasy that everything would work out “if only he saw things my way.”
However, a relationship based on “my way” is a dictatorship and as such is doomed to fail. Relationships can only work if they develop “our way”, and both partners have to work hard for it. Developing “our way” and having a successful relationship has to be based on connecting rather than being right. Finding “OUR WAY” requires both partners to agree to some rules and learn some useful communication skills.
1. Step: agree on the ground rules
Helpful ground rules are: use ‘I’ statements, actively listen, respect other’s differences, don’t threaten withdrawal in any way, stay on target, never be abusive, stay in the present (at the moment I feel that never want to see you again), agree on a time-out signal, do something nice in the middle of the fight, don’t compromise but be flexible, accept the present and forget the past, remember that the point of fighting is to improve closeness!
2. Step: take stock
To figure out how to restore/improve your relationship, you need to be aware of what’s wrong. Equally, if not more importantly, it is the foundation of your relationship, that means the good of it. What are the pillars on which your relationship rests and what is the foundation on which you could build?
Step 3: Create a Relationship Vision
In order to be clear about what you want to work on, you will need to have a vision, a goal in mind for your relationship. It is not enough to say “My relationship is not good.” It is much more important to say “how do you want your relationship to be different”. This will give direction to your efforts and make it clear to your partner what you want. For example, in a restaurant you would order “spaghetti with salad”. The waiter wouldn’t know what to bring if your request was “I don’t want pizza or salad.”
4. Step: Know yourself
Now we’ll take a look back at your formative years and explore the experiences that shaped you into the person you are. Understanding yourself is probably the most important ingredient in having successful relationships.
Step 5: Understand your partner
Understanding your partner is an important part of effective communication in relationships. Only when you can see her partner for who he or she really is, without projecting any of her past experiences onto him or her, will your relationship be successful.
6. Dealing with relationship angst
Each couple over time creates a certain dynamic through which they repeatedly recreate anguish. This distress is caused by dysfunctional patterns in how couples work through stressful problems or avoid intimacy.
7. Improve your communication skills
The core of good communication skills in relationships is active listening. By using active listening skills you ensure that you really understand what your partner is saying. People often don’t listen. Either they don’t pay attention to what the other person is saying, or they think they know what the other person “really” means. It is also important to be aware of your body language. Are you open and welcoming, or closed and distant? It is also very effective to make an “I” statement. It enhances intimacy and ensures clean communication.
8. Conflict management
No matter how close the partners are, there will be a time when conflict enters the relationship. This happens even with the best matched partners. This has to do with the different needs and the different levels of awareness that each partner has at any given time. A powerful strategy for managing conflict is ‘connecting dialogue’, a non-violent communication strategy. It involves 1. describing the problem you see in nonjudgmental language, 2. expressing how you feel about it, 3. stating what you need instead, and 4. telling your partner in specific terms what behavior you would see instead.
9. Avoid Conflict Amplifiers
There are a number of things to avoid in successful communication. They are: oppose, be right, blame, collect complaints, daydream, deflect, fight dirty, generalize, give advice, judge, read minds, sarcasm, and placate.
10. Finding the way back to love
To prevent the relationship from becoming dull and deteriorating, both partners need to continually inject new life, new ideas, and new pleasures into the partnership or marriage. It’s about having regular times during each day where you and your partner commit to doing ‘relationship work’ i.e. show your partner that you appreciate them, share something from your daily life, show interest in your partner Share your wishes, hopes and dreams with your partner. You can keep the romance going in your relationship by surprising your partner with a romantic date or an exciting outing. Avoid having only routines.
