Building quality relationships depends upon you!

We all want to have healthy, happy relationships with the people we know and love.  However, building strong relationships can be hard work.  I have come to see that if I desire to have a quality relationship with someone, most of the responsibility will be mine.  Of course, that does not totally relieve the other person or persons from his or her part but, if I really want a relationship to succeed, I have to approach it and work at it as though it all depends upon me.  Maybe an illustration will help.

When I am driving a car, there are other people all around me who are driving their cars, too.  The other drivers are not primarily focused on me.  They are focused on their own transportation needs.  However, as far as the safety and progress of my trip goes, it largely depends upon me.  If I am alert and careful in traffic, I will have a better chance of being safe and moving forward in my journey.  I cannot expect other people around me to make my trip successful.   

This is very similar to a relationship.  As you are driving along in your relationships, you must approach the journey as though it depends upon you.  How you act, what you say, your thoughtfulness, your kindness, your words of encouragement, and your attitude, all go into the process of making a relationship succeed or fail.  I don't know about you, but I want to be the kind of person that others are happy to see come, sad to see go, and excited about having back.  Wouldn't that be a great thing for someone to say about you?  That would be a commentary worth all of us having! 

I also believe that there is a limited amount of people with whom you can have close, meaningful connections.  While I do not know the exact number, I would guess that it is somewhere between twenty and fifty.  This "educated guess" comes from my experience of working in two of the largest churches in America.  I discovered that out of a church of about ten thousand members, a person would have about twenty to fifty people that they knew closely.  In fact, no matter the size of the church, the ratio of close, personal relationships would remain the same.  My point is, there are only so many people with whom you have the time and energy to be close.  This not only includes the people you work with, but also your neighbors and family. 

Naturally there are different levels of closeness ranging from the casual acquaintance to that with a mate or family.  This week, why not step back and take a look at your relationships?  It might be a good idea to make a list and even break it down into two categories; close relationships and casual acquaintances.  If you do not take the time and effort to determine who you want to be close with, I can assure you that it will never happen by accident. 

As I said earlier, close, warm, intimate relationships require time, effort and hard work.  They are painful at times but they are also very rewarding.  If you want to have quality relationships in your life, put the burden on yourself and start taking the necessary steps to fulfill your desires.  After all, in the end, relationship is what life is truly all about.

This information is provided in congruence with Personality Insights USA.