10 Things Happy Couples Do

I was shown this and would like to pass it on to everyone else.
Enjoy


By Mark Goulston, M.D.
Happy couples know that the real relationship begins when the honeymoon is over. They know that unless you maintain the garden of love, its beauty will wither and die. In a recent column, you discovered the 10 relationship mistakes to avoid. Now discover the 10 things that happy couples do:
1. Go to bed at the same time.Remember the beginning of your relationship, when you couldn’t wait to go to bed with each other?Happy couples resist the temptation to go to bed at different times.They go to bed at the same time, even if one partner wakes up later to do things while their partner sleeps.
2. Cultivate common interests.After the passion settles down, it’s common to realize that you have few interests in common. But don’t minimize the importance of activities you can do together that you both enjoy. If common interests are not present, happy couples develop them. At the same time, be sure to cultivate interests of your own; this will make you more interesting to your mate and prevent you from appearing too dependent.
3. Walk hand in hand or side by side.Rather than one partner lagging or dragging behind the other, happy couples walk comfortably hand in hand or side by side. They know it’s more important to be with their partner than to see the sights along the way.
4. Make trust and forgiveness your default mode.If and when they have a disagreement or argument, and if they can’t resolve it, happy couples default to trusting and forgiving rather than distrusting and begrudging.
5. Focus more on what your partner does right than what he or she does wrong.If you look for things your partner
does wrong, you can always find something. If you look for what he or she does right, you can always find something, too. It all depends on what you want to look for. Happy couples accentuate the positive.
6. Hug each other as soon as you see each other after work.Our skin has a memory of “good touch” (loved), “bad touch” (abused) and “no touch” (neglected). Couples who say hello with a hug keep their skin bathed in the “good touch,” which can inoculate your spirit against anonymity in the world.
7. Say “I love you” and “Have a good day” every morning.This is a great way to buy some patience and tolerance as each partner sets out each day to battle traffic jams, long lines and other annoyances.
8. Say “Good night” every night, regardless of how you feel.This tells your partner that, regardless of how upset you are with him or her, you still want to be in the relationship. It says that what you and your partner have is bigger than any single upsetting incident.
9. Do a “weather” check during the day.Call your partner at home or at work to see how his or her day is going. This is a great way to adjust expectations so that you’re more in sync when you connect after work. For instance, if your partner is having an awful day, it might be unreasonable to expect him or her to be enthusiastic about something good that happened to you.
10. Be proud to be seen with your partner.Happy couples are pleased to be seen together and are often in some kind of affectionate contact — hand on hand or hand on shoulder or knee or back of neck. They are not showing off but rather just saying that they belong with each other.

If I vanished one day would you care?

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Thanks,
Clathyn III

It seems lately that question has gone through my mind. I feel that in some areas of life I have truly failed but at the same time I have excelled. I feel that relationships are not really my strong point at times. I look back at my serious relationships and tend to see that I could be a majority of the reason that they failed. In one instance its not knowing what I want from life just because I was young at the time and wanted the exact opposite of my Significant other at that time. Then she got was fed up with me and decided that she wanted a break because I wanted a business and she wanted a family(Ironically she is truly excelling in her education and I have a little one). At that time I said fine and just left and wanted nothing to do with her. It took a while but I would say that we became decent friends and now dont talk. After that I met this girl who turned my world upside down and didnt even know it. She resisted me but I remained persistant and determined. I would say that at that time we meshed and were honestly unstoppable. We struggled at times but pulled through. That relationship I would say truly defined a lot of who I am since we had a wonderful kid out of that relationship. Dont get me wrong it wasnt peachy the whole relationship but it really had its good times. That one ended in a horrible manner which was pretty much all me to blame. When I left i took my daughter because I thought at that time it was the best thing to do for her since we were both not stable and had issues. If you really know me then you know the rest of that story(or atleast my side since there is two sides to every story and honestly in some view points I was wrong). After I that relationship was over I started dating this girl who really kept me on my toes. We dated even though she was at school for about 8 months. Then one day she said that she was prompted to break up with me. Which i was okay with that. Off and on we dated but her parents never really endorsed our relationship. After we started to date things were cool but in a matter of days got weird. So I decided that we needed to end our relationship if her parents could not accept me for me. We still talk a fair amount but sometimes I feel that I am too demanding for our friendship. All that ties in to how I am feeling tonight/this morning. I have really wanted to make a difference in my life and in Karma's life without putting strain in other areas. Last night I just couldnt sleep. There are about 10-15 different things that I feel that I MUST change to really live life to the fullest. One of them is people I surround myself with. I feel that I have a couple of good friends and a couple of bad friends who do things when they are easy for them. I feel that if I am going to get to the next level I want to get to I need to find the people at that level and work my way to it and stop trying to cater to others needs and not my own. I actually worked out today between Physical therapy and work. It was the greatest feeling to actually work out. Now that I have ranted if you have made it this far thanks for reading. If you have negative emotions about this post let me know. I would like to know how others feel about my emotions and feelings!

C.3