4 Habits of ALL Successful Relationships | Dr. Andrea & Jonathan Taylor-Cummings | TEDxSquareMi

Have you ever stopped to think why only very few people have an amazing relationship? Did they just get lucky? Are they the chosen ones? Maybe I seriously think most of us would agree, right? Where good

relationships

require work, the problem is greater. We often have no idea what to work on. Over the past 20 years, working with countless couples, we have observed that every

successful

relationship each exhibits four simple but fundamental

habits

that we want to share with you over the years. In the next 15 minutes or so, the good news is that these are

habits

we can all learn and develop, and when we do, we significantly increase our chances of having one of those amazing

relationships

, if we don't, we probably never will. in all failed relationships. that we have ever seen has lacked one or more of these habits, as we were recently reminded over Sunday lunch, and what Sunday lunch it was we invited.

We met this couple and connected well with them socially because we shared similar urban backgrounds, let's call them. Rachel and Steve, so we invited them to lunch with us to discuss the business that Steve wanted to launch, but as we ate and chatted, I started to sense that Rachel wasn't happy at all, so I leaned over and said Rachel, what do you think? about this business idea and her response said it all. I don't know anything about this and he never talks to me about anything, so John and I just exchange quick glances to say this is serious, what we're going to do there, and suddenly the thin wallpaper covering the cracks.

I've just started to unstick myself and I'll drop the frustration and the disappointment and the anger and the fact that Steve was working more and more outside the home and that when he came home on weekends, until now he was sleeping downstairs in the living room and Then Steve dropped the bombshell, you know if it wasn't for those two guys he would have left you a long time ago. Now we make spicy food, but that's a little spicier than what we were planning for Sunday lunch right now. We'll get back to Rachel and Steve's story, but I guess you already know that their story isn't unique.

Let me share with you some statistics: divorce rates around 40% in much of the developed world and breakup rates for cohabiting couples at much higher rates. 60 to 70 percent, statistics tell us that about half to 50% of all long-term couples simply don't respect distance, what that tells us and don't look around now, but you or the person Sitting next to you you are a Rachel. o Steve, that's the reality now, this emotional trauma is also spreading and impacting our mental health. In their 2016 report, the Mental Health Foundation issued the stark warning that the absence of quality relationships is killing us faster than obesity and deficiency. of exercise and all of this is also having an impact on the next generation.

Marriage foundation research has shown it to be the greatest predictor of adolescent mental health. Let's guess what the family breakup is. Her research continues to show that when couples separate children. They are 10 to 15 percent more likely to have mental health problems than when the couple stays together, these are big numbers now, all of this explains why the epicenter of mental health today is among young people 16 to 24 years old, that's where it is and Of course, none of this is free. Family breakdown in the UK is costing us UK taxpayers a whopping £51 billion a year. It is a huge number.

It is almost half what it costs to run the entire National Health Service. The breakdown of relationships is a huge problem. es and to solve a problem of this scale, to borrow a phrase from medical science, what we need are better fences at the top of cliffs instead of just more ambulances at the bottom and in relationships, these four habits are fences strong, you see, all relationships disappear. about a similar set of obstacles triggered by life events, it could be setting up a home together or having your first baby or, in a work context, being promoted to positions that involve or require more time away from home, so these obstacles They manifest as unmet expectations.

Conflict resolution, on the other hand, creates issues of trust and respect and poor communication outside of abusive relationships, success comes from being equipped to overcome these obstacles without problems, because stumbling over one obstacle after another only leads to frustration and when People feel frustrated and stuck with no path forward, they end up going their separate ways. Our experience over the last 20 years confirms that mastering these four habits helps you overcome obstacles. It is not about being perfect, we are not perfect, but about be intentional in developing habits, will we share the habits? The first habit is to be curious, not critical, it helps you overcome the obstacle of frustration that arises from unmet expectations and we learned this ourselves the hard way.

Our story dates back thirty years ago, when we met in business school. when andrew came to the uk to get his masters degree and ended up getting him his sr. also and don't let the current hairstyle fool you, that was me back then, anyway a few years later we set up a business together and it took us about three months before the wheels started coming off because very quickly I realized I realized that now there were different working styles that were competing with each other and since we now had all our eggs in one basket, the financial pressure was enormous for us, so everything became a problem, even the simplest things, Now for some couples it is the toilet seat up or down.

For us, the biggest predictor was the state of our desks, one was very organized, yes, and the other was more like organized chaos, let's say, and the challenge, problems would happen, arguments when we had to change desks to use the only desktop computer we had. This was 25 years ago, but now, because we are together 24/7, problems will follow us home, so we spend many nights in tension, you know, hugging the edge of the mattress instead of hugging each other, so forget about any physical action we were doing. You didn't even touch your toes back then you talked about papering over the cracks now it was Einstein who said you can't solve a problem with the same level of thinking that got you there so in desperation we looked around and said yes How can we change this mentality?

We did it and we came across material that helped us understand that, in reality, our biggest source of frustration was actually our strengths, just unrecognized, unappreciated and imbalanced, so the number one habit is to be curious, not being critical, it's about investing time and how we are connected. differently so that we can learn to play to our strengths rather than wasting time and energy criticizing differences, so given these differences, habit number two, being careful not to crush ourselves, helps us overcome the hurdle of poor styles. of conflict resolution, our natural struggle or whether fight or flight responses a very self Center is about taking care of myself and my interests rather than being off-center, so we need to literally reprogram these automatic responses by developing skills and habits that allow us to do better in conflict situations to take care of each other through the process to work towards genuine and genuine resolutions, no matter how angry we might be with each other, one of the disciplines we developed was establishing ground rules which are boundaries that They would control our behavior in conflict situations so that we wouldn't keep falling into this obstacle over and over again, for example, we agreed that we would never hit each other, we would never walk around the house angry, and we would never threaten divorce just to be spiteful, let's face it, we will be disappointed and we will frustrate each other from time to time.

To tell anyone who says they never argue, they lack passion or lie through their teeth, but the habit of being careful not to crush each other helps us learn to work together, argue well, treat each other with care, and come out stronger together, sure, and habit number three. Asking, not assuming, helps you overcome the hurdle of frustration that arises from the mistrust and disrespect that can creep into relationships. Going back to Rachel and Steve, it turns out that their biggest challenge was the different perceptions of respect in their relationship, although they came from the same cultural background, Steve had grown up with a very traditional mindset and his expectation was that his wife would go and do for him. what mom did with dad;

In fact, he hoped more than that that Rachel would become best friends with her mom and learn how to do it. be his ideal wife that way Rachel, on the other hand, is thinking on what planet because in her mind they were never going to have a relationship that remotely resembled that of Steve's mom and dads, she now recognizes that they needed additional information to reframe the challenges in their minds, we shared with them material on mutual respect and how to agree on roles and responsibilities at different stages of life and were blown away when literally before the week was over, Steve texted me to say: you know, thank you very much. has really helped us unlock some challenges and have a really proper conversation in years, so habit number three is really about being good at having those brave conversations where we ask and discuss instead of assuming and stereotyping, and that It leads us clearly to habit number four.

Before I correct, it's about learning to communicate real value and appreciation and suppressing our insatiable need to give constructive feedback. When you live and work with someone day in and day out, it's very easy to take them for granted and just constantly be on their back, but as As the saying goes, people go where they feel welcome but stay where they feel valued, so we must be intentional about finding meaningful and specific ways that create warmth in the relationship and that can sometimes just be breaking the deadlock. routine for us. We have been known to disappear in the middle of the workday to go to the movies after a period of intense workshops and 25 years later we still take date nights seriously to keep the fun, anticipation and intimacy in the relationship, otherwise We take the risk. lose the magic and just become functional in the routine of work and talking about kids and cooking and doing laundry and we sign up for more than that so habit number four plug in before correcting oh no let's be real before we say that If we get really good at connecting in our routine conversations, we guarantee you'll do it in the bedroom too, so number four, connect before you correct, is about being intentional about shifting that balance to connect before we correct each other, Now listen, we are not sharing these habits in the same way.

It's good to have these four habits that can literally save lives. Let me share with you how Rachel and Steve's story is almost over. We met them two weeks later for coffee and we could see from their body language that they were in a much better place. holding hands, laughing, things were fine, but when they opened up and shared the experience, we were shocked when Rachel, describing her emotional laws, simply paused and said, you know, I found myself thinking that if Steve continued Go ahead with the divorce, just write. send him a letter, tell him to take care of the children and walk in front of a bus, but by a casual conversation with us and a little information, tragedy could have struck our friends right under our noses, so the reality hit very hard that day, relationship breakup can literally kill us, we are happy to report that Rachel and Steve continue to do well, but we wonder how many Rachels we are missing and with this growing concern about mental health and well-being, why The equipment of relationships is still left to chance exactly?

We all invest in the things we value our education our homes our pensions yet what stops us from investing in our relationships? What would the world be like if everyone practiced these habits of being more curious than critical, more careful than The overwhelming question of asking instead of assuming and connecting more than we correct. Here's the thing: When we all begin to develop and practice these habits, we not only significantly increase the chances that our relationships will survive, but we now begin to thrive as individuals, as families, as businesses. nations and whether each of us can take responsibility for developingthese habits in our own relationships together, perhaps we will leave the world a better place for generations to come.