If you’re looking for a little guidance when it comes to love, you’ve come to the right place. The Cheat Sheet spoke with eight top relationship experts to get some of their best advice. So pull up a chair and read on for more.
1. Take it easy
The best relationship advice I’ve ever gotten, and that I give, is “easy does it.” Too often we get caught up in fear-based needs to control our partner. This pull becomes a destructive compulsion that corrodes the integrity of the relationship. It replaces respect and compassion with anger and resentment. It destroys the quality of our lives and over time, the relationship.
This advice impacted the way I approach romantic relationships in that I allowed for a lot more space, which in turn allowed for less reactivity, more peace, happiness, and respect. The classic struggle of all relationships is finding the right calculus in the togetherness-and-autonomy equation. Typically, when a relationship is under stress, one of the partners asks for physical space to break the tension. This is suboptimal. The best way to incorporate space is by being proactive and providing emotional rather than physical space. To do this, partners need to allow each other the space to be themselves and to have their experiences without trying to control the outcome or think that you are responsible for their lives and reaction. It’s hard work and takes practice, but the rewards are well worth the effort
2. Give 90%
My parents advised what they did in their own marriage: “both of you always think about giving 90% to your partner and you both will be very happy.” They meant it’s so important to think about how your partner is feeling, to stand in their shoes, to be giving and compromising, and emotionally generous. That 10% is for the understanding that sometimes it’s also OK to be a bit selfish, to place your needs first, or stand firm on something. They also made clear that this only works if you are both giving 90%
3. You are responsible for your own happiness
It’s not my partner’s job to make me happy. It’s my job to make me happy. Of course it’s easy to feel good when my partner is acting in a way that I want —but needing them to be a certain way in order for me to feel good —that’s bondage. Thinking that they’re always going to be in a good mood and directing their affectionate attention towards me — while that may be possible during the initial stage of a relationship, is impossible to sustain long-term. I’m responsible for my happiness. My partner is responsible for her happiness. We deliberately focus on things to feel good in our lives and for things to appreciate in one another.
4. Stop waiting and live your life
When I was single and stressed about finding love, my good friend, Scott, a confirmed bachelor, told me this. He said, “Lisa, you need to calm down, chill out, and stop expecting love to be here already. Your sense of entitlement is killing your ability to attract a good man.” When I realized he was right, I stopped waking up every day feeling angry that love hadn’t found me yet. I stopped being resentful that my friends were married and having lives that felt out of reach to me. I stopped feeling like my life was on hold. As cliché as it sounds, I stopped waiting and started living. Overnight, my outlook changed. My results changed, too. I started meeting men wherever I went. I went on dates, had fun, didn’t give my heart away foolishly, and met my husband. I knew he was The One when he told me, “I’ve always been too nice for the naughty girls and too naughty for the nice ones.” That had been my experience with men.
5. Love yourself
You can’t love anyone more than your willingness to love yourself. Through this advice I learned about the importance of caring for my mind, body, and spirit. I liken love to the oxygen mask on a plane. You have to apply it to yourself before applying it to the person next to you. This advice improved my chances of winning my wife’s hand in marriage. She was searching for true love. She wanted someone to spend the rest of her life with. Conveying to her that I loved myself signaled that I could be a pillar of strength and compassion.
