How to Have Better Relationships: 4 Principles to Live By

Relationships are one of the cornerstones of a healthy life. When you have good relationships with people, it becomes easier to navigate your work, hobbies, and social life. Unfortunately, it’s not always easy to start or maintain good relationships with people, whether you are close to them or not. Perhaps you arrived at this post since you are wondering how to have better relationships.

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How to have great relationships: My personal experience

I do think I am generally an agreeable person who desires to cooperate with others. Relationships for me are important in terms of quality, rather than quantity. However, I do know that agreeableness isn’t necessarily always a good trait in terms of starting or maintaining good relationships… and you can’t always rely on being agreeable to have a strong bond with others.

Thus, there are some things I have learned by experience having relationships with different people–whether it’s coworkers, friends, or my family–which I believe are helpful to allow people to be in harmony with each other.

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How to have better relationships: 4 principles that worked for me

Do not take everything personally

One of the hardest things I have to learn about myself and others is not to take everything personally. People act according to the ways they were brought up, their culture, their personality, and many other factors that don’t always include you. I realized that whatever people say, we do not always have to take it personally and choose our battles to preserve peace.

When I stopped taking things said personally, I became more at peace and the less people affected me negatively. More often than not, the things people say or do are not meant to attack you, but rather a reflection of themselves in the situation.

Avoid contempt and believe the best

Wanting to know how to have better relationships with friends and family? This is something I find so valuable when it comes to preserving relationships. Often, when someone offends us, we hold them with contempt–this means that we generalize our single experience with future experiences with them. Not only that, it affects our relationships with people who are similar to that single person, making us judge other wrongfully.

The Bible says in Galatians 3:28, “There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is no male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus.”

In God’s eyes, we are equals. We are to believe the best in everyone as God does for us.

Approach each situation with empathy

One of the things that also helped me preserve and start great relationships with others is approaching every situation with empathy. Empathy is so important not only for other people’s wellbeing, but for our character development and self-awareness.

Before doing or saying anything, think about being the other person in your shoes. Sometimes, it’s not always about being right, it’s also about being kind. This is something I need to learn when it comes to close relationships, such as family or friends.

Empathy is also something I talk about with my husband when it comes to people who serve, such as grocery workers, restaurant staff, or those who are in a lot of customer-facing positions. I always tell him to put himself in people’s shoes, working 8-10 hours a day with challenging people, the physical burden, plus other personal problems that can occupy their mind. Being kind and considerate to them helps us practice empathy.

Protect yourself and other people’s peace

This is somewhat related to my first point which talked about not taking everything personally. Having good relationships doesn’t always mean forcing to restore a bond that makes your mental wellbeing suffer, or hanging on to something volatile.

The higher ground is learning to protect your peace and other people’s peace–whether it’s finding a compromise, forgiving, apologizing, making a distance, or repairing relationships, do what it necessary to find peace.

“If possible, so far as it depends on you, live peaceably with all.” Romans 12:18

I hope these tips on how to have good relationships help you out. You can also look at these other related reads on my blog:

• How to Make Your Marriage Stronger and Better: Ways to Improve
• Signs of A Relationship that Will Last: What to Look Out For
• How Can I Forgive and Forget the Past? Strategies that Help

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