(continued from last week…)

Relationship communication tip number two is that we need to put our friendship before our loveship. Friends put each other first while those who often times have love relationships or sexual relationships sometimes develop those without really developing a true friendship first. So when we take the time to slow down and be a friend to the other person, it deepens the relationship and allows us to have even a more fulfilling experience of that relationship.

Do unto others as you would have people do unto you is sage advice. So is do unto others as they would like to be done unto. You treat your friends the way they want to be treated. You take good care of them. You share with them.

Quite often, when involved in a relationship and focused on ones’ own wants and needs, they forget to care about that other person as an individual. Why? Because it’s about them, what they get, what they want, what they think. We need to slow down so that we’re considering the other person and what they really want and need–not just ourselves.

The other person is not an opponent. They are a connection. They’re an individual; they are a communication partner, and with that person that we have a relationship with, as we play this game of love and caring communication, we need to be friends. We need to treat them how we would treat friends.

And you need to remember that there are times when you’re not going to agree, when things are not going to work out the way you had hoped. You need to remember to be a friend to that person throughout the process.

They may compete to get their own needs met and when that’s happening, we need to slow down, be more conscious, be more thoughtful, don’t just react but to think about why is that person behaving the way they are. This must be important to them and is it important to me and if so, what can we do to make it so we both get some of what we need.

Those couples who put friendship with each other first create very fulfilling relationships. This doesn’t mean putting your partner’s needs before your own. It does mean putting your partner’s needs as an individual before the needs of the relationship. You’ve got to help them get what they need. You need to be supportive of them and where they want to go.

You need to communicate well enough that you’re each looking at and thinking about what the other person desires, needs, and wants to help them feel good about being with you and having a friendship and lovership with you. Friends not only love each other but they genuinely like and accept each other. They communicate. Their personalities thrive and match.

Lovers sometimes, on the other hand, want to change or improve the other to fit within their own needs so they can get gratification in their own way. There are times that may be appropriate, but most of the time we have to slow down enough to let that other person get what they need.

Couples that are true friends usually stay deep friends long, long, into the relationship because the friendship is much more than just getting what they want.

They acknowledge the coupleship. They acknowledge their communications. They deal with each other in kind and helpful ways. They trust one another. They want the other person to have a fulfilling relationship and they do what they can to help provide that.

When you have a very true friendship, instead of just going to the other person’s place and trying to help or advise them as to what they should do, you two can work to help each other gain what you need. You turn to the other person for advice. You listen to their counsel and you give counsel freely and they listen to you.

If you and a good friend are working together on a project and you have a disagreement, you wouldn’t let that disagreement come between you would you? Instead you’d work together as a team to find a solution. The problem is outside of your friendship. It can’t ruin the friendship. You listen. You compare. You take counsel.

Don’t let your relationship at an intimate level put a wedge between you as friends with those people that are important to you and especially in your primary relationship. The fire of true friendship remains through anything and it enhances and makes even better the spark of romance and love you share with the person most important to you.

(to be continued…)

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