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You can love someone from a place of empathy and kindness even through difficult times. Some couples revel in empathy and kindness because their loving, intimate, and passionate relationship is unshakeable in good times and bad.
Other couples are strained and come and go with minimal intimate contact. They may share meals and the same home, but there is not much joy. Then there are the “in-between” couples who try to make do by being proactive in their relationships. If you’re in the last group, certain moments in your relationship show how your empathy and kindness help you thrive as a couple, even in the most difficult of times.
Here are four relationship moments that show how empathy and kindness help couples thrive through difficult times:
Relationship moment 1: Contribute to each other’s lives
How much time do you spend each day thinking about how to make your partner’s life more wonderful? Psychologist Will Meek, Ph.D., elaborated, “Companionship and belonging are our need to share our lives and have a sense of belonging, acceptance, and affiliation with others.
It’s a need to feel like we have someone on our team, and that we are meant to exist in the same space as them. When these needs are met, we usually feel contentment, warmth, and security. We understand that we have someone we can rely on, and that offers a sense of relief.”
Relationship moment 2. Consider their needs
What have been the most effective ways to put a smile on your partner’s face? Some partners keep doing what they think will work again and again, feeling confused when those strategies fail to work again and again. Others do what they want someone to do for them again, which lacks empathy and consideration. It just doesn’t work now, or when selecting a Christmas gift! When we consider the needs of our partner and carefully craft options to please them, the relationship must improve.
“Those couples who share the greatest degree of intimacy and fulfillment are not the ones who experience the least conflict or the fewest upsets, but are rather those who are the most willing to relate with both honesty and sensitivity,” suggested couples counselors Linda and Charlie Bloom. “They have developed good and effective communication skills and learned how to deal respectfully with the differences that inevitably arise in even the best relationships.”
Relationship moment 3: Don’t let resentment build
Passion is one “make it or break it” option for long-term relationships, but first, you need to get the other parts right. Desire is based in large part on trust and a feeling of safety in a long-term relationship. While passion for passion’s sake may be enough for a hot weekend, if you’re going to see that person month after month and year after year, you cannot afford to let resentment build. You will find yourself cut off and out in the cold, intimately and emotionally!
Life coach Susan Kulakowski explained, “Forgiving yourself and those you resent involves understanding that we’re all simply human. We misunderstand ourselves and each other more than we realize. Sometimes we unknowingly contribute to the circumstances we resent.”
Relationship moment 4: Face financial stress as a team
Finances are the other biggest challenge to long-term relationships. The financial pressure can either bring you closer together, you two against the world, or it can make one of you leave a sinking ship. Again, the biggest difference between the two groups is not the finances. It’s the empathetic connection between the partners, a skill that you must develop in yourself!
“Co-creating a budget allows you to work toward shared and individual goals,” advised life coach Ann Papayoti. “It empowers you both as you agree on fair divisions of debt and both become conscious of your spending to support the goals you have set together. Be sure you are both building individual credit, and if you choose to have a joint bank account for certain debt and expenditures, know the benefits of maintaining separate accounts as well.”
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This post was previously published on medium.com.
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Photo credit: Hoi An and Da Nang Photographer On Unsplash
