Back in the days i have written my opinions about communication in my blog. Because i think the first thing we need to be able to live with other human beings is a functional and strong communication. But i have said that communication happens over a relationship. I also mentioned that you can write a whole book about the concept of relationships. In this post, i have tried to write my base opinions about relationships from different perspectives. This has been a bit of a complicated post but aren't relationships also complicated :D
What i understand from relationships is 2 people to establish some sort of a connection over a topic during some time of their lives. For example, work relations, friendship, neighborhood, marriage, family relations ...etc. There are also other types of relationships where people take advantage of each other or single sided relationships. But since they are abnormal, they are not part of this post. I say the relationship is the connection that carries communication, but you can assume it is like a road or a bridge or a string. I will mention it as bridge in this post.
But the first thing i would say would be this: Relationship is a serious topic. But unfortunately people aren't even careful about what they say these days. This seriousness problem is a whole other topic. I have a blog post called the concept of once. It is strange to see people making mistakes that they can only make once. Of course, relationships are suffering from this negligence.
Relationship is a daring game. You can't know what will you discover on the other side while establishing a relationship. You may face a very unpleasant world in the end. Thus, the bridges may wear out or be destroyed over time. Or it is also possible to end it with communication like civilized humans without destroying everything.
You may not initialize a relationship like flipping a switch nor end it by cutting it with a knife. I mean burning the bridges may not be as easy as you think. I prefer not wasting anything in this world. You shouldn't create a relationship if you are not meant to use it to the end. Because maintaining, or rather properly maintaining a relationship, is a serious business. If you want, you can have a relationship with fights or hate but wasting our precious joy in this life is also nonsense.
Sometimes, the nature of the relationships can change and evolve into a different state. This doesn't always mean a bad thing. After communicating and getting to know the opposite side, your relationship might get stronger or weaker. Or one side of the relationship may change and stop communicating with the other as usual. You may need to adapt to these changes or maybe end your relation if it deems necessary.
I think it is important to ask why did we create this relationship. To take or to give? Are we the the always giving side or the always expecting side. You have to avoid being selfish or being crushed or exhausted. There has to be a balance. Also, sometimes people use their relationship as a means to their purposes or find relationships that suit their purposes. Which one do you think makes sense? Both are bad in my opinion :) The first one is manipulation, the second one is egoism. Let's take a look at different types of relationships.
Some relations are established not to communicate, but to keep it on the side and use if necessary. Work relations might be in this category. They are actually falling out of the scope of this post. Because their nature shapes them as connections between entities rather than human relations. They usually don't have obligations to obey some ideals like normal relationships. Even though, since the connected parts are humans, it is not nice to give the impression "you are merely a contact for me".
Some relationships are mandatory and can't be revoked. This is the situation that tests the humankind the most. You have a mom and dad just when you are born. Then you have the potential to have relationships with your relatives. Then you would have friends or enemies in your class in your school, since you can't just stay on the sidelines. You have relationships with your teachers. You have relationships with your colleagues or superiors. You have relationships with your neighbors. You have a marriage relationship with your wife to maintain for the rest of your life. We are surrounded with relationships :)
You can't single sidedly end these types of relationships, you have to keep them going. As a matter of fact, people would like to just get rid of the relations they don't like and put new relations instead, like lego parts. That is why being a human and communicating over a relationship is coming into picture here. It separates us from animals. You would need empathy in relationships. You should avoid crashes and damaging the bridges you have. It is even possible that you may start your relationship with the wrong foot from the beginning.
The toxic relationships that start with manipulation are examples of these. The bridges are built with care but used carelessly. There are lots of crashes, it is used roughly and the other side becomes the victim of the relationship, rather than the participant. Even though we can thoroughly get to know the person after some time of our relationship, we should be avoiding the ones with a dirty slate behind them. But still, we may also make other mistakes about relationships.
We have something called loneliness epidemic in this century. This statement means people are having their experiences alone or living certain parts of their life alone, even though it is easy to connect with others thanks to internet these days. For example, having a couple of friends but not having intimacy with them. Or being married but not having a meaningful place in the other participants life. These are most common symptoms of this 21st century syndrome.
The trouble here is not the technology or this era of the world. There is most certainly some amount of effort and sacrifice in the term relationship. If it is not a pathological relationship, people would not like to be the one always giving. They want to be receiving too. But if you go overboard, people want to be always receiving or they just don't ever want to be giving. This is unfortunately the most common case today. We have to work on the things we can present, like effort or care or sacrifice or time.
The expectations are important parts of relationships. We have lots of expectations or beliefs or prejudice in this life. We act on our expectations while inside a relationship we build. But then disappointments come in. But it may be less destructive if we establish our relationship without expectations and work more on the communication. Expectations are like half transparent papers. The more they gather, the less you can see the other side.
People usually neglect the nature of their relationship and try to shoot messages to the other side. But if they just observe the messages they receive, they can understand what kind of bridge is built in-between. Maybe it is a one way bridge, maybe it is a very weak one, maybe it is built with very different expectations... Thus, all the messages are just disappointments. Unfortunately, people are trying to force their way to the other side instead of looking at the process from the beginning. This is kind of selfish.
At the end of my post, i would recommend you to glance over your life. How and why do you have relationships with others in this world? How are you using these relationships? We sometimes unintentionally have non-ideal relationships. There is a good chance that you are not the one that damages or wears out the relationship or uses it for self benefits, if you are honest to yourself and if you don't have ill intentions. I mostly have a one way relationship with my readers. I write to you to try and give you new ideas. Let's not burn this bridge :D See you at the next post :)
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