You’re used to hearing about how difficult it is to find your man, to really fall in love, to build intimacy and trust, to keep your feelings for many years. All these are undoubtedly important topics, but there is another, no less difficult task to accomplish — to learn how to be with someone you love without dissolving into a relationship. If there is too much distance, you will begin to gradually move away from each other; if too little, you will feel tension and fatigue. Not everyone can find that perfect balance. And often this is the reason for misunderstandings, mutual resentment, scandals, and, as a result, the destruction of relationships. If you don’t want to go to extremes, try to adhere to the following principles.
6 ways to be together without feeling suffocated
1. Discuss your expectations with each other in advance
Building relationships without talking about important topics on shore is a huge mistake. The main reason for most conflicts is not the differences in your views, desires, and needs themselves, but the lack of clear agreements. For example, a girl doesn’t seem to mind that you spend your day off meeting with friends, but at the same time feels annoyed that you just put her in front of the fact. Perhaps she already had plans that included your participation, she refused offers to see her friend, expecting to be with you together, or maybe she needed your help, and so on.
The bottom line is that if you don’t discuss your expectations with each other, you will constantly feel uncomfortable. Everyone will focus on their own ideas, wait for the partner to show interest in themselves, and delay making plans until the last moment. This is how resentments appear: one feels that he is being ignored, the other feels that he is being pressured. As often as possible, talk about how much time you want to spend together and how much time you want to spend separately from each other, what leisure formats you are interested in, and what needs and desires you have in a given period of time.
2. Save your personal time for your plans and interests
Even in a romantic relationship, it’s important to remember that you’re two separate people first, and only then are you a couple. Therefore, it is important to support your own interests, strive for your personal goals in general, and to do something that is not directly related to a partner. If one weekend you decide to watch football and she decides to go to a dance lesson, your relationship won’t get any worse. On the contrary, it will make them more stable and you happier.
When the two of you have at least some time for your plans and interests, you will start to feel much better. Visit. A F R I N I K . C O M . For the full article. A few hours a week spent apart from each other can restore your energy, increase the number of topics for discussion, and make you remember why you started a relationship in the first place. Personal space can and should be perceived not as distancing, but as an opportunity to replenish internal resources.
3. Do not perceive the need for privacy as rejection
Everyone has their own needs and desires. Some people can spend almost all their free time with their partner, while others find it vital to be alone for at least half an hour a day. And all this is absolutely normal. Although people often encounter emotions that paint the opposite picture for them: they feel annoyed, offended, angry, or sad. Someone may interpret a partner’s desire to be alone as a signal that feelings for him have cooled, and so on.
Remember one important thing: if a person wants to spend time apart from their partner, it doesn’t mean they’re tired of the relationship, or they’re moving away. Most of the time, it’s just another way to recover, stay in silence, and focus on your own thoughts. If you calmly accept this need, there is no tension in the relationship. But as soon as you start trying to figure something out for your partner or get him to explain and justify himself, you start to distance yourself from each other.
4. Respect each other’s boundaries, even if they are different
Again, each person has their own personal boundaries: it’s okay for someone to be in touch all day, but someone doesn’t want to check their phone every five minutes, someone wants to spend evenings exclusively with a partner or alone, and someone likes meetings with friends and gatherings with relatives. In general, your level of need for personal space may vary greatly. But this fact in itself is not a problem. Difficulties begin at the moment when one of you begins to evaluate the other’s personal boundaries through the prism of his perception.
For example, he says that a person is behaving abnormally, that he needs to change, that it’s worth trying to do something else, and that he might like the result. In the vast majority of cases, it doesn’t work that way. Even if one of you forces the other to agree to break their boundaries, it’s likely to lead to conflict and frustration. The only working option is to have an honest conversation with your partner and accept the fact that you can’t be alike in everything.
5. Make sure that your closeness does not turn into control
Closing the distance and establishing emotional intimacy increases your involvement in each other’s lives. But here it is important not to cross the fine line between sincere and harmless interest and a thirst to establish control over a loved one. When one partner constantly asks awkward questions, arranges checks, and expects to be accountable to him, of course, the other will constantly live with a feeling of pressure.
He will have a feeling that he is not being given any freedom, that any emotion, any decision, or action can lead to a quarrel. Moreover, a person may not even have the intention to control anyone, but their very behavior will lead a partner to such thoughts. That’s why it’s so important to keep track of how certain actions look from the outside, to monitor reactions.
6. Separate the concepts of “time together” and “time together” from each other
You may feel that if you’re both in the same place, you definitely need to do something in common or interact with each other. But you can “be close” without maintaining direct and constant contact. You can spend the evening at home, while doing your own thing. For example, you can glue models, and your girlfriend can transplant flowers. Technically, you are next to each other, but you do not bind yourself to a single cause. It turns out that you spend your time pleasantly and interestingly, having the opportunity at any time to discuss something or switch to another activity. This is also a kind of form of maintaining balance in a relationship. At the same time, it is not so energy-intensive and does not involve you in the interaction completely.
