Healthy Relationships

Relationships.

Whether you’re in one or not it’s important to be able to identify the healthy aspects of a relationship. There is so much online now about red flags, attachment styles, and boundaries. It feels like everyone is an expert! But let’s take it back to the basics. Every relationship you’ve been in or will be in has one thing in common: you.

Our experiences in both childhood and past relationships help mold our ideas about relationships. What we hold as an ideal in our minds, or maybe examples of what a healthy relationship isn’t. Experiences can also develop attachment styles. But what’s important is that these things can shift. Your attachment style can change if you know the points to work on, new knowledge can change ideals. You’re never stuck. Which means you can break unhealthy cycles.

Ok but, what actually makes up healthy relationships? By no means is this everything, but there are three core ideals: Mutual respect, care, and compassion. Sound like obvious things? Sure, but think of how these things show up in small ways. Are you able to communicate how you feel? How is it received? What about communicating differences? Those three points make all the difference in these scenarios of communication.

One of the most important things you can communicate in a relationship are boundaries. Healthy boundaries allow you to feel connected not only to yourself, but to others enough to share without feeling threatened. But did you know a boundary isn’t actually that limit being communicated? It’s what you do in reaction to what someone else does. And too loose or rigid of boundaries can result in overextending or isolating oneself.

Check in with yourself. Where your ideals come from, if those ideas are still true to you, and if necessary, how to shift to a more healthy approach or perspective. How your communication feels, both giving and receiving. That you’re setting those boundaries with action behind them. If you find you want more support in any of this, plus more as these points in no way cover everything a relationship is, check out these helpful resources. The below have been supplied to us by our February Lunch & Learn speaker Abigail Hust, licensed social worker and certified sex therapist, who shared all of this information and more!