Reading Corner

This week’s blog asks if you’re losing your identity in a relationship. Here are some thoughts to this topic.

How to Be With Someone But Still Be Yourself “But that feeling of merging may contribute to you feeling like you’re losing your identity—or losing yourself in the relationship. When two become one, there’s beauty to that. A reciprocal relationship celebrates and encourages your unique sense of self within it. But that process usually doesn’t happen cleanly, and you may start to fear that your independent self will be annihilated.”

5 Things You Can Do To Avoid Losing Your Identity In The Relationship “A recent study from the University of Liverpool in the U.K. found that of the men and women who had entered into a married or cohabiting relationship for the first time during the study, many noted they experienced a loss of their single identities, specifically after moving in with their partners.”

7 Ways to Tell if You’re Losing Yourself in Your Relationship “Sometimes our relationship can lead us to lose confidence in ourselves, stop doing the things that are important to us, compromise our lives for our partner and sometimes our personality even starts to change.”

This week’s blog is on the paradox of intimacy and separateness in a relationship. Here are some interesting writings on this topic.

The Paradox of Intimacy in a Healthy Marriage “To many of us, the struggle for intimacy may seem just as paradoxical. Most of us want to be intimate, to feel emotionally connected with another. At the same time, we want to be independent and self-sufficient. This conflict and tension is at the core of what it means to be human.”

How to balance intimacy and autonomy in your relationship “A common relationship difficulty for couples is managing the balance between their need for connection versus their need for autonomy. Partners want to be both attached to their mate as well as detached for self-identity. How well partners succeed in honoring each other’s needs for togetherness vs. separateness greatly impacts their individual and relationship satisfaction.”

Closeness and Separateness “There are two basic human needs that feature in intimate relationships: the need for belonging and connectedness and the need for individual freedom and separateness. Sometimes we seem to have to sacrifice one for the sake of the other. Yet in a relationship that thrives both needs can be fulfilled.”

This week’s blog is on the need for total acceptance in a successful relationship. Here’s a variety of viewpoints on this topic.

Acceptance: The Foundation of Lasting Relationships “Relating is simply about acceptance of the other and commitment to that person above all else, including what we want. Acceptance is recognizing the other person for who he or she is and being attentive to the circumstances of the relationship moment by moment.”

Acceptance: The Key to a Happy Marriage “Acceptance also takes maturity. It is the mature person who grasps that just because someone is different, that doesn’t mean there is something wrong with them.”

It is what it is…. 3 Ways to learn Total Acceptance “Learning to practice acceptance can drastically improve our outlook on our current state of affairs. And not just any old acceptance, but TOTAL ACCEPTANCE.”

This week’s blog is on how to communicate in your relationship and getting to know yourself. Here are some articles discussing this topic.

We’ve linked to this first article before, but it is so to the point that we’re including it again.
9 Steps to Better Communication Today “The most popular myth about communication in relationships is that since you talk to your partner, you’re automatically communicating. While talking to your partner is indeed a form of communication, if it’s primarily about everyday, “surfacey” topics (“How were the kids?” “How was work?” “How’s your mother?”), you’re not really communicating about the important stuff. This article is primarily about how to talk in a more open and rewarding manner with your significant other.”

Healthy Relationships “Open, honest communication should be part of every healthy relationship. Use the guidelines below to open up the channels of communication between you and your partner”

8 Tips For Communicating Better in Relationships “All of us who have relationships have struggled with communication. It comes in friendships, family relationships, romantic relationships, and work relationships, to name the main ones. But each of these relationships are in our lives so we can learn how to be better communicators, and thus not only express ourselves effectively but learn how to meet others’ needs and get our needs met as well.”

This week’s blog is on maintaining flexibility within your relationship. Here are some articles discussing this topic.

Improving Couples’ Attachment Security, Intimacy, Stability and Satisfaction “I believe the primary objective in couple therapy is to help couples improve the stability and satisfaction in their relationship and learn to stay flexible, not rigid. It’s important for couples to maintain a context of intimacy and engagement that allows them to experience a sense of trust and security in which they can be ‘safely vulnerable.'”

How to be Flexible in a Relationship “A lot of us have been conditioned to think that once we find the person who we believe is perfect for us, then the hard work is over. Everything should be smooth sailing from that point on. After all, if they are perfect for us, shouldn’t everything just fall into place? But that couldn’t be further from the truth. In fact, once you find the partner you are ready to commit to, that’s when the real work begins. And any healthy relationship will require a certain amount of flexibility from each partner.”

Relationship Tips for a Happy Marriage Part 92: Be Flexible “Would you describe yourself as a flexible person? Flexibility in marriage means being open to each other’s plans and ideas, and being willing to go beyond the comfort zone where necessary. It also means getting over the idea that your desires are the most important consideration in the relationship and responding to the needs and desires of the other party.”