Healthy relationships and productivity go hand in hand. Why? Each relationship you are in requires a part of your time. Relationships require work, but unhealthy relationships require much more work than healthy ones do. All that negativity keeps you constantly engaged in or focused on the relationship and gives you less time to do things for yourself, your success, and your quality of life. Fighting, worrying, being upset, dealing with issues, consoling others, and being interrupted by others all take away from your productivity. So, pick your closest relationship, and if you see any of the following bad relationship habits in it, work on overcoming them.
1. Thinking You Complete Each Other, Not Complement Each Other
Too many people buy into the theory that you need to complete each other in order to be happy and have a successful relationship. That’s crap. And it’s one of the top bad relationship habits affecting people today.
You are a single, whole person before you meet someone, and you remain a whole person after you meet them. They don’t make up a part of you. They don’t add a piece of heart, brain, or toe to you. They aren’t the other half of your soul. You are complete as your own person.
They don’t complete you, they complement you. They add love to your life that helps you be stronger, support that encourages you, and insight that helps you steer towards the life you want.
Don’t look for someone to complete you. You are whole and complete the way you are. If you want them to complete you, it’s not going to happen. And as you struggle to try to make them complete you (which will never happen), it’s going to cause a lot of friction and trouble in the relationship, which will take away from you being productive, successful, and happy in life.
2. Trying To Change Them In Some Way
We have all done this at some point in our lives. I know I have. But once I stopped doing it, and allowed my partner to be the man he is, our relationship quickly got a lot better. This is why I think it’s one of the bad relationship habits that need to be dropped before you can work on developing healthy relationships.
You Cannot Change Their Past
It is ridiculous to want to change someone’s past. You can’t. She or he did what they did and it is a part of who they are. It helped them learn, grow, and become the person they are today.
Yet so many people focus on the past of someone they are in a relationship with, and they let it dictate how they feel about that person and how they interact with them.
If you focus on trying to change their past (which is impossible to do), you are going to drive yourself insane focusing on the aspects that you don’t like and labeling your partner as ‘their past’ and not who they are now. That’s going to cause a lot of problems in the relationship and take up a lot of your time that could be spent on more productive things.
Always remember that they are who they are today because of their past experiences. They have formed their beliefs, desires, and habits from experiences they have had in their lifetime. The more you try to change them, the more you are telling them that they are wrong in the way they have lived and, furthermore, all of their experiences were for nothing.
You Can’t Change Them Right Now Either
The only reason we try to change other people is to make them more like us. We want them to believe our beliefs and think like us. We want them to act, talk, and speak like us. We want them to do it the ‘right’ way – our way.
That’s crazy!
You are in a relationship with someone different than you. If they were exactly like you, then they WOULD be you, and that would be pretty pathetic and boring for you and your relationship. They would bring nothing new to the table in the relationship. And, they couldn’t complement your life the way they do now.
If you want to be in a happy relationship, then be supportive of who they are (unless they are doing something that is hurting you directly in some way). Don’t try to change their personal traits, habits, and behaviors just because you don’t agree with them.
Healthy relationships are, in part, about acceptance and support. You can offer both of those things by accepting your partner for who they are.
3. Treating Them Worse Than You Treat Other People
It’s funny how we can sometimes treat strangers better than the people we are in relationships with. Think about it, when you talk to a stranger you usually:
- Smile
- Say thank-you
- Say you’re welcome
- Have patience with them
- Look them in the eye when talking
- Listen to what they are saying
- Help them out
- Talk politely and respectfully
With people we are in a relationship with, we are more inclined to do things like:
- Roll our eyes at them
- Never thank them
- Lose patience
- Talk sarcastically
- Talk with a short temper
- Ignore them while they are talking
While it may not be like this all the time, it’s easy to get into the habit of treating other people better than we treat people close to us, and that is a bad habit that we need to break to create healthy relationships.
We should always treat our loved ones with the respect that they deserve. They are the most important people in our lives after all! We spend more time with them than anyone else. And they boost our self-esteem, confidence, motivation, and overall productivity and success in life.
I’m so thankful for my family & friends. Seriously.. don’t take your loved ones for granted people! They are all you have.. treat them well
— Katie Krause (@Katie_Krause) April 28, 2009
4. Living From The Ego In Your Relationship
What is your ego? It is your sense of self-importance.
Living from the ego is bad for your overall quality of life, and living from it in the relationship is one of those toxic relationship habits that so many people need to get rid of.
It can be a good thing to have an ego in your professional life, as it helps you move forward towards your dreams and goals in life; however, your ego can also decide how you view the world around you, and this is when it affects your relationships negatively.
We often let it habitually dictate our thoughts in a relationship. For instance, we may think:
- I’m right.
- It’s my way or the highway.
- But I’d rather do this.
- It SHOULD be done this way.
- They have no idea what they are talking about.
If you find that your ego speaks up for you a lot in your relationships, then you need to build a habit of removing that egotistic talk from your mind and, more importantly, not letting it affect the way you interact with or look at people in your life.
For example, if you ALWAYS want the dishes done a certain way and feel as though there is no other way to do it – relax, take a breath, and let someone do it their way for a change. When you become aware that your ego is what is speaking up and not the actual truth of the situation, you will find that instead of criticizing their way of doing the dishes, you will be able to step back and just be an observer of the situation.
If you don’t think you can commit to letting go of your ego for the long-term, then give up your power for a day and just let it be. Take it as a day-by-day thing, and you will find that slowly your ego will start to melt away and your ability to see things from another perspective will start to replace it in the relationship.
Letting go of your ego has a few benefits. You will:
- Stop attacking people for doing things ‘wrong’ and they will start to feel more valued and respected in the relationship.
- Find that you will feel a sense of letting go (let go and let live) that comes from living outside of your ego.
- Feel less stressed and anxious and more relaxed and in the moment.
How To Remove Your Ego From The Relationship
Simply become aware of it. The more aware of it you are, the less likely it is to take over your words, actions, and thoughts. You become aware that your viewpoint is not always the right viewpoint, and you start to let go of the need to be right.
An interesting thing I read the other day was that everything has no meaning until you give it meaning. Therefore, the way someone does something is not good or bad unless you label it as good or bad. Your perception determines whether or not it is right or wrong, but without your perception it is meaningless.
Understanding that your ego is simply one perception can help you to stop letting it control your thoughts, emotions, and actions in the relationship.
5. Blaming Others For Your Emotions
You are the only person responsible for your thoughts and your emotions. It doesn’t matter what other people say, do, or think. It doesn’t matter what goes wrong or how much the world seems to be against you. You choose to feel a certain way by thinking about a situation a certain way and then reacting in a certain way.
Think of it this way: Two people can have completely different reactions to a situation. That’s because one person may think it’s a blessing and feel thankful while the other person thinks it’s a curse and feels upset. There is always more than one way to look at things, and the choice is there for everyone to make.
Other People Don’t Have Power Over You
Other people have no power over your emotions, and when you blame them for having that power, you make them feel like they are walking on eggshells around you. They don’t know how to react, act, or talk to you because they feel like their words are either going to break you or build you, and they can’t be sure what it’s going to be today.
In short, they don’t get to be who they want to be. They are so busy trying to accommodate themselves for you. That will affect your relationship negatively, which will affect your productivity negatively.
For example, if your day was really bad, you could come home and expect your partner to be happy and supportive. But if they also had a bad day, they might not feel like being supportive. How you choose to react to that will influence how you feel.
They are not to blame for your emotions when they are not feeling good and supportive. If you feel bad, then you are making yourself feel bad because you feel like they are not doing what you want them to do.
When you take a step back and realize that you are in complete control over your emotions, then you can let other people be who they want to be without making them feel guilty. You can stop being a victim in the relationship. And that’s going to improve your relationship in a big way.
A course to help you understand that you are in control of your own life is Becoming Limitless by Vishen Lakhiani. In fact, all courses from MindValley will help you move out of a victim state and take more control over your life.
6. Expecting Your Relationship To Be Something It’s Not
This is one of those bad relationship habits that can ruin all of your relationships easily.
You can’t expect your relationship to be exactly like some fantasy that you have in your head. If you do, you will be disappointed.
For instance, you can’t expect your relationship to look like Bob and Sue’s relationship. That isn’t going to happen. You are not going to have a relationship exactly like someone else’s relationship.
Try to not see other people’s relationships as better than yours. Try to focus on developing good relationship habits that make your unique relationship as strong and happy as possible.
With good relationship habits, your relationship will develop into a strong, supportive relationship. But, it may not look like what you picture in your head. And if you expect it to, I can guarantee that you’re going to be disappointed.
“Blessed is he who expects nothing, for he shall never be disappointed.” – Alexander Pope
