As I have said before, arguments with a partner generally stem from not feeling loved, valued or respected enough. Humans are creatures of emotion and instances, so it is almost impossible to avoid arguments one hundred percent of the time.

The skill though is to recognise arguments early and if avoiding them is not possible then trying to move through them in the most amicable and beneficial way for your relationship is the number one priority. Below are a number of ways to deal with arguments in a relationship…

Misconceptions surrounding arguments in relationships:

Some people claim that arguments are “healthy in relationships” and others state that “you only argue with the people you love”. Whilst these have some truth to them, they are rationalising the problem from an extrinsic source.

The reason why someone would think that arguments are healthy in relationships is because they produce a profound spike of emotions. A heavy third of attraction is based around creating emotional spikes, and negative emotions in a relationship often SEEM better than neutral or passive emotions.

When someone refers to arguments being healthy, what they actually mean is that the emotional rollercoaster of feeling their partner cares and the bliss of the making-up period is conducive to the relationship as a whole. There are better ways of achieving this though and whilst a strong will and display of emotions is imperative to a long-lasting relationship, you want to always try to make them wholly positive emotions. You don’t have to argue to express your feelings or to have a ‘making-up’ period! [Continue reading this post...]

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This entry was posted on Tuesday, April 28th, 2009 at 4:32 pm by Samuel McCrohan and is filed under Relationships.
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In the conclusion to the article ‘The ONLY way to prevent your partner cheating’, I talked about being the best boyfriend or girlfriend possible. Below is a list of ten attributes that can help you be the best boyfriend or girlfriend possible…

1.) Lead an attractive lifestyle:

An attractive lifestyle is something you should be constantly trying to optimise if you want to live a happy and fulfilling life and the more happy and fulfilling your own life is, the more happy and fulfilling your partner’s will be… Emotions are contagious!

There is a common piece of dating advice that says ‘bring them into your world’ and it definitely carries on into relationships too. Humans are creatures of habit and routine and so there is nothing more exciting than being incorporated into an exciting and new attractive lifestyle.

An attractive lifestyle is made up of many aspects: having a healthy social life with lots of interesting people in it, having exciting hobbies and creating opportunities such as travelling are all wonderful things to be able to include your partner in. [Continue reading this post...]

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This entry was posted on Wednesday, April 22nd, 2009 at 3:34 pm by Samuel McCrohan and is filed under Relationships.
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Are you COMPLETELY satisfied with your current relationship?

The more couples I come across, either through work or simply through a growing interest in the mechanics and details of a healthy relationship, the more people I see who are simply not content in theirs.

I don’t believe it can ever truly be a one-way issue either. Even when there is an obvious dominant person in the relationship, to have an unresponsive or lacklustre partner is equally dissatisfying.

These observations were further brought to my attention recently on a forum that I occasional visit. Someone posted the following sarcastic yet poignant mantra entitled ‘My girlfriend’… It is the last line that really makes me empathise with this person:

“I love how she rarely wants sex.

I love how she never does any housework.

I love how she nitpicks at harmless things I do.

I love how she is gaining weight.

I love how at age 22 I feel like a middle-aged married man.

I love how I feel I can’t leave her.”

For this article, I am going to list a couple of reasons as to why someone might stay in a relationship, even if they know it is not wholly right for them, before revealing the ONLY reason you should stay in a relationship… [Continue reading this post...]

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This entry was posted on Tuesday, April 7th, 2009 at 3:27 pm by Samuel McCrohan and is filed under Relationships.
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Long distance relationships are becoming a far more common setup these days. I would define one, not necessarily by literal distance but more so by how often a couple can feasibly see each other.

This actually happens to be the situation me and my girlfriend Heidi have been in since very early on in our relationship. As it stands, we are rarely closer than an hour’s drive apart and are often up to three hours drive away from each other. However, we both make the relationship work because we both WANT to make it work! Although every relationship is different, here are some general pointers for managing a long distance relationship…

Being realistic about the relationship:

You want to be realistic regarding your relationship as soon as possible and ideally before anything becomes too serious. Once people become too attached to one another, it’s a lot harder to think logically about specific terms and desires. You want to decide as soon as possible what is really going to work for you. [Continue reading this post...]

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This entry was posted on Thursday, April 2nd, 2009 at 3:05 pm by Samuel McCrohan and is filed under Relationships.
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One of the biggest hurdles to overcome when dating an attractive woman is accepting that other people will find her attractive and as a consequence, will try and hit on her.

I had it especially hard as my girlfriend was a freshman at University when our relationship first started becoming serious. This is a place where there are obviously a lot of sexually-charged, inebriated guys who don’t all necessarily have the best morals yet when it comes to dating. When I visited my girlfriend during this time, I would come up against a lot of situations where she was getting hit on and found several ways to effectively deal with it, both emotionally and in practice…

Take pride that she is attractive to other people:

Think honestly if you would rather date someone who no one ever showed any interest in, or someone who everyone wishes they were with? It is a massive COMPLIMENT to you if someone hits on your girlfriend.

As I’ve stated before, flirting within certain boundaries is harmless and it actually invigorates a woman to know she is still desirable to men, so let her have this non-judgemental validation. I remember talking to one of my older brother’s female friends a while back (they are around the thirty year old mark) and she said her biggest fear was to no longer have guys show interest in her as it would be a sign that she is becoming old and unattractive. Embrace the fact that your girlfriend is attractive and be proud to show her off to the world, knowing ultimately that she is with YOU! [Continue reading this post...]

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This entry was posted on Monday, March 30th, 2009 at 3:41 pm by Samuel McCrohan and is filed under Relationships.
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I actually disagree that there is such a thing as a ‘bad patch’ in a relationship. Every relationship is made up of individual moments, which are guided by how each person in the relationship is feeling at each particular moment. However, a lot of couples refer to a consistent spell of negative emotions in their relationship as a ‘bad patch’. There are several ways to become more conscious about these situations and ultimately decide how best to rectify them…

The main cause of bad emotions in a relationship:

The main catalyst for bad emotions in a relationship and what constitutes for 99% of those emotions is a feeling of inadequate validation from your partner, or to put it another way, not feeling loved enough!

Think back to all the times you have felt even the slightest bit of resentment towards your partner and I imagine you can make this theory fit. Even seemingly trivial acts in a relationship can contribute towards this. Something inconsequential such as your partner not showing enough interest in something you’ve achieved, or your partner not taking the time to understand your point of view can incite these initial feelings of undetected resentment. Often even a justifiable reason, such as being overwhelmed or busy, cannot counteract the feeling. [Continue reading this post...]

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This entry was posted on Monday, March 23rd, 2009 at 3:47 pm by Samuel McCrohan and is filed under Relationships.
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Being cheated on, or the FEAR of being cheated on is one of the primary crutches in a relationship, and ultimately destroys a number of them. I personally have never cheated on a girlfriend and to the best of my knowledge, have never been cheated on either… but that’s not to say that the irrational fear of someday being cheated on occasionally crops up with me too. First I am going to list a couple of instinctual techniques that both men and women frequently use as clear tactics to settle these fears of cheating. I will explain why each one is not the best course of action and then reveal to you the ONLY way you can prevent your partner cheating on you…

First, what to try and avoid doing…

Keeping tabs on your partner:

This is a really common one. I remember a few years back when I was out with some old friends for a ‘lad’s night out’. Obviously, any girlfriends were politely not invited and all was set for an epic, fun night in our favourite nightspots. One of my friends (who I shall call John for the sake of privacy) was a confident and intelligent guy, who had acquired himself a seemingly lovely girlfriend and they were now in their first year of living together. [Continue reading this post...]

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This entry was posted on Wednesday, March 18th, 2009 at 12:17 pm by Samuel McCrohan and is filed under Relationships.
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Does the perfect partner exist? Yes. Will you ever find them? Unlikely. I do believe however, that with a degree of constructive searching, you can find someone who is VERY close to that elusive perfect partner. Here are some ways that you can skew the odds in your favour of finding that perfect match…

Know exactly what you are looking for:

Often people jump into relationships far too easily. Time and time again I hear from friends of mine (for some reason this comes more from my female friends) that they really want to be in a relationship… and then the next minute, at the first opportunity, they’re actually in one. Knowing you want a relationship is not enough if you actually want to find someone who really fulfils all your criteria for a suitable partner. Rarely do people really sit down and think about what they want in a partner, expecting their dreams to be satisfied through blind faith alone. [Continue reading this post...]

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This entry was posted on Saturday, March 14th, 2009 at 11:24 am by Samuel McCrohan and is filed under Relationships.
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One of the main reasons why relationships fail in the short term is because they never really got started in a way that represented the relationship as something long-lasting. A lot of relationships decline as they can’t sustain, or they deviate away from the core foundations that they were built on. Starting a relationship in the best possible way is key to making it a lasting and fulfilling relationship, as well as knowing pretty early on if it really is the right relationship for you…

A SUPERB metaphor for relationships:

As a general rule of thumb and from my own personal experience of relationships, whatever you set in place for the relationship in the beginning will remain in place in the long term. What a lot of guys will do is be the nice, doting boyfriend early on, who will do whatever his new girlfriend wants and generally try to impress her as much as he can. Then, once he feels secure enough in the relationship, he will start to slack off and take a more dominant stance. He will then wonder why this does not get the same reactions he is used to. [Continue reading this post...]

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This entry was posted on Wednesday, March 11th, 2009 at 7:48 am by Samuel McCrohan and is filed under Relationships.
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