Relationships

Love Shouldn't Hurt  •  Clues for Communication  •  Love vs. Infatuation  •  What About Living Together?

We all spend a lot of time thinking (and often stressing!) over our romantic relationships. Issues or problems in romantic relationships are really just an intensified version of the ones you face in every other relationship. So let’s take a minute talking about relationships in general, before we get into your questions about that particular relationship that’s so close to your heart….

We were created with an unquenchable longing to be in relationship with others. Think about your life for a moment. What are your happiest memories? And then, what are your memories of greatest loss or pain? Our bet is that both your best and your worst moments in life involve people—relationships.

Our desire for relationships is a legitimate and good desire. Why then are our relationships so often full of hurt and pain, instead of trust, love, and intimacy? The reason is not hard to discover: selfishness and self-centeredness. We are all guilty of caring more about our needs and wants than we do about others. So we all have stories of how others have hurt us by being selfish—and we have hurt others too.

Our world today—from reality TV, to the latest issue of Cosmopolitan, to the halls of the local high school—is obsessed with finding the right "formula" for successful relationships. After all, we all want relationships that bring happiness and love instead of heartache. If you have tried some of those various strategies for landing the right girl or guy—and then keeping them—you know that these strategies lead to confusion and frustration. Here’s the reason: there is no shortcut for building trust and respect. And these are the foundation of every relationship—romantic or not.

Remember the selfishness and self-centeredness that we talked about earlier? The Bible teaches something totally different when it talks about how we are to relate to one another: "Do nothing from rivalry or conceit, but in humility count others more significant than yourselves. Let each of you look not only to his own interests, but also to the interests of others" (Philippians 2:3-4). Jesus tells his followers, "A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another: just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another" (John 13:34).

So if you want to know what true love looks like, you’ll find it here—seeking another’s good before your own. The more costly the sacrifice we make for someone, the more loving the act…. In a famous passage from the Bible we read:

“Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth. Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never ends.”
~ 1 Corinthians 13:4-8 ~

Wow! We see that “true love,” as just described by the Bible, is selfless. Romantic love, according to the world, is selfish. True and selfless love leads to the development of trust and respect in relationships—healthy, lasting, and fulfilling relationships. Selfish love leads to heartache and broken relationships. They are unhealthy, short-lived, and damaging.

These basic truths of how to build trust and respect in relationships are the same regardless of whether the relationship is one with your parents, siblings, friends, coworkers, boss, boyfriend or girlfriend, or spouse. 

Okay, but what about my romantic relationships?

Well, we’ve talked through what makes a good relationship with anyone—unselfishness and love that puts another first. We want relationships that are built on that crucial trust and respect. How do we go about building a romantic relationship like that? Here are some thoughts for you:

Be Friends First
It is crucial to the future health and success of your relationships that you begin in the right place—as friends first of all.

Backwards Dating
If the first encounters in your relationship are physical and not social, then most often you will continue to be physical with each other and this will build a false intimacy between you that lacks a true foundation of trust and respect. Since you do not really know who the other person is yet, you cannot be “loving” them through your sexual activity. You are only using each other to gratify lust. Remember, you cannot love someone you do not know! Additionally, sexual activity (if allowed to continue) will crowd out the more important emotional and social areas of the relationship that need to develop. If all you have is physical passion, and you aren’t growing in love and knowledge of the other’s character, mind, or soul, and the relationship is doomed to failure. This is backwards dating. To start a relationship through sexual activity is to begin at the end.

Walk, Don't Run!
It is important from the outset, that you are not in a hurry to progress the relationship to more intimate stages than it is mature enough to handle. Getting to know someone as a friend should be a patient and relaxed process. It should also be fun! Don't put artificial pressure on yourself to get another person to notice you or “fall in love” with you. Instead, focus on getting to know who that person is. Ask questions—what are his likes, dislikes, experiences, relationship with family, interests, hobbies, favorite foods, books, movies, characters, bands, favorite ways to kill time, favorite television shows, or dreams and goals for the future. By having these types of conversations, you’ll get to know another human being and find friendship, encouragement, and good times. And this time, without romantic distractions, will only help you determine if indeed this is someone you would want to have a committed relationship with.

So have fun, laugh, spend time together in groups, with friends or family, and remember—be honest as you talk! Only with truth, and no pretensions, will you establish trust in your friendships.

Person or Possession?
Many people rush through the friendship phase of the relationship because they are anxious to "have somebody." Note the possessive language! We want to "have somebody" so that we feel okay about ourselves. "If I am not alone," we tell ourselves, "then there must be something special and lovable about me." But if we are not secure in ourselves before beginning a relationship, then we are weakening the relationship by placing on it a weight it cannot bear—our self-worth. Remember that the way to build a loving relationship is to build up and encourage the other person—to put them first! A relationship that is supposed to "complete you" is off to a wrong start.

Who's the 'Right' Person?
You’ve seen the headlines: “Finding Mr. Right! Read How to Land the Man of Your Dreams!!” And yes, this is the dream of nearly every person on earth—finding their soul mate. Longing to find “the one” and get married is a good thing, but an obsession with finding “the right person for me” actually puts our focus in the wrong place again and derails our hopes for true and lasting love. We don’t want to start our relationships with a selfish quest for a person to give us what we need! During our single years, we should spend our time and energy on becoming “Mr.” or “Miss Right.” See the difference?

While you're single is the  very best time to focus on your own character and lifestyle. Without the distraction and time commitment of a romantic relationship, you have the opportunity to build yourself up into the person you want to be—the person who will someday become the "right" person for someone else. If you commit yourself first to becoming the right kind of person, one who considers the needs of others as more important than his or her own, then your odds of success at forming a lasting and fulfilling relationship will only continue to increase. In this way, you will also be freeing yourself up to truly love another by giving yourself to him or her, and they will be free to do the same...and truly love you.

Now that’s happily ever after!