Is Jealousy Destroying Your Relationship?

Jealousy is a common problem that couples present when they go to counseling. When one partner chooses jealous behaviors, the dynamics of the relationship change. They are no longer a couple in an Adult Relationship.
Now they are caught in a cycle of Investigator and Suspect. The Investigator spends an enormous amount of energy checking up on the Suspect, who may or may not be doing anything reprehensible. The Suspect spends time defending and explaining his/her behaviors. They are locked in a pattern which will destroy their relationship and they usually don’t what to do.
Both partners are miserable playing this game. The game is all about Control. "If I don’t check up on her, she'll make me look stupid" or "He'll make a fool of me." People who choose jealous behaviors may not realize that their behavior looks pretty silly or even crazy. Their partner didn't "make" them look stupid.

I was actually told by several women that "all men cheat." If this is your belief, you are probably an Investigator. Problem is: you have to sleep sometime. You can’t chain yourself to your partner. You have decided that you alone are capable of controlling your partner’s behavior. What’s more, you've decided it's your Job as his partner to keep him from cheating on you.
What a way to live your life, spending your time spying on each other! Trust is a decision. It’s not based on how the other person acts. If you choose to stay with a partner who is not trustworthy, you are doing so with your eyes open. If you are choosing jealousy without cause, you are doing so to control your partner.
The very things you do to control your partner are the things that will drive your partner away. Are you ready to try something different?
Keep in mind that jealous behavior is a choice you are making. It starts with your thoughts: I wonder where he is. She’s probably with someone right now. Why didn't he call me when he said he would? Why is she wearing that dress? Who was that woman who called him?
These thoughts lead to your behaviors, such as calling excessively (read, more than twice during work hours), listening in on phone conversations, checking phone lists and emails, interrogating your partner, and many other destructive behaviors.
You begin to feel awful after imagining all of the things your partner is doing (these are thoughts; you can change them). You can also change your behaviors if you choose to. If jealously is destroying your relationship, there is hope if you are willing to do the work.
First, if you're with someone who is trustworthy, you can change the thoughts that are plaguing you. Whenever you get those thoughts that start your heart racing, ask yourself the following questions:
What evidence is there that my thought is true?What evidence is there that my thought is false?What would someone else say about this thought?What other explanation could there be?
After you answer these questions, decide what new course of action you will take based on this exercise. Repeat this as often as needed. Hopefully, you will soon find yourself feeling calmer and less ready to play the Investigator and Suspect game.

Transforming Our Relationships By Loving Ourselves

How can we transform our relationships--making them closer, more intimate, more creative, more satisfying?
I've seen that happen in my own life. And the change came, not from working on the relationships, but from loving myself.
What's made the difference: love for myself, comfort with who I am, the feeling of being on my own path, and knowing what I feel and what I want.
When I love myself, I still enjoy and want love from the other person, but I don't feel desperate for it, like I'd disappear if I didn't get it. I don't feel like I'd do anything, even try to be someone I'm not, just to be loved.

When I feel comfort with who I am, I can feel right away if I'm still comfortable when I'm with this other person. I can judge a potential partner not by looks or achievements, but by whether I feel even more myself when I am with him.
When I have the feeling of being on my own path, satisfied with and excited by what I am doing in my life, I'm not going to be jealous of my partner's accomplishments or needing him to be smaller so I don't get too anxious. Nor will I need him to accomplish more so I can ride along on the accomplishment wagon.
When I know what I feel and what I want, then I can communicate my desires -- and be open to hearing what my partner wants as well. When I know what I want and I trust that, I don't end up resenting the other person because I haven't said what I needed and they didn't read my mind.
Perhaps the biggest gift I've received in the relationship area was the certainty that grew in me after many years of inner work, that the other person's feelings belong to them.
Growing up in an alcoholic/codependent family, I soaked up the idea that when Dad was depressed, it was the job of all the rest of us to handle his feelings for him. My mother didn't show her feelings at all, so I had her feelings for her too.
When I started getting into relationships, it was nearly automatic to believe my partner's fears and angers were my fault and my responsibility. In the resulting tangle, no wonder it was hard to feel myself.
I even thought that's what "love" meant!
Many years of inner work using a process called Focusing have shifted all this for me. I can sit with my partner when he's upset, but it doesn't become my upset. It belongs to him. When my nephew is in tears over his own relationship woes, I am there... but I don't offer advice unless he asks, because that's his feeling, not mine.
The space I have for connecting with others is much bigger now, because I am myself, not all the people around me. It feels great!

Free Tips to Make Your Boyfriend Commit

If you are dating an emotionally unavailable man, you are probably wondering if it is at all possible to make him commit to a relationship with you. Emotionally unavailable man is someone who for some reason is dead set on never committing to anybody. While there are men who are outright players, there are also good honest men who have been burned in the past and are gun shy of commitment. Taming a player is one thing. Making an emotionally unavailable man commit is different.
One of my best friends is forty something year old divorced man. He has two great teenage kids, great friends and otherwise fantastic life. He has got everything he needs, great job, lots of money, and a variety of interests and social circles. Since his divorce six years ago he never wanted to commit to anybody. He had always swore he would never get married again.
He was dating on match.com and other internet dating sites, meeting a variety of women, going out on dates, socializing and once in a while taking a woman home after a date. He has had some sporadic short term relationships, but nothing serious.
Recently I ran into him after not seeing him for some time. I remembered talking to my friend a while ago when he told me he had started seeing someone. Naturally, when I bumped into him recently I asked whether he was still seeing the same woman. Guess what, he told me she had moved in and they were planning to get married.
So, what made a man who was a commitment phobic commit to one woman? The answer is easy. She was a special woman. She wasn't like anyone else he had dated before. To understand the psychological profile of a commitment phobic, check out my post Commitment Phobic Man

Zodiac Love Match

The study of love compatibility reveals our hidden desires and unexplored secret realms. The astrology love compatibility between two people can be divined from a careful comparison between a couple’s astrological sun signs. We are all born under the powerful influences of the sun, moon and the planets of the cosmos. Think of your birth as a frozen moment in time of the Universe. Our spiritual, inner being is created at that precise temporal alignment of the skies. Our zodiac love compatibility is forever cast.

The placement of the sun, the rising planets and moon phase mark us all with our distinct characteristics. Our Horoscope signs have a huge impact on our astrology love compatibility with our lovers, mates and potential love interests. Our relationship horoscopes can guide us to that special someone who can tap into our erotic depths. Try an online, love compatibility test to begin your quest for insight into your relationships.
Astrology Love Compatibility: Find Romance
We all yearn for romance, love and affection. When we realize something is missing in our love relationships, we may turn to love astrology for the answers. Insight into the astrology love compatibility with our partners can help us forge a new, romantic connection. Once we understand our lover’s inner needs and motivations through our romance horoscope, we can love with a new understanding and awareness.
Understanding and accepting the personality traits of our lover can lead to a new found spirituality, which translates into romance and sexual attraction. The zodiac love compatibility between two lovers is a powerful covenant of desire and romance elevated to an ephemeral bonding, like no other. Mary understands the importance of astrology love compatibility and it's role in all relationships. You can visit her blog to make use of the free love compatibility calculator.

A Happy Relationship - It's Your Choice

As with everything in life, there are various schools of thought on how to get what you want in a relationship. Here's one that, if given a chance, works very well. Oprah had a show many years ago where the theme was, "Would you rather be happy or would you rather be right?" You might be asking, "Why can't we be both?" It's possible that you can actually be both happy and right but if that's the case, be grateful for your blessings and fill the rest of us in on how that works. For the most part, we are constantly making choices to manage our relationships, our expectations, and our feelings.
My advice - choose happy! Happiness really is a choice. It's a gift you give yourself that really does keep on giving. And the best part... it's a gift you share with everyone whose path you cross.
Have you ever noticed how yawning is incredibly contagious? If you see someone yawn, hear a yawn over the phone or even hear the word "yawn", what happens? You yawn don't you? You pretty much can't help yourself. (Did you yawn as you read this?) Isn't it the same with smiling? When a stranger smiles at you, don't you reciprocate with a smile? Ditto laughing. Try it and take note of the results.
You may be thinking that yawning, smiling, and laughing are not a big deal but the point here is that the energy you project onto the world is reflected back to you. This works the same way in the microcosmic world of your relationship. You get to create the atmosphere in which your relationship lives.
Getting What You Want
So how do you get what you want in your relationship if you don't get to be right? Simple, you put your partner's needs and desires first. Notice I'm not being gender specific here. This may seem radical and counter-intuitive but think about it for a moment. If both of you are putting the other's needs first, you both get what you want, not by taking but by giving. Maybe not in every given moment or circumstance - that's where compromise comes in - but rather, in the over all scheme of things.
Here's how it works. It's Sunday afternoon, you want to watch football but your partner wants to go to the new blockbuster movie that just opened. Instead of escalating to an argument over who always gets their way, try understanding your partner's wishes. If each of you wants the other to be happy you can see several options to the problem.
You record the football game, go to the movie and watch the game when you get home. (Make sure you isolate yourself from friends and the media until you've had a chance to watch the recording)
You watch the football game and go to a later movie.
You watch football and go out for a nice dinner and plan a special midweek date to the movie.
You watch the football game and your partner goes to the movie with friends.
You go to the movie and read the highlights of the game on the Internet when you get home but you will get to watch football all next weekend with no distractions.
You can probably think of some other options as well. The point is, if you are truly putting each other's happiness first, you will want to reach a compromise that works for both of you.
Again, you may not get what you want in every situation, but what you will get is a happy, healthy, and loving long-term relationship.
And since happiness in contagious, when the one you love is happy, you will be happy in return.
Ann Carol Cook

Love - Troubled Relationships

When you are the only one who has to forgive, understand, wait and be an angel with the person you love, while they are always sick, tired, full of problems, depression and nervousness, this is a troubled relationship that can only make you suffer.
If you have that kind of relationship, you are not the only one. Many people accept troubled relationships because they love the other person and they cannot think logically and realise that their relationship is in fact killing them.
If you keep giving excuses and trying to justify the other person's mistakes, then you are masochist: you want to suffer. Your attitude is a real suicide.
You have to face the truth and stay far away from people that only take advantage of your goodness, love and dedication. A relationship where only one person gives and the other one only gets, is not balanced, and cannot last for too long, since some day, after suffering very much, you'll stop loving the other person and start only hating them.
If you see that the other person has too many defects and they don't do anything to correct them, think about how your life with them will be. Are you ever going to be happy this way?
Perhaps you are waiting for a magical solution...
Of course you are, because you are in love... However, be realistic! Don't try to make excuses for their faults, but pay attention to their mistakes.
You are not going to live only with their kisses. You'll have to bear their selfish personality for life... Think about that.
If you stick with this relationship, time will pass, you'll only feel worse with this situation, and in the end you'll realise that you lost the best years of your life with the wrong person.
Why? Are you so blind? Are you so weak?
If you see that a relationship is only provoking you problems and making you sick, be wise and put an end to your martyrdom while you can. Later things may become too complicated, if you get too involved with the wrong person.
Be careful, because besides suffering, you are also in danger of losing your mental stability for being a victim of a selfish creature that will only ruin your life.
After big deceptions and hate, come craziness and despair.
Stay far away from this tragic end! Be wise and learn how to look for the right person for you.
You need someone who will make you happy and who will really love you very much.
Otherwise, why should you have a companion?
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The Elements of Compatibility

When relationships between two nice people don't end up the way everyone had hoped, the blame is often directed at incompatibility. After all, the relationship didn't end all that badly, so it doesn't mean either of them was a jerk. They were simply incompatible – they don't dance to the same tune.
But when you think about it, does “compatibility” really have a fixed definition? Is it judged by how well they spend time together? Perhaps it's how cute they look together? Whatever it is, since so many breakups happening because of “incompatibility,” it might be a good idea to explore what compatibility really is, instead of just dismissing it as a salad of traits that a man and a woman have in common.
In reality, compatibility is much more complicated than you might think. Some elements of compatibility exist at an unconscious level and you might not even know about them. For example, have you ever heard of the saying that most individuals are more attracted to mates who display the qualities of their parent of the opposite sex? You may have noticed that you're more attracted to guys who look, sound, or act like your dad. It may sound funny, but it's actually been proven that people prefer mates that make them feel perfectly safe and at ease – something they used to feel with their parents! This fact, among many others, proves that there's much more to compatibility than what meets the eye, so to speak.
So, is it possible to use compatibility to your advantage in the dating game?
To keep it short, compatibility is composed of four essential aspects that, when used completely and harmoniously with each other, can increase your chances of getting into a healthy, long-lasting relationship with someone you're perfectly comfortable with – and vice versa. These traits are the following:
The Way You Talk
Conversation has a very powerful attracting mechanism, but remember that not all people in the dating game mean what they say. I'm sure you've experienced having to tell a white lie to your date one time or the other. Well, that's something you should avoid. A great talking style is marked by having totally nothing to hide from each other. Read: Brutal honesty.
Your Activity Levels
Whenever you feel bored, tired, or otherwise uneasy when you and your boyfriend do something together, it's a sign that your activity levels aren't on the same page. In other words, you're incompatible on an activity level. A good relationship should thrive on the time you spend together. Try to be more open to each other's reality, but make sure no one tries to impose their “reality” on the other, either.
Financial Smarts
There's a reason why so many couples break up over money matters. Your financial intellect (or lack of it) is a very powerful dictating factor on how far a relationship can go, so do yourselves a favor and start reading up about financial security, debt management, and other ways to always have something for a rainy day.
Sensual Response
This draws the line between being friends and lovers. The first three traits can improve any relationship, even if it's not romantic. But the way you respond to each other at a sensual and sexual level is a defining factor in your relationship's health and longevity.
About the Author
Aaron Adams specialises in relationship matters for women.