Life is all about relationships. We cannot exist without relationships. Between you and anyone, or anything, there is a relationship. Our relationships can be the source of our greatest happiness or of our greatest heartache and pain.

So here are a couple of questions for you:

What constitutes to happiness for you?

And how important are your personal and professional relationships to your happiness and success?

Successful, happy, and healthy people often have good relationships. We, as humans, rely on the quality of all our relationships to feel good, strong, happy, and successful.

A 75-year-long Harvard study on Happiness demonstrates that happiness and living a healthy long life are not about wealth, or fame, or working harder.

Good relationships keep us happier & healthier.

Relationships in which we feel lonely and unsupported are detrimental to our health. When we are in relationships with little affection or with toxic interactions, the stress and loneliness shorten our lives.

Living in the midst of good warm relationships, on the other hand, is protective, affects our physical pain positively, and also protect our brains from decline. Happy couples experience, for example, that their memories stay sharper for longer.

Creating a relationship is like preparing a great dish. There are certain basic ingredients that every relationship needs, and without those ingredients, you don’t have an edible dish or a relationship at all. On top of those components, there are other ingredients and spices which you can add to make a relationship better and to individualize it to taste and requirements.

Everybody has different criteria for what makes a happy or successful relationship. Some people are comfortable with a certain amount of friction, or even enjoy playful arguments, as they find them stimulating, other people strive for more harmony and less conflicts.

Relationships are complex, multi layered and always changing, evolving in one or the other direction. A constant re-evaluation of the situation and our level of happiness and satisfaction is useful in order to adjust our course of action and flow. Everyone has different interpretations or perceptions of actions, words or behaviour. We tend to draw quick conclusions and we always try to protect ourselves. As a result, we sometimes adopt destructive behaviours.

Communication is key. We use various styles of communication, verbal and non-verbal. We have not typically learned how to handle difficult emotional situations at school. Therefore, we have a lot to discover in regards to handling our emotions and interactions.

Communication always starts with us. We need to develop self-awareness around what our needs and our typical behaviours are in various situations.

What are our triggers?

What are our responses? Do we respond with defensiveness, empathy, compassion, love or by attacking?

Why?

What are our resources in short or long term relationships to apprehend change?

Are we able to be vulnerable, to listen carefully, to always wear our “love” or “appreciation” lenses?

Are we able to feel safe, to be vulnerable, authentic, empathetic, compassionate and are we able to apprehend difficult conversations with an open heart at all times?

Every work or personal relationship teaches us something about ourselves and gives us new insights.

We want to inspire you to develop a growth mindset for all your relationships, and to turn working on the relationship into something that can be fun and playful.

Contact us if you wish to know more about our customized programs.

We offer talks, presentations, individual coaching and workshops around the co-creation of successful, healthy and thriving relationships.