My Relationship Articles
Building Relationships, Commitment, And Love - S Is For...
We continue our series on how to build interpersonal relationships, whether with family, coworkers, friends, or that special someone...
Commitment and love are important to all of us; they are worth fighting for; they are worth working for. You also should know that in spite of many promises there is no secret for success, no checklist of things to do, and just as importantly no checklist of things not to do. But we do have suggestions, now continuing with the letter S. We actually have a double series of articles for the letter S. The focus here is on sacrifice, sage, and sense.
S is for sacrifice. Sometimes if you want a relationship to work you have to sacrifice something. Is the sacrifice worth it? Perhaps you should ask is the relationship worth it. Undoubtedly, it is sometimes worth sacrificing to maintain or build a relationship. But not always. Life is full of compromises, of sacrifices. But you have to decide on your principles, on what cannot be compromised away. At one time they called this sort of thing non-negotiable demands. Don’t forget, you may not be the only one who is making sacrifices to keep the relationship going.
Some sacrifices are murderous.
S is for sage. A sage is a wise person, usually someone fairly old. When I hear the word sage I get the image of a wise, elderly gentleman with a white beard that flows down to the floor. One of the wise things this sage knows is how to get around without stepping on his beard. A really sage sage will know how to get his own way without stepping on other people’s toes. And a really, really wise sage will know how to step on other peoples’ toes and have them apologize for it. Sage is also a green herb that seems to go well in turkey stuffing. Try to use both of them in a sentence.
Sense for deafblind people, a British charity.
S is for sense. Most of us have five of them. If you really want to go far in relationships you have to develop a sixth sense, the art of reading between the lines. If you are really good you can sense what people are going to say or do perhaps even before they can. By sniffing the air you can sense that today is not the day to ask for a raise, much less to be transferred to the new office in the Bahamas. It won’t make sense to raise the subject. And I sense that your boss won’t be raising those issues.