As human beings, we crave connections with people. Therefore, we all want to know the “secrets” to great relationships to better connect with others.
But not every relationship is great or even easy. Maybe your neighbor is hard to get along with. Perhaps you’re disappointed with your friends or struggling with your relationship with a parent or siblings. Sometimes our marriages aren’t quite what we’d hoped they would be. Raising kids leaves us second-guessing our relationships and parenting skills, especially during those toddler and teenage years!
If you’re struggling with a difficult relationship or hoping to go from good to great relationships, I have five tips to apply today!
Let me be your guide as you learn how to apply these concepts in real life to see meaningful results in your relationships. Learn more HERE
- Remember that Relationships are Thoughts
One of the secrets to great relationships is to remember that relationships are thoughts. What does that mean? Our connection with others is based on our perception of them and how they perceive us—what’s going on in our heads. We can change any relationship in our lives, whether it’s with our spouse, friend, or acquaintance, simply by changing our thoughts about that person.
How many times do you have a differing opinion about someone else? Maybe your husband thinks the neighbor overly assertive, while you find her funny and charming. Or your teenage daughter adores her friend, while you have certain reservations about the pal. It’s common for two people to have very different opinions about someone—our relationships are based on thoughts.
Knowing that relationships are based on your perception and feelings makes it easier to cultivate better relationships in your life. If relationships are thoughts, and you can control your thoughts, you have the power to make any relationship anything you want—to shift your relationship, shift your thoughts!
Think of someone you’re having a tough time with right now. What are your thoughts about that person? Could you change your thinking, and would it give you a more positive outlook?
- Explore Your Expectation of Others
Oh, expectations! Our expectations can lead to disappointment and hurt without realizing why or how we got so crushed. We all have expectations of other people. It’s totally normal and a key part of great relationships.
We expect and trust that someone will act a certain way. When someone behaves the way we want (or expect), we like them. We also believe that if the person acts a certain way towards us, they like us too.
We expect our friends to laugh with us, return our calls, and schedule time with us. They expect the same. If one of us doesn’t meet those expectations—for instance, if we stop returning our friend’s calls—they will probably assume something’s wrong. After a time, they might feel we weren’t holding up our end of the friendship and would wonder if we still liked them.
Now, most of the time, our expectations are subconscious. When our expectations are met, they’re barely on our minds. Because we often don’t focus on them, we don’t regularly communicate our expectations to others.
We assume others “know” how they should act in a relationship. So we don’t express our needs or wants because we expect them to read us. Can we say a recipe for disaster?!
The truth is that our friends aren’t psychic. They can’t read our minds and don’t know our expectations. So if we want to have great relationships, we need to let others (our dates, our mom, our pals) know what we need from the connection.
- Get Real About Unconditional Love
Of all the emotions human beings like to feel, love is at the top! Love is the best! It feels good, safe, warm, comforting. When we’re loved and when we’re giving love, we feel accepted and happy.
Most of us hear about unconditional love. But what does it really mean to love unconditionally? It means we don’t feel hate or anger towards someone. We love them as a human being. We choose to feel love because it feels good to us.
At the same time, when we feel hatred, bitterness, or anger towards someone, the person we’re hurting the most is ourselves. There’s a saying that feeling angry towards someone is like taking poison and hoping someone else will die.
When I bring up the concept of unconditional love, people often think it means loving others’ actions, even if you don’t agree with those actions. But this is NOT unconditional love. Unconditional love is loving the PERSON, but we don’t need to love their behavior.
This divine love is the kind of love that Christ has for us. He loves us, but he doesn’t love everything we do. As Prophet Russel M. Nelson said, “Does this mean the Lord does not love the sinner? Of course not. Divine love is infinite and universal. The Savior loves both saints and sinners.” Just like parents don’t love every action of their kid but still love their kid, the Savior still loves us.
We can love ourselves and love someone else and still leave a relationship, and we don’t need to feel hate or even anger in the process. We can still have the joy and good feelings of love but from a distance. This leads to the next secret of great relationships…
- Set Healthy Boundaries
To understand healthy boundaries, let me tell you what healthy boundaries are not—they aren’t threats or manipulations. A healthy boundary is about what YOU will do. A threat is what you want someone else to do. Manipulation is making a threat to coerce someone to do what you want. It’s about trying to control or dictate the actions of another.
If you struggle with boundaries, it helps to remember that you can’t control other people. You can only control yourself. You have control over your actions and reactions, thoughts, and feelings. However, you don’t have control over what another person says, does, thinks, or feels.
So what does a healthy boundary look like in a great relationship? A healthy boundary is something you set as a consequence if someone violates you emotionally, physically, or verbally.
For example:
- If you manipulate me, I will leave the relationship.
- If you hit me, I will leave and call the police.
- If you say mean things to me, I will leave the room until we can talk calmly.
Sometimes it’s beneficial to tell another person about your boundary, and sometimes it isn’t necessary. The boundary is for you, not them. When a boundary is crossed, however, it’s always appropriate to tell the person.
For example, if my child takes money from my wallet, I consider it a boundary violation. If I don’t say anything and he keeps doing it, I would become upset and blame my child for those feelings. A healthy boundary means talking to my child about the situation, letting them know why I’m upset and providing a consequence.
“I don’t like it when you take money from my wallet without asking. If you do it again, I will ground you from your video games for a week.”
Healthy boundaries have four elements:
- They’re set with love for yourself and the other person.
- Boundaries are about what you will do.
- Boundaries must be communicated when violated.
- Consequences must be followed through no matter what.
Healthy boundaries are the foundation for strong relationships.
- Embrace Your Relationship with Yourself.
Now let’s talk about one of the most important relationships you have—your relationship with yourself. You can be your own best friend or your own worst enemy. So when you’re building great relationships with others, it can help to explore your relationship with yourself too.
How do you think about yourself, speak to yourself, and feel about yourself? Having a great relationship with yourself means committing to thinking better about yourself. It sounds easy, but really, it’s tricky. Our brains are wired to look for problems and solve them. Unfortunately, looking for problems in ourselves can backfire big time. We spend so much time judging ourselves that we’re left with little energy to love ourselves.
This self-judgment is a bad habit, but one we can learn to change!
We are all amazing! I’m amazing, and so are you! If we want to change our relationships for the better, we should think about how fantastic we are. My high opinion of myself—my self-worth—comes not from what I’ve done but from who created me! I can’t take credit for being awesome. God gets all the credit for that!
But I can take responsibility for acknowledging that I’m a result of His handiwork. You can do this too! When you realize this, you can start to enjoy a fantastic relationship with yourself. I don’t spend time looking for my flaws and putting myself down. I spend my time loving and encouraging myself—it’s much more fun! I recommend it to everyone!
Ultimately, the way we think about ourselves will spill onto those around us. If you have a lousy relationship with yourself, it creates negativity in your other relationships too. We can’t hate ourselves and love others. Great relationships aren’t built that way.
Being aware of these five secrets for great relationships will help you adjust your approach and strengthen your connections. But awareness is only the beginning. When we actually begin to apply these tools, is when the magic really starts to happen.
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