11 Tips For Building A Healthy Relationship Romance

A healthy relationship romance is something every human seeks, but only some humans experience or are capable of delivering without learning the skills that come naturally to others. We all desire to feel loved, cherished, and connected to our partners, to trust them implicitly, and expect them to honour their vows and commitments. You can build and keep a healthy relationship romance that is stable, satisfying and goes the distance, but it will take hard work and communication, and not all relationships are healthy. Let’s look at some tips to help you build a healthy relationship romance.

Defining A Healthy Relationship Romance

All relationships hit rough and rocky patches in the first three years. Successful relationship romances require commitment, compromise, and a willingness to be flexible, adaptable, and evolve as you learn lessons and grow with your partner. Blending two personalities into one relationship can be challenging when one party is fixed or set in their beliefs and refuses to compromise and problem-solve for a resolution.

Most people will enter a new relationship having walked away from an old one that didn’t work and left them with some trauma and baggage. Having a healthy relationship romance starts from the first date. A person always signals their true intentions from the get-go, but some people lack the ability to see the warning flags or choose to ignore them, hoping they can change the other person and make them better. What happens is the other person erodes their confidence, isolates them from friends and family, and then sets about destroying them. They try to fix and stick out unhealthy relationships with people who are not fit to be in a relationship with anyone at the cost of growing jaded and hopeless that love exists or that they deserve romance and respect. Regardless of whether your relationship is new or you have been together for a decade, there are steps you can take to build and maintain a healthy relationship romance, but only within a healthy relationship.

What Makes A Healthy Relationship Romance

Part of what defines a healthy relationship romance is sharing a common goal and vision for how the relationship will grow and evolve over time. You will have a tendency to like and dislike similar things and share a similar outlook on religion, politics, and how children should be raised and disciplined. There will be a greater number of similarities that allow you both to exist in a happy and serene space that nurtures each other without ending up in a warzone at the end of each day. An unhealthy relationship is one that sees you screaming and laying blame on the other person when you know it is your fault. You are projecting your denial, trauma, and baggage onto your partner, then refusing to take accountability for your part and opting to blame them.

However, there are also some characteristics that most healthy relationships have in common.

You maintain a meaningful emotional connection with each other.
You keep outside relationships, hobbies, and interests alive and separate from your partner. You both need to have other interests that do not involve each other in order to have something to share and talk about when you are together.
You each make the other feel loved, valued, respected, and emotionally and sexually fulfilled.
You communicate openly and honestly.
Understanding there is a difference between saying you love them and showing them you love them. Words are cheap; actions speak the truth.
When you give and receive love freely, you feel respected and valued by your partner.
You both get each other and can talk about everything and anything in your lives openly and without fear of judgement.
You are not afraid of respectful disagreement and expressing your opinion in the same way you allow them to express theirs.
Some couples talk things out quietly, while others may raise their voices and passionately disagree in decibels loud enough the entire neighbourhood has a front-row seat.
The key to a strong relationship is not to be fearful of conflict or expressing your feelings even if they are going to upset the other person. The truth is rarely appreciated by those who most need to hear it spoken. They will not thank you for pointing out their flaws, but a healthy relationship will listen to you state your truth and then work together to resolve the problem once the dust settles.
You need to feel safe to express all aspects of your true self without fear of ridicule or retaliation.
Resolve conflict without humiliation, degradation, or insisting on being right. Even if you are right, being right has never proven to give the wronged person any measure of genuine joy. So what? You were right. Big deal. Do you want the medal or the chest to pin it on?

Some relationships that last for years lose the spark and the romance. Both parties become complacent, stuck in a peaceful coexistence. Life, work, and family can get in the way and slowly steal the romance and passion from a relationship. The ability of both partners to relate to each other emotionally or sexually can dissolve. While the relationship may seem stable on the surface to anyone looking in, the lack of actively seeking romance and passion with someone you know intimately inside and out when you are exhausted mentally, emotionally, and physically can lead to boredom within the stale relationship. The lack of growth in any direction but apart often sees one or both parties opting to engage in an affair to feel the thrill of romance and excitement again with someone new who engages and stimulates them and makes them their first priority.

Despite the claims of romance novels or romcom movies, no one person can meet all of your needs for the duration of your life. In fact, expecting too much from your partner can put unhealthy pressure on a relationship and form a toxic co-dependency.

To stimulate and enrich a healthy relationship romance, it is essential for both parties to sustain their own identity outside of the relationship, preserve connections with family and friends, and maintain separate hobbies and interests that allow you both to make a date night and then actively romance each other while catching up with the antics of your separate lives and the people in it.

Good communication is an essential part of any relationship. When both people know what they want from the relationship and feel comfortable expressing their needs, fears, and desires, it can increase trust and strengthen the bond. People grow and evolve every day, and each year to pass brings a new and different set of life goals that might change dramatically from the version you both entered the relationship with originally. A healthy relationship romance will grow with the changes and modifications that both partners desire going forward. It may also be time to accept that your relationship has run its course and served its purpose, and you both need to amicably separate and venture out into the world to find new people who are in alignment with the new you.

Falling In Love Versus Staying In Love

For most people, falling in love is the result of some fated or destined event or meeting with a person. Staying in love or preserving that “falling in love” sensation requires dedication and commitment. A healthy, secure relationship romance can serve as a source of dual support and happiness in your life, strengthening all aspects of yourself and your mutual relationship through the good times and the bad.

Many couples focus on their relationship dynamics only when unavoidable problems need resolution. Once the problems have been resolved, they often switch their attention back to their careers, kids, or other interests. Relationship romance requires ongoing attention and commitment for love to flourish. The ego is fragile and needs to be gently stroked and allowed to bask in the warmth of a partner willing to give and receive without limitations.

As long as romance in the relationship remains important to both partners, the relationship will flourish. When one party stops and the other notices the lack of romance, things will start to break down and require some honest conversation to get things back on track.

#1 Spend quality time face-to-face

You fall in love by looking at and listening to each other, actively wanting to spend as much time with them as possible. Many couples find that the face-to-face contact is better on their early dating days but it is gradually replaced by hurried texts, brief emails, and instant messages that avoid having to talk to them at all. Sending a text or a voice message to your partner saying “I love you” is great, but if you rarely look at them or have the time to sit down together, they will feel like empty words you use to placate but that you no longer genuinely feel for them. They feel taken for granted, become unhappy and distant, or start the disconnection process as a couple. The emotional cues needed to feel loved can only be conveyed in person using touch and intimacy. Intimacy does not mean ‘having sex.’ Intimacy means taking the time for extended foreplay and making love to each other, so both are left sated and fulfilled in the post-bliss of shared orgasmic euphoria.

No matter how busy life gets, it is essential to carve out blocks of time to spend together each week. Try something new together. Doing new things together can be a fun way to connect and keep things interesting. Go back to dating and actively seeking shared experiences with each other. If that means finding a good babysitter you can trust, then do that!

Somewhat ironically, staying close and connected to each other can be achieved by together giving your time to others outside of the relationship. Volunteering for a cause, project, or community event can keep a relationship fresh and interesting, exposing you to new people and ideas. It can deliver the chance to tackle new challenges and experiences you wouldn’t seek out otherwise together. As well as helping to relieve stress, anxiety, and depression, doing things with an altruistic intent benefits others and delivers immense pleasure to the givers. Human beings are hard-wired to help others. The more you help, the happier you will feel——as individuals and as a couple.

#2 Stay Connected Through Communication

The tone of your voice and your body language matter. Slouching or crossed arms shows a defensive or disinterested mannerism. Talking in a monotone voice and offering monosyllabic words is disrespectful to the lady opposite you. She will pick up on your attitude problem instantly with that sixth sense they have. Even if the woman is your idea of ‘hide in the closet hideous’, someone will think she is their idea of a goddess. Beauty is subjective, and she might be looking at you and mentally deciding that strapping blood-filled chum bags to her ankles and swimming in shark and croc-infested waters would be more enjoyable than enduring a second of your company. She hid it better and chose to give you the level of respect she intended you to show her.

#3 Take Note Of Your Partner’s Nonverbal Cues

Nonverbal cues are what our subconscious reads and the energy vibration we pick up from the people around us. Nonverbal cues are exactly that, not spoken, and include eye contact, tone of voice, posture, body language, and gestures such as leaning forward, crossing your arms, touching someone’s hand, raising an eyebrow, biting lips, rolling eyes, leg-spread and the general aura and energy a person emits. You can feel when someone is angry before you see it because you feel the angry energy radiating from them before they open their mouth to tell you.

Learning early in the relationship how to read your partner’s body language and nonverbal cues will tell how they really feel even if their words contradict your feeling from them. This ability will assist you with being able to handle the situation and respond accordingly. For a relationship to work well, each person has to understand their own and their partner’s nonverbal cues.

#4 Be A Good Listener

While a great deal of emphasis in our society is put on talking, if you can learn to listen in a way that makes another person feel valued and understood, you can build a deeper, stronger bond and connection with them.

There’s a big difference between listening and learning and hearing and then ignoring. When you are engaged with what is being said, and you ignore all other distractions to focus on them, you hear the subtle intonations in your partner’s voice that tells you how they are feeling and the emotions they are trying to communicate to you. Being a good listener doesn’t mean you have to agree with your partner or change your mind. But it will help you find common points of view that can help you to resolve conflict.

#5 Manage Stress

When stressed or emotionally overwhelmed, you are more likely to misread your relationship romance status and your partner and send them confusing or contradictory nonverbal cues.

People can relapse into unhealthy patterns of behaviour and project their issues onto their partner, making them the cause or blame for the problems they are experiencing when it has nothing to do with the partner. They are merely there to take out their frustrations upon in a cowardly act. People in high-stress or emotionally charged situations tend to be volatile and fly off the handle with loved ones, saying or doing something they later regret.

#6 Keep Physical Intimacy Alive

Touch is a fundamental part of human existence. Studies on infants have shown the importance of regular, affectionate contact for brain development. And the benefits don’t end in childhood. Affectionate contact boosts the body’s oxytocin levels, a hormone that influences bonding and attachment. While sexual fulfillment is often the cornerstone of a committed relationship, it should never be the only method of physical intimacy. Frequent kissing with tongue duels, erotic touching, sensual massage, holding hands, hugging, and simply holding each other embraced as you lay on the sofa can convey emotional intimacy and connection to and with your partner.

Unwanted touching or inappropriate overtures can make the other person tense up and retreat. If there is a lack of physical intimacy or the desire to become intimate, you need to have the dreaded talk about your relationship and where it is likely to go, and why they no longer physically desire you or vice versa.

#7 Learn How To Compromise

Healthy relationships are built on compromise. However, it takes work on each person’s part to ensure a reasonable exchange and that both parties sacrifice something to meet in the middle and reach a compromise. It is not a compromise if one person gets their way and the other capitulates every time. That is a toxic relationship that will decay over time, not a healthy relationship.

#8 Recognise And Acknowledge What Is Important To Your Partner

Knowing what is truly important to your partner in and about the relationship can go a long way towards building a solid foundation that weathers the occasional storms and hurricanes every relationship endures.

Don’t make “winning” every argument or scoring bitch points at their expense your goal or submitting to them if they have to win every argument against you. Pick and choose which battles you need to win and only fight to the death on the battles you mean to win. Let the mud slide and walk away. If the fight isn’t one you are prepared to dig in and win at all costs and then ask yourself if it is even worth winning the point and what will be gained by arguing and losing other than animosity.

#9 Learn How To Resolve Conflict With Respect

Conflict is inevitable in any relationship, but to keep a relationship strong, both people need to feel they have been heard and acknowledged. The goal is not to win points on an invisible scoreboard but to maintain and strengthen the relationship by seeing the weaknesses and strengthening them in a healthy manner that allows you both to grow as individuals and as a couple.

Make sure you are fighting fair. Keep the focus on the issue at hand and respect the other person. Refrain from starting arguments over things that cannot be changed or keep dragging up past mistakes. You made mistakes in the past too, and your inability to let them go says more about you being at fault and holding a grudge that is toxic to the harmony and longevity of the relationship than the other person’s actions or words.

Don’t attack someone directly with words like, you made me, you did this, it is your fault. Opt for ownership of your side of the argument and use statements to communicate how you feel as a consequence of their actions while owning your own. For example, instead of saying, “You made me feel humiliated and fat in front of your friends,” try, “I feel disrespected when you comment on my weight in front of your friends. Stop disrespecting me for their amusement and your ego. If my weight is an issue for you, then your disrespect is an issue for me.”

Never drag old arguments and mistakes into the mix. Rather than looking to past conflicts or grudges and assigning blame, focus on what you can do in the here and now to solve the problem and then honestly assess the relationship to see if it is even worth trying to fix. Not all relationships are worth trying to fix. Sometimes avoiding a clean and mutual dissolution of a partnership when it is first apparent the situation is no longer healthy can result in an unnecessary escalation into domestic violence and impacted trauma on children who are taught that is how a normal relationship looks and how they will go on to treat their own partners later in life. Your actions, words, and deeds in a relationship don’t just affect you but all around you in both positive and negative ways.

Be willing to forgive. Resolving conflict is impossible if one party is unwilling or unable to forgive the other. Know when to let something go. If you can’t come to an agreement, agree to disagree. It takes two people to keep an argument going. If a conflict is going nowhere, and a resolution cannot be found by compromise, you can both opt to disengage and move on. As the Frozen movie tag song say, “Let it go, let it go!”

#10 Flexibility, Adaptability, And Change

Be flexible, adaptable, and open to change. Change is inevitable in life and is forced upon you regardless of whether you go with the flow or fight it all the way. Flexibility is essential to adapt to the changes and growth that are always taking place in any relationship. It allows you to grow stronger together through adversity, where we discover our weaknesses and strengths. Anyone can last in a relationship that never faces any challenges or hardships, but it takes two special people who genuinely love each other to fight the fights and stick to the pothole-filled back roads in a car without suspension to get to their dream destination. While the back road journey might test you both to the extreme and push you to the edge of a cliff, it is only in those places that you really get to see each other’s true colours, honesty, and commitment to the vows and promises made in the beginning. Anyone can quit and walkway when the going gets tough, but only the tough stop to tighten their bootlaces before setting off to conquer and dispatch the problem returning the victor.

#11 Last But Not Least

There is no shame in seeking outside professional counselling if your relationship romance has hit the wall.

Admitting there is a problem is half of the battle won. Reach out together. Sometimes problems in a relationship can seem too complex or overwhelming for the parties to handle as a couple. Couples therapy can look at your situation with unbiased eyes and offer insight and advice to help you make calm and rational decisions together.