What is the biggest killer of any relationship? 

Not having personal space. I do not mean physical space. Space in terms of a time zone when we can be with ourselves and having a mental space where we can be ourselves and not living in relation to others.

The concept of love, as most of us understand, is in many ways binding. It is popularly believed that once we have the love of our life, we can stop looking out for ourselves. We feel good being with each other but then we want that feel good to occupy all of our life. We find more and more reasons to be together and the rest of the time we want to be wrapped in the thought of our muse or be on phone either talking or chatting with ... you know who.

No problem with this. It is a nice feeling to begin with. I know that. But the problem starts when in order to be with our loved one, physically or mentally, we take all our attention from ourselves. Eventually, when the initial spike of passion starts coming down, at least one of us has to be involved in daily chores and we spend less and less time with each other, we begin to feel a sudden emptiness within. 

Often this is when the drama begins. We blame our partner for not being the same person they used to be in the initial courtship period. We feel neglected and cheated on while they start feeling nagged and distrusted. That’s how the relationship starts to deteriorate.

But it doesn’t have to be this way. Only if we can recognize ours and our partner’s need for being ourselves, we would not be giving up our entire self thus sacrificing our favorite activities, meeting other people we like to be with, mentally getting oriented around only one person. 

To be in a healthy relationship with each other, both the partners need to be in a great relationship with themselves. We need to value ourselves individually. We can be one with our partner when together, but then we are really two different people with needs more than to love and to be loved. We have mental, emotional, physical, social and spiritual needs. To live a happy and contented life we need to strive towards satisfying all of these needs from time to time. In order to achieve that we need to spend time with ourselves, contemplating, learning, practicing and participating. When we are working towards fulfillment of our needs we do not have the need to blame our partner for not giving us all the time they have or not ensuring our happiness.

Finally, Each one is responsible for their happiness. And only two happy and stable individuals can make a wonderful satisfying relationship. 

 

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