Invest in Your Relationships
Hi there!
Welcome back to the MoodiNews. Every Thursday, we discuss a variety of matters related to mental health and self-improvement.
I’m so glad you’re here.
This week, we will be discussing INVESTING IN RELATIONSHIPS! YAY!
One of my favorite people on the internet right now is retired psychotherapist and attachment specialist Adam Lane Smith. Adam talks a lot about relationships, including how to get them and why they are important.
Below is one of my favorite quotes from Adam:
“Do not be afraid to engage with other people. This, in fact, is the only thing that makes life worthwhile.”
I like this statement because it highlights the importance of human connection.
As Adam suggests, without the joys, challenges, and surprises of sharing our existence with other people, life gets stripped of most of its meaning.
One of the best ways to invest in your well-being is to invest in your relationships.
Investing in relationships means putting time and energy into nurturing healthy, interpersonal connections in your life.
Essentially, it’s the practice of initiating deeper connection with others.
This concept might seem straightforward—and maybe even obvious—but, as a therapist, I see people cut corners in the arena of relationships all the time.
Relationships take work and proactive effort to maintain, which is something that people sometimes find annoyingly inconvenient.
When talking about investing in relationships with my clients, one of the most common complaints I hear is this:
“But no one ever calls me! I’m tired of initiating all the time. Why do I have to be the one to reach out?”
Investing in relationships is all about rediscovering our need for other people, and then throwing ourselves into the action of nurturing healthy bonds with others.
Often, this means approaching others first in order to foster connection, rather than waiting around for someone to remember to invite us out or wish us a happy birthday.
Here are a few ways that you can practice investing in your relationships:
1) Be the one to initiate more interactions with the people you actually like.
2) Make more of an effort to spend quality time with friends and loved ones (i.e., undistracted, unrushed time spent in each other’s company).
3) Follow up with people and prioritize correspondence that is meaningful for connection (i.e., responding to or sending texts, emails, letters, etc. that show consideration for the relationships that you value).
4) Say sorry or make amends when needed so that your relationships stay on solid ground.
5) Make small gestures to show your love and appreciation for the people in your life who help you out (i.e., surprise a coworker with a candy bar, fill up your spouse’s gas tank unexpectedly, or share a kind word with your child).
Investing in relationships requires us to notice when we need to improve as a parent/friend/brother/sister/coworker/neighbor, etc., and then putting in the work to make those improvements happen.
(After all, we can’t hope for much of a payoff from an investment that’s never been made.)
Therapy is all about helping people rebuild a healthy foundation off of which to thrive, and relationships are certainly one of the pillars of a life well-lived.
If we invest wisely in our relationships, over time our efforts will come back tenfold, and we will experience our reward in the form of a fulfilling, well-connected life.