CULTIVATE HEALTHY RELATIONSHIPS
Shared joy is double joy; shared sorrow is half a sorrow.
—SWEDISH PROVERB
From the first gentle caresses from a loving mother to the last warm hand that ideally encases ours before we take our last breath, the ways in which others touch our lives can have a wonderful, soothing impact. Supportive relationships have been found to promote not only stress relief, but also physical health and longevity. This chapter will focus on the benefits of healthy relationships and the toll of conflict and will provide tools for fostering a healthy social life. It can help you to improve the relationships that mean the most to you and to let go of the ones that are bringing you down.
People We Know
Most of us know at least one person who takes the wind out of our sails. While we all have our own idea of what is annoying, people who are critical, unfriendly, judgmental, and prone to complaining tend to fit most people’s definition of toxic. They are the people who will be the first to criticize your ideas and the last to offer praise. They have a certain tone of voice or look in their eye that lets you know in an instant that you are somehow failing to measure up to an imagined standard of adequacy. You know in your gut who these people are in your life: Are you looking forward to seeing them? Does any part of you dread the thought of encountering them? Are you so used to them that you are fine seeing them, but you know what their reactions to you will be, and they make you uncomfortable? People like this can drain your energy over time and can introduce subtle, steady amounts of stress into your life.
Most of us also know at least one person who shines brightly in our lives (if we’re lucky). This type of person is there for you when you need a pep talk, celebrates with you when you want a high five, and is someone around whom you can completely be yourself. If you were facing a crisis, he or she is someone you know you could count on, and someone you would always want to be there for, as well. Such people are good for our health and our happiness and are perhaps some of the best stress relievers of all.
Why Relationships Matter
We may find ourselves pushed to achieve at work and school and spend whatever leftover time and energy we have on our relationships, but with the benefits that healthy relationships bring, they should be highly prioritized in our lives. Michael Frisch, a researcher who studies happiness and emotional well-being, has called healthy relationships the “holy grail of happiness,” and for good reason. They add support, enjoyment, and meaning to our lives, as well as other benefits, as described below.
Healthy Relationships Are Associated with Better Health
Numerous studies have provided solid evidence that healthy relationships are good for us, not only emotionally, but also physically. People in happy relationships experience a host of advantages, including enhanced immune functioning, lower emotional reactivity, a decreased incidence of emotional health issues, and increased longevity. Those who have rich social lives tend to live longer, stay healthier, stress less, and enjoy life more.
The central point here is that relationships need to be healthy, or at least reasonably so. Relationships that are emotionally toxic, or that bring more negatives than positives, can be more detrimental to us than most other types of stressors. Therefore, it’s important to be proactive in managing our social lives and maintaining balance. The contrast is stark: Healthy relationships deliver enhanced health, increased longevity, greater levels of happiness and well-being, and reduced levels of stress, while toxic relationships engender stress and can negatively affect our health.
How Toxic Relationships Bring Greater Stress Than Other Stressors
Certain stressors affect us more than others. The perception of threats to your safety, such as from the sound of someone attempting to break into your house, can trigger your stress response and produce a stronger response than can a mere buildup of annoyances during a long day at work. Relationship difficulties tend to hit us harder than many other problems because in many ways we need other people for our own safety. We may be able to physically survive with relatively few connections these days, but remember that our stress response was designed for a distant time when physical threats loomed everywhere and being excluded from the group meant you didn’t have the safety of the pack to protect you. Your body responds to the type of threats that might leave you out in the cold. In fact, we need human connection to survive and thrive. Just as babies who are not cuddled and cared for adequately can suffer from failure to thrive, we are less physically healthy as adults when we have fewer supportive relationships. And when relationships tear away at our self-esteem, the effects of this can absolutely be sensed and can be experienced as toxic. Such relationships tend to activate the stress response more often, and the consequences of this affect the body and the mind.
Developing Relationship Skills
Before we kick out of our lives all imperfect friends and loved ones (and wouldn’t that include just about everyone?), we would be well advised to recognize that it is more effective to focus on making our existing relationships healthier. While we can’t change other people, we can alter how we behave in our relationships, and often that’s enough to make a profound difference in the entire dynamic. Changing our part in what family therapists call the “dance”—the interplay of expected roles and reactions—creates room for new ways of being with each other. Rather than withdrawing from relationships, manipulating others, or engaging in less healthy self-protective behaviors that ultimately cause more stress than they relieve, focusing on developing relationship skills can help you to refurbish the relationships you have that need a little fixing up.
Here are some simple changes you can make to reshape relationship dynamics in a positive way. Whether you are in a relationship that drains and stresses you and are wondering if you can save it, or whether your relationship is good and you just want it to achieve its greatest potential, the following skills can benefit you. These skills can help you to create relationship dynamics that are more supportive and respectful of both parties, and they can benefit you as well as those you love.
Setting Boundaries
When we hear about setting boundaries, we usually think of ways to keep people at arm’s length. This is an effective function of boundary setting: If we feel that our rights are being infringed on, rather than cutting the offending parties out of our lives, we can simply set boundaries, so these individuals can take a certain amount of liberty with us but no more. In setting personal boundaries, we decide how close we’d like others to get to us—how much sharing we would like, how much we are willing to give, how much we would like to take—and communicate that to the other person in a respectful way. This often involves enforcing a desired amount of space and respect in our relationships.
Boundary setting, however, can also foster closeness. It’s not all about pushing people away. When we set boundaries with others, we actually allow them to become closer to us than we may have otherwise allowed, because we know that there is a line—that they can get close to us without going too far. Without healthy boundaries, people tend to either let others get too close, and then push them way back, or cut people off entirely. (Ironically, a cut-off relationship is not considered one with healthy boundaries, because there is no closeness to begin with; boundaries suggest that people can get close, but not too close, not that they cannot get close at all.)
What constitutes healthy boundaries? Different people have different comfort levels when it comes to boundaries, so boundary setting necessarily requires participation from all people in the relationship. Some people are more comfortable with closeness than others, and as long as this works for them, this is healthy. If people set boundaries that continually cause them stress because the boundaries are too lax or rigid (they either allow too much contact or keep people at too far a distance), the boundary-setting patterns may be an issue. But a friend who likes to have close boundaries and has healthy, fulfilling relationships with others who have close boundaries can be considered to have “healthy boundaries.” Likewise, someone who prefers more distance can also have boundaries that are considered healthy as long as they let people close enough that their relationships are strong and survive.
Activity to Try: How to Set Boundaries
The process of setting boundaries can help strengthen your relationships and relieve some of the stress within them. Here are some tips that can help you with this process:
• Know where your boundaries lie. There are a few different ways to set boundaries with people, and the important first step with each of them is the same: Become clear with yourself about where your boundaries lie. If you do not know where you stand, you cannot effectively communicate this to others, no matter what techniques you use. This aspect can be challenging in itself because you may not know where you want to draw the line (and others may sense that, which may be why they are overstepping your boundaries in the first place). Examine how you feel, and what you would like to allow, and decide where your boundaries lie.
• Communicate this clearly and firmly. Now that you know what to say, the how becomes easier. That said, it is important to be up front and clear when you let people know. State what you need and expect with kindness, but also with confidence. Your statement should not sound like an accusation, a question, or a dirty secret. You are entitled to your boundaries, and it helps others to know what they are, so you are being a good friend by communicating.
• Back yourself up. If your boundaries are not being respected, take action. This does not need to be angry, punitive action; you simply need to get yourself out of a situation in which you are putting up with something you said you would not be willing to do. For example, if you are scheduled to meet a friend for lunch and you have agreed on a time, that is establishing a boundary—you will be there at a specific time. If you friend does not show up and does not call after a respectable waiting period, it is okay to call and say that you will not wait indefinitely, or you can even leave after a certain amount of time if your friend cannot be reached. You can reschedule, and make it clear that you can wait only a certain amount of time the next time as well. This frees you from waiting indefinitely, without your having to take more drastic measures such as cutting off the relationship or never agreeing to meet this friend again.
How to Manage: Work on Communication Skills
Healthy communication involves effective listening, as well as ways of speaking that make it easy for the other person to clearly understand what you are both thinking and feeling. Effective communication involves both parties, but by learning communication skills that you can use, you lessen the burden on the other person. With these techniques, you can make it easy for the person if he or she wants to hear you and understand, and avoid unintentionally contributing to any conflict that may already exist. The following are some communication strategies to keep in mind as you navigate discussions that could potentially turn to conflict.
Using Messages
It becomes easy to sound as though you are making accusations against someone when you are both upset. “You really made me angry”; “You were so inconsiderate.” Statements tend to want to escape our lips starting with “You, you, you!” This is a simple shift, but resolving not to begin sentences with you, and instead starting with I, can soften your statements and take out the sting. Better still, following up with the word feel can really help you express yourself without blaming the other person for your experience. This moves the point of the conversation from accusations, which can automatically bring out defensiveness in the other person, to an explanation of your personal experience, which is more likely to invite understanding. Taking things a step further, the following structure can make things even more clear, while keeping communication from becoming combative: “When you [whatever behavior you observed], I feel [whatever emotions you are feeling].” This lets the person know exactly what it was that upset you and exactly how you felt as a result. This helps you avoid other communication pitfalls such as interpreting the person’s motives and applying negative labels and allows you to focus simply on the behavior and the feelings, which lets a more emotionally neutral discussion ensue.
Listen, Then Speak
It may feel unfair that you have to be the one to listen first, but what is often the case in typical arguments is that both parties are simply seeking to be heard. Both of you may be merely mentally crafting what you are going to say next, rather than truly listening to one another. You may both be simply waiting for a chance to speak, and forgetting to listen. By listening first, and asking for clarification until you are sure you understand, you are showing the other person respect and demonstrating how the person may show you the same courtesy. Even more important, you are gathering important information that can alter what you say next. (Conflicts can be resolved so much more easily when both sides understand one another!) By seeking first to understand, then to be understood, you are increasing the likelihood that you will both be heard.
Cool Down If Necessary
As you may remember from Key 2, when the body’s stress response is triggered, it becomes more difficult to think calmly, rationally, and clearly. This can make it difficult to communicate in a healthy way. If you are a little upset, talking things out and coming to a place of mutual understanding will likely help you both to feel better. However, at a certain point, it becomes counterproductive to attempt to resolve a conflict if you, or both of you, are so “triggered” that coming to a place of understanding is just not feasible. At this point, it helps to take a break and cool off. Rather than storming off, try to calmly affirm that this is an important issue to discuss, and you would like to go over it when you can both be more calm. Then decide on a time when you will come together and talk again. In the meantime, try your best stress relief techniques, so you can come back to the discussion from a more centered place.
Let Go of the Need to “Win”
Some people pride themselves on never losing an argument. If this is a goal of yours, it’s time to reevaluate. Rather than thinking of communication in terms of winning and losing, bear in mind that the real goal is for mutual understanding to occur. New solutions can be explored, and compromises can be reached. But if you are bent on winning the argument, the relationship loses.
Be Respectful
Perhaps the most important point to remember is that the other person should be given respect. This means avoiding sarcasm, mocking comments, personal attacks, stonewalling (refusing to respond), or other manipulative tactics designed to increase personal power or make the other person uncomfortable. Remember that you care about this person and you want both of you to be happy. Then try to come to a place of mutual understanding. If you have that intention in mind, many of the other details become just that—details.
Activity to Try: Cultivate Empathy
Sometimes the key to letting go of anger when you face conflict, and the key to understanding the other person, is empathy. When you can more easily grasp what the other person is feeling, it becomes easier to understand that person’s actions. And it becomes more difficult to remain angry. Cultivating empathy is easier than it may seem. Empathy eases the path to forgiveness and can enhance altruism. Because forgiveness and altruism are linked to enhanced wellness and reduced stress, deepening your capacity for empathy brings added benefits.
Your capacity for empathy is partially inborn and is partially shaped by your experiences and habitual thought patterns, but you can work to deepen your capacity for this important skill in the following ways:
• Actively seek to understand what others are feeling and why, not simply what they are saying. Then work toward being able to guess more accurately.
• Think of a time when you felt what the other person is feeling now. Vividly remember what it was like, and think of how you would have liked others to respond to you.
• Think of all that this person brings to you, and how much you would miss the person if he or she were not in your life.
• Practice loving kindness meditation (mentioned in Key 8). This can deepen your capacity for compassion and kindness toward others.
How to Manage: Cutting Out Toxic Relationships
One of my favorite quotations—from an unknown author—is this: “At some point, you have to realize that some people can stay in your heart, but not in your life.” (This quotation has also resonated with many of my readers and has garnered quite a bit of positive feedback when I have shared it online.) I believe that it strikes a chord because it gives us permission to let go of relationships that are toxic, even if love is still present. While we can continue to love and respect others, they are not always a good fit for what we are trying to maintain in our lives. Simply put, certain relationships cannot be saved by even the greatest efforts at improvement, particularly if only one party puts in the effort. (Even if both parties are making an effort, sometimes we simply want different things, and these things conflict with one another’s pursuit of peace.)
When to Let Go
How can you tell when a relationship is worth saving and when it is better left in the past? There are no hard-and-fast rules. However, if you find that a particular relationship seems to add more negatives than positives to your life, and you can’t see a clear or viable solution, you may want to consider letting go. Obviously, if a relationship is abusive, it is best if you let go and move on. But what about relationships that make us feel bad more often than they make us feel good, but the thought of losing them creates stress? The following types of relationships can be toxic, but the decision to either hang on or cut ties can be a difficult one:
• The relative who constantly makes belittling comments, but who is not around except on certain holidays.
• The gossipy friend whose brand of friendship chips away at our self-esteem, but who can be fun.
• The boyfriend or girlfriend who is volatile or critical, but who can also be supportive and committed.
The relationships with each of these individuals bring something negative to the table, but aren’t an easy fix for various reasons. Cutting a family member out of your life can create consequences in your other relationships, and severing ties with a relative you barely see isn’t always worth the upheaval it may cause. Friends who aren’t overtly toxic and bring positive experiences to your life may be missed. Having someone who loves you and offers support may seem to be something to invest in, particularly if you are someone who has not had positive experiences with previous romantic relationships. We need to look at the big picture and the balance of positives and negatives that someone offers before we decide to unilaterally sever ties.
A good first line of defense is boundary setting. Healthy communication can also breathe new life into a less-than-thriving relationship. If other measures are taken and a particular relationship makes you feel bad more often than it makes you feel good, you may want to look at the cost of cutting ties. If it seems worth the fallout, this may be one of those instances where letting go is necessary. Particularly if you believe that you are dealing with someone who is resistant to change and inflexible, even after the person is made aware that some of his or her behaviors are hurtful to you, the relationship may be worth reexamining. Relationships with narcissists and sociopaths, for example, tend to cause much more heartache than the relationships are worth, and usually the best way of managing these relationships is to let them go.
How to Let Go
Letting go gracefully can be difficult, particularly if you have mixed feelings about whether it is a good idea to sever ties. Having a respectful conversation about why the relationship is not working may be wise, if you are dealing with someone with whom you can have a respectful conversation. If the relationship is a friendship rather than a romantic association, it may be more feasible and practical to simply become “too busy” to get together as much as before, and let the relationship peter out. Another option, one that would be effective with a closer relationship, is to explain what it is about the relationship that is not working for you and (without coming from a place of being punitive) let the person know what changes would need to occur before you could pick up the relationship again in the future. The ideal with letting go is to do so with minimal drama, as the point of letting go of toxic relationships is to relieve stress. Creating an even more toxic situation, with a new enemy, is something to avoid.
How to Manage: Focus on Healthy, Supportive Relationships
Focusing your time and attention on healthy existing relationships, and creating new ones as well, can be a healthy new focus for your emotional well-being. Whether you are doing so as part of an emotional recovery from a toxic relationship or simply because it is a good idea, renewing your focus on those who make you feel good inside, and returning those good feelings as best you can, is worth your time and energy. Here are some things to keep in mind when building a healthier social circle.
Meet New People
Do not shy away from adding to your social circle. The next person you meet could potentially be an important person in your life. Do not overlook new opportunities. You may seek out new friends.
Be Equitable
Be sure to give back as much as you take from your relationships. You may not have the exact same attributes to offer, but be sure that you are not doing a disproportionate amount of giving or taking, or resentments can grow and sap the relationship of its positive energy.
Stay Positive
In finding the balance between positive and negative in our relationships, an equal amount of each is, in fact, not the best we can hope for. An equal number of positive and negative interactions is actually detrimental—for our relationships to be considered positive, supportive, and beneficial overall, we need a much higher number of positive experiences than negative ones.
A few experts on relationships have come up with their own recommended ratios of positive to negative interactions, but probably the most popularly cited ratio comes from relationship researcher John Gottman, who has studied couples and their interactions and can predict (with more than 90% accuracy) which couples will stay married and which will divorce in the near future, based on observing a few key aspects of their communication styles. (I will explore that in a minute.) This important researcher has discovered quite a bit about what makes a relationship healthy or unhealthy, and one of his findings is that a relationship requires no fewer than five positive interactions for every single negative one, in order to feel pleasing to both parties. This means that for every time you ask your partner to please stop doing something annoying, you need to point out five things about that person that you appreciate. For every fight, you need to have at least five times where you enjoy (not merely tolerate) each other’s company. For every time you make each other feel unhappy, you need at least five times where you have made each other feel fantastic, in order to maintain a positive balance. (Although this research was conducted on couples, I would apply this rule to friendships as well.) For some relationships, this comes quite easily; for others it can be a struggle.
Face Issues When They Arise
Knowing the importance of positive interactions (and the damaging effects of negative ones), it can be tempting to brush problems into the back corners of your awareness and avoid confrontation when things are bothering you. Perhaps paradoxically, this is not a great idea, either. When we attempt to avoid conflict by avoiding discussions, we risk actually perpetuating the conflict by failing to resolve the underlying issues that are leading to conflict in the first place. Keeping in mind the communication strategies I discussed earlier in this chapter, here are a few more techniques for navigating relationships in general.
Don’t Force Your Agenda
We all want to be heard, and mutual understanding is vital for a healthy relationship. It is also natural to want to get what you want out of the relationship. However, if you find yourself pushing hard to get what you want at the expense of the other person’s needs, this can weaken your relationships. This seems an obvious point, but we can sometimes do this without fully realizing it. We may tell ourselves that it’s for the other person’s own good, that if the person understood the situation better, he or she would want what we want, that if the person did ultimately agree, he or she obviously didn’t object to the pressure that much.
The problem with pushing your agenda is that if you do it too often, and at the expense of the other person, the relationship eventually suffers. Have you had feedback in your relationships suggesting that you could stand to listen more? That you seem to need to control things a little too much or that people don’t always feel heard when they are with you? If you hear this once or twice or from just one person, it may be a fluke. If you hear it somewhat regularly, it is something to explore. (When you are being completely honest with yourself, what does your gut tell you?) Try to aim for win-win situations and compromise whenever possible. When that isn’t possible, see if you can take turns in who gets to have the first choice in outcomes. This can help to keep things equitable and keep everyone feeling respected.
Avoid Contempt Like the Relationship Killer It Is
One of the most telling findings that John Gottman found in his studies on relationships (remember the psychologist who studied the patterns of couples’ arguments and could predict which unions were destined to dissolve?) is that contempt is a strong sign of impending doom. Contempt is evident when one or both partners show clear disdain for the other person—there is not just disagreement with the partner’s ideas, but disapproval of the partner as a person. It goes deeper than a mere argument and cuts at the core of who the other person is. If you find yourself treating with contempt people with whom you disagree, this has to stop.
Organize Girls’ Nights, Game Nights, and Date Nights
One of the best ways to enhance the social support you have in your life is to work on maintaining the relationships you already have with friends and family. We may think of them often or stay in contact via social media, but seeing them in person and creating new memories is important as well. Getting together with others is something we should all be doing on a regular basis. We may do this when we are younger and have fewer responsibilities, but it is a healthy idea to continue the practice throughout our lives. In fact, it is during those times when we have greater responsibilities and greater stressors that we need our relationships for increased support. Organizing a monthly or weekly night to get together with friends creates the perfect venue for relaxation, bonding, and blowing off steam from the stresses of the week. Having a regular date night with your significant other can add another layer of strength to your relationship and can stave off stress that may result if your bond weakens because of a lack of time spent together merely having fun. And maintaining this regular habit ensures that it will actually happen on a regular basis—it can get you past the inertia of not wanting to plan anything or of having busy schedules. This may all be easier than you think. Here are a few simple ways to make it happen:
• Have a standing invitation for friends to come over for games and drinks—or whatever you find to be fun. If you ask people to bring food, drinks, games, or whatever you will be sharing, all you need to do is make your house somewhat clean.
• Have a standing weekly or monthly night when you all get together, and have everyone take turns planning what you’ll do. This ensures that the work of planning is evenly distributed, and everyone gets to have his or her first choice of activity at least once every few times.
• Arrange for a sitter at regular intervals, and allow yourselves as a couple to be spontaneous in what you plan for the night.
Get Involved in Groups
Maintaining our current relationships is important, and so is the act of making new friends. The obvious benefit to joining an established group is that you can meet many new people who share at least one of your interests or beliefs. Studies show, for example, that people who are involved in a religious community enjoy superior health and longevity and at least some of these benefits accrue from their involvement in the group: They gain social support, involvement in activities, and a sense of belonging. Membership in other groups can also bring feelings of belonging, introduce you to potential new friends or romantic partners, and provide you with social opportunities that you may enjoy. An added bonus: You may be involved in planning, but you will probably be able to join already planned events rather than having the responsibility of planning your own. By reaching out to new people, and maintaining healthy ties with those already in your life, you can create a truly supportive social circle that involves less stress.
Questions to Ask Yourself
• Which relationships in my life give me the most comfort? The most stress?
• What changes can I make that could reduce some of the stress in my social life?
• What are my best habits in communicating? What are my worst?
• Do I give about as much as I take in my relationships?
• What one person causes me the most stress, and what is it about him or her that is stressful?
• What one person brings me the most happiness, and what is it about him or her that I appreciate?
• If I could change three things about my social life, what would they be?
• Am I generally happy in my relationships?
Evaluate Your Answers
After your reading about relationship skills and dynamics, the answers that come from these questions may take on new significance. Noticing the habits that contribute to your relationships in a positive and negative way can help you to identify new ways of relating that can serve you. Identifying people who cause you the most stress and bring you the greatest comfort can help you to decide if you need to change where you place your attention. Look at your level of happiness in your relationships. If it is not what you’d like it to be, you now have more tools to make changes that will enhance your relationships and life satisfaction, and reduce stress. Identify at least one change you would like to make, and see where that takes you.