5 Tips for Strengthening Your Relationships

Relationships can be one of the most stressful, draining, and confusing aspects of life. Relationships can also be one of the best, most fruitful, and most vibrant aspects of life. Whether it is marriage, friendships, family bonds, church family, or becoming parents – relationships make life an adventure.

To do life with others is to make memories, to see things from a unique perspective, and to be challenged to overcome obstacles and look for the meaning of life outside of yourself and your wants.

Relationships can face a variety of obstacles:

• Jealousy and insecurity
• Poor communication
• Feuds that stem from gossip
• Setting unrealistic expectations
• Seeing others as competition
• Past grudges or hurts that hinder your ability to trust and invest in relationships
• Relationships built on lies to avoid telling the unwanted or ugly parts of yourself
• Lack of respect toward one or both parties
• A major life event that shattered one or both individual’s world
• One-sided relationships
• When someone seeks their self-worth from someone else in a relationship
• Inability to forgive

5 Qualities to Help Strengthen Your Relationships

Perhaps several of these obstacles are currently causing conflict in one or more of your relationships. Here are some key qualities to consider concentrating on right now to strengthen your relationships:

1. Communicate

Communication is the driving force of relationships. It is the way we connect, get to know one another, work through conflict, and build relationships that will withstand the storms of life. It is important to reflect on how you communicate with others.

Do you speak what is on your mind or beat around the bush? Are you holding back by refusing to tell the truth in a situation at the risk of being judged? Do you allow others time to respond to a question without interrupting them? Does your tone immediately become angry if someone says something that catches you off guard?

Tone, timing, and authenticity are key to healthy communication. Let others respond without immediately planning your response or refusing to let them finish. Use an inviting and warm tone rather than harshness in your speech. Take a minute to breathe and collect yourself if a conversation is headed in a negative direction. The key is to avoid the screaming matches and to let harsh words bombard your conversation. Once words are said, they cannot be taken back.

May the words of my mouth and the thoughts of my heart be pleasing to you, O Lord, my rock, and my redeemer. – Psalm 19:14

2. Resolve conflict

Conflict resolution is key to all relationships, whether it is with a spouse, friend, sibling, parent, or next-door neighbor. If (and when) an issue comes up, healthy relationships choose to work it out rather than run away at the first sign of conflict. Effective conflict resolution is being assertive rather than beating around the bush.

It is speaking your truth and allowing the other person to speak theirs. When working out an issue, you want to resolve conflict in a way that promotes growth. If you are fighting with your spouse, tell them your side of the story and then ask for theirs. Do not let your conversations and attempt at handling conflict be one-sided. Be quick to listen. Keep your tone in check.

My dear brothers and sisters, be quick to listen, slow to speak and slow to get angry. – James 1:19

3. Serve

Focus more on what you can do for the other person. Someone once said, “If speaking kindly to plants helps them grow, imagine what speaking kindly to humans can do.”

It is important to approach relationships with the other person in mind. Relationships should not be built based on what someone else can do for you, but how you can be there for them. Celebrate their wins in a big way! Be there for them when a family member is diagnosed with a terminal illness. Take them a meal when they have their first baby. Ask questions about their job. Take an interest in their hobbies.

To be in a healthy relationship you do not have to like all the same things, but you must be willing to get to know and appreciate who they are as an individual. You might not ever consider having a stamp collection or going running for fun while those are two of their most prized activities. You do not have to pretend to love those things, but you can take time to appreciate those things about them.

Let your focus be more on lifting the spirits of those around you than what everyone around you should be doing for you. It will change your entire perspective and appreciation of the people in your life.

Patience can persuade a prince, and soft speech can crush strong opposition. – Proverbs 25:15

4. Refuse gossip

Gossip – the word that makes us twitch as it rolls off the tongue. It is safe to say that we have all been hurt by gossip. Perhaps you have lost a best friend over it or refused to make close friends because of it. Perhaps gossip did some heavy damage to your heart because trust was lost in a relationship.

Gossip is the enemy of relationships. It brings them to ruin, and it shows the nastiest parts of us. When you are hurt by gossip, it often goes into the “bag of tricks” to use on someone who wronged you. Gossip is never the answer. If people are gossiping about others to you, they may be gossiping about you to others.

Some people gossip without realizing just how easy it is to do. It is key to consider this and begin catching yourself in the act so you can begin finding a better way to conversate. Build others up rather than tear them down. Talk about the good you can do in the world rather than talk about what everyone else has done wrong.

Some people make cutting remarks, but the words of the wise bring healing. – Proverbs 12:18

5. Put God first

If you want to learn how to navigate relationships the right way, make the Holy Spirit your guide and mentor. Read the Bible, study God’s Word, and make the Bible the road map of your relationships and your life. Putting God first means choosing mercy, grace, forgiveness, love, and compassion in your relationships.

It means looking out for the needs of others. It means making a relationship with Christ as the center a priority. It means choosing relationships that make you better, not bitter. It means admitting you need help, even when pride wants to consume you. It is going all-in for those who love you because that is what Christ did for us. It is choosing not to run after the first disagreement but using it to strengthen your relationship.

Do not be afraid or discouraged, for the Lord is the one who goes before you. He will be with you; he will neither fail you nor forsake you. – Deuteronomy 31:8

Signing up for counseling means deciding to put the work in even if it is one-sided. Sometimes only one party is willing to seek help to salvage a relationship. Sometimes it takes the spark of one person working on a relationship for the other to feel compelled to put the work in. They want to know you are choosing them, too. One thing is certain relationships take work.

Relationships are pivotal to life here on this earth. Relationships include both support and surrender. Dying to self, working on yourself, and admitting when you need help, and asking for it. Rick Warren said, “Four of the Ten Commandments deal with our relationship to God while the other six deal with our relationships with people. But all ten are about relationships.”

Relationships are worth going the extra mile. Your relationships are worth investing in. Seeking relational wholeness for your heart is worth the investment, regardless of what the other person decides to do. Today is your day to invest in relational wholeness with God, others, and yourself.