5 Secrets to Make 2016 Your Best Relationship Year :)

I want you to have a very wonderful 2016, especially when it comes to your romantic relationship.

If you are single, I want to help you make this the year you attract your right mate.

If you are already in a relationship or marriage, I want to help you make your relationship strong and solid, filled with love and satisfaction for both you and your partner.

If you must let go of your relationship this year, I want you to be able to let go with the minimum amount of pain, recover well and start on the road to creating the relationship you want.

To start your year of in the direction of healthy, wonderful romantic relationship, here are 5 secrets to making 2016 Your Best Relationship Year. Use these and start your 2016 off right!5 Secrets to Making 2016 Your Best Relationship Year

1.    Become relationship smart.
The best thing you can do for yourself in 2016 is dedicate time to improving your relationship life. This does not just mean finding people to date if you are single, or working on your relationship if you have a partner. Creating a healthy, successful relationship takes something more.

I suggest you work on becoming relationship smart, meaning you become a person who understands yourself and others in relationships. To do this, first work on your relationship patterns. You can then closely examine the choices you habitually make in relationship situations, understand them and perhaps change them. You can learn more about what makes relationships healthy, and what to change in your relationship situation to make it work.

That’s a lot to learn, but it is absolutely doable. I work with my clients on this all the time and see them gain tremendous relationship wisdom often in as short as 3 months of coaching.

2.    Choose your support people wisely.
Whether you are single and seeking a new partner, or in a relationship or marriage and looking for support, choose wisely the people you surround yourself with, connect with and confide in. The people in your life matter to your emotional and mental well-being.

When you are the most vulnerable and raw, the wrong people can alter the course of your relationship and your life permanently. Well meaning friends can give you the wrong advice or make you doubt yourself, your judgement, and your capacity to make your relationship work. They can tell you to leave a partner you should hold on to, or tell you to hold on to a partner you should let go. The wrong people can tell you that a situation is your fault, when in fact you have done everything right. Or they can tell you that it’s not your fault, when in fact the responsibility is yours.

In these times of need, the right people can offer support and lift you up, helping you see clearly what you need to see, so that you are more able to create the relationship and life you want.

3. Consider the roles you expect your partner to play.
Not all your needs can be met in a relationship, because not all of your needs are relationship related. Yet, both men and women will often try to get their partner to fill all the important roles in their life. Many relationships struggle under this burden.

Here are examples of roles that certainly should not be pushed upon your relationship partner:

Your only best friend; your constant companion, your only support, your only social connection.

In many cases it’s hard to know if what you expect from your partner is healthy or unhealthy. You may want to get into a habit of examining what you need or want from your partner and questioning whether that particular need should be met in your relationship or in another way.

4. Relationships take work. Make sure it’s the right kind.
Relationships take work. But it should be the right kind of work, the kind that makes you grow and makes your life better. The work of a relationship should never be settling for less emotional connection than you want, or learning how to put up with a relationship that feels empty a lot of the time.

A good relationship should make you work through your insecurities because it is safe. It should make you work through your needs, because they are well taken care of. It should push you to grow emotionally and in your ability to open up and connect because your partner wants that from you. This kind of work is not easy, but it’s the kind of work that pays off for a lifetime.

5. Find good help.
Dating, relationships, marriage, or letting go of a relationship are difficult for most everyone. You don’t have to struggle through these relationship situations and transitions alone.

When you find good help, you will be able to find your way out of the forest of emotional and relationship confusion, with new skills that will serve you for a lifetime of healthy relationships.