Friendship is a solid foundation for any relationship. Keep and carry this relationship advice with you to help you shine your light and be a blessing to others, especially when you'd rather not be nice. Showing up with love, whatever the occasion, is the best way to create a more loving world.

“Because you are, innately, at the highest level, everything, mirroring can work an awesome way. You can choose to either deal with yourself through other people or other people through yourself.” — Teal Swan

Our relationships grant us a beautiful opportunity: we can work on others through ourselves, and we can work on ourselves through others. 

20 Digestible Nuggets of Relationship Advice for Every Relationship

1. Prioritize being at peace over being perfect, right, or understood. Start there.

2. Don’t seek proof of your worth in the perceptions of others—it’s not their job to tell you who you are.

3. When you notice you’re about to play the role of judge, be a detective and get intensely curious.

4. Treat people in pain with compassion, not more pain.

“If you want to be of greatest value to others, see them as you know they want to be.” — Abraham-Hicks

5. Look at the person who is with you now and see them as if for the first or last time.

6. Rather than trying to say the right thing or provide the perfect solution, focus on being fully present with others.

7. Don’t make the little things exhausting. Most arguments aren’t worth the energy we give to them.

8. When you feel hurt, dismantled, closed down, tense, impatient, angry, misunderstood, unloved—consider the love that’s missing and treat the pain as though it’s a call for your love. Love, not despite what you feel but because of what you feel.

“I feel that there is nothing more genuinely artistic than to love people.” — Vincent van Gogh

9. Before you enter a conversation or walk into a room with other people, take inventory of your internal world. Take care of your own energy first. Set an intention for how you want to be with this person or these people, and what kind of energy you want to bring.

10. Listen to understand, not to reply.

11. In conversation, talk less about your collective fears and pay close attention to your shared dreams.

12. Talk less about yourself. Make your conversations other-focused.

“There are two kinds of people in this world. Those who walk into a room and say ‘Here I am’ and those who walk into a room and say, ‘There you are.’” — Unknown

13. Reach out from a place of love first, and a place of love last. Sandwich any constructive feedback with authentic praise, compliments, admiration, appreciation, or words of affirmation. Before you speak, ask yourself, “Am I coming from a place of love with this?”

14. Reach out for the sole purpose of connection. Rather than reaching out to someone to impart news or request information, do it just because you’re thinking of them. You don’t need a reason to reach out to someone, to start a conversation—love is reason enough.

15. Don’t be too stubborn to say you’re sorry or too proud to admit that you don’t know everything. Open yourself to all possibilities. (It hurts at first, but it’s worth it in the end.)

16. Forgive yourself for not wanting to forgive.

“People grow when they are loved well. If you want to help others heal, love them without an agenda.” — Mike McHargue

17. Honor your own perspective and your own experiences before you compare your story to someone else’s.

18. Let go of others’ opinions of you. They’re not yours to hold.

19. If you choose to do something for someone, do it because that’s who you are.

20. Hug more. It’s good for everyone.

. . .

Tell me:

Which of these thoughts did you need to read today?

Tell me in the comments. I’d love to hear what works for you!

If it’s dark, turn up your light.

With love,

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Jen

P.S. Want to celebrate your person with poetry? Go visit my shop for prints of handwritten poems and other words of hope and heart. From the bottom of their heart, they’ll love it.