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When you encounter confrontation or disagreements, do you make the mistakes of polite distance, short, brief, and curt interactions, and holding superficial conversations? These are just some of the unhealthy ways many leaders relate to one another. In this article, you will discover 6 tips to grow closer or further apart in relationships, heighten your relational awareness, and shake up your leadership senses.
6 Ways To Grow Closer In Your Relationships:
- Be honest, open, and truthful in your communication.
- Pray, hope, and wish the best for those you are in a relationship with in order to continue in love, grace, and kindness.
- Have a strong desire to work on and be in relationship no matter what. Commit to one another.
- Accept others' shortcomings and faults.
- Desire to know the heart of those you are in relationship with.
- Know your own heart and motives toward others.
6 Ways To Grow Further Apart In Your Relationships:
- Gloss over and avoid the issues.
- Shut down entirely or communicate ineffectively when disagreements occur.
- Pray and hope ONLY the best for "self." For example, look at what she or he did/said to me, "How could they do/say that to me?" "Why can't they just do what I ask of them?"
- Have a zero tolerance, no grace policy for the faults and shortcomings of everyone except you know who-SELF.
- Simply no desire to work on and be in the relationship any longer.
- Impure motives and an unclean heart blind you to the reasons distance is creeping in between you and those you care about.
Awareness Tip: Keep a journal of your daily interactions with others to be aware of how you are showing up and to watch for growth spurts, dips, or stagnancy in relationships.
Kindness Tip: According to a recent study conducted in an elevator, both men and women who were presented with a flower (rather than a pen or nothing) were likely to smile. Give someone you are in relationship with a flower or a bouquet of flowers and put a smile on their face.
Additional tantalizing pointers for consideration:
- How did the relationship start?
- For what purpose are you together?
- How different would the relationship be if you stuck to those intended purposes for one another?
- What could you remove from your life that is getting in the way of you making progress in the relationship?
- What would it look like if you got into the game of what God wants to do in your relationships?
- What are you holding onto that no longer really serves the relationship?
- How does resting in God's timing come into play in the relationship?
You can apply these tips to grow closer and still grow apart because one of the persons in the relationship does not desire personal development and change. He or she simply may not be committed to life-long learning, which automatically creates distance.
Certainly, there are many other things you can consider to heighten your awareness in your relationships. For additional reading on deepening your relationships read Waking the Dead: The Glory of a Heart Fully Alive by John Eldredge.
In joyful relationships,
Karen M. Pina GOD's Coach
(c) 2007 Gifts Ordained By Direction/Karen M. Pina. All Rights Reserved
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