Four Qualities All Successful Relationships Share

An intimate relationship is so much more than just having someone to keep us company. Romantic love is a renewing force that brightens our days and, on more than one occasion, allows us to settle our debts with those darker experiences in our lives. A healthy relationship helps us grow. It strengthens our body and mind and allows us to become more than we are. We stop feeling like solitary wolves traversing an uncertain path.

Building a healthy relationship has more to do with making the effort than with being lucky. While each individual relationship is different, in any strong relationship, you’ll find the following four characteristics:

Trust

Trusting someone means that you know this person, you believe that they know you and you know that they would never do anything intentional to hurt you. You feel like this is someone who is at your side and with whom you can share what you think and feel without walking on eggshells.

Can this really be achieved in a romantic relationship? Of course! Trust is formed when the two people involved in a relationship establish a pact of mutual support that doesn’t involve perfection, but the choice to recognize the errors and correct them.

Strong communication

Communication involves a process where each person involved is honest about how they think and feel and will verbalize it in the best way possible. At the same time, both people are also opening up their minds and hearts so that they can hear what the other person has to say.

When this level of communication is achieved, the relationship enters into an intimate area shared between two human beings. However, this isn’t something that can be achieved overnight. A lot of effort has to be invested, but the results are more than worth the wait.

Tolerance

Being tolerant is not the same as giving up, nor is it repressing negative feelings. It represents a much more elevated virtue that actually refers to the ability to accept the other person as they are, without trying to change them. You decide whether or not you love who they are.

You can’t say you love the person while trying to change them so that they better fit your desires and expectations. Building a healthy relationship means accepting that person and feeling accepted by them in return, faults and all.

Respect

The word “respect” is repeated throughout our lives, however, we don’t always stop to think about what it really means. Respecting someone means seeing them as an honorable person. This means valuing their virtues, abilities, ideas and dreams. It doesn’t mean doing something that would diminish, offend or harm them. It means having the good intention to search for everything that benefits your partner.

There is no such thing as a perfect relationship, however, accepting the imperfections becomes an important form of emotional support in our lives. The two people involved in the relationship depend on this bond to either encourage growth.