Advice for Building Caring, Meaningful Relationships that Last

An engaging, secure love relationship can be an ongoing source of support and happiness. Good relationships strengthen all aspects of life: your health, your mind, and your work. However, if the relationship isn't supportive, it can be a tremendous drain. Relationships get better or worse depending on how much or how little we understand and invest in them. These tips can help keep a healthy relationship strong, or repair trust and love in a relationship on the rocks.

What do you expect from a relationship?

Curiously, how you felt about the people who cared for you as an infant may have shaped your expectations of love. If your caretaker was understanding and caring about what you needed, you trusted them and the emotions you felt for them. But if your caretaker was confused, frightened, or hurt you, your expectations of love may have become colored by these experiences. This relationship with your primary caretaker may also have made you feel uncomfortable with emotions–both your own and other people’s.

Most relationship advice comes from the observation of people who are in either very good relationships or bad relationships. People who want their relationship to be good are given advice such as to fight fair, avoid taking out their problems on their partner, and to expect ups and downs. This is good advice, but it doesn't take into consideration how negative early life experiences  shape many people’s view of love and relationships. To change this view, you need to understand why the experience of feeling loved is soIMPORTANT to your brain and nervous system as well as your heart.

Understanding love relationships

Human love has an evolutionary purpose.  When we experience feeling loved our brain and nervous system become more relaxed and efficient and we feel happier and are healthier. Feeling loved is nature's antidote to stress. There is no quicker or more effective way to override too much stress and upset than positive face-to-face communication with someone that makes us feel understood, safe, and valued.

Falling in love is often an experience that seems to just happen to us but preserving the “falling in love” experience takes commitment and effort. Given its rewards, though, it’s well worth the effort.