William Blake Jr. wrote:
> These are:
>
> Caring
> Compassion
> Communication
> Consideration
> Clarity
> Compatibility
> Credibility
> Charitability
> Commitment
> Creativity
> Consistency
> Cooperation
>
> Caring - mutual caring about one another - is the first ingredient of
> anything that can possibly qualify as a love relationship. There can
> be no worthwhile relationship between people who don't care about each
> other, and genuine caring about the partner is the first ingredient of
> any possibly lasting love. Any relationship that is shorn of caring
> turns into exploitation and ultimately abuse, coldness, and mutually
> assured destruction. People absolutely must care about each other in
> order to have any love between one another; and people who don't care
> about one another have absolutely no business being together. Caring
> provides the nurturing soil in which can grow love, as well as the
> partners. It is the first and main ingredient of love - as well as of
> friendship or indeed any meaningful interaction. The partners or
> friends who don't care about you are neither your friends nor your
> partners. And with caring, it is possible to overcome many obstacles,
> as well as many problems in self or in relationship. Caring provides
> the motivator and the soil; other things provide the tools to make it
> matter.
>
> One such tool is compassion. Compassion means understanding where the
> person comes from and relating to them on the basis of that. A
> frequent grievous error that people make is that of judgment rather
> than compassion: Of failing to understand the person's motives,
> experience and ways of thinking before jumping to negative conclusions
> about their motivations and behavior and then prosecuting them for
> their perceptions of them. Few things kill love more reliably than
> lack of compassion; few things are as damaging emotionally. Compassion
> makes it possible for people to understand each other; to relate to
> each other on meaningful level; and to work through whatever problems
> that they may have, in a manner that is forgiving, kind and mutually
> enriching. Some people are compassionate overtly; others become so
> through training and experience, which may sometimes involve learning
> from errors and understanding own shortcomings enough to be forgiving
> of those of another. Whether natural or trained, compassion is the
> bridge between other and self that make possible the lasting and self-
> replenishing flow of goodwill and passion; and with genuine
> compassion, the error of judgmentalism that kills meaningful
> relationships is overcome.
>
> Communication is what makes possible for caring and compassion to
> manifest and to continue. Communication makes it possible for people
> to talk through their problems, to work through their disagreements,
> and to come up with intelligent solutions that take the needs of both
> partners into account. Communication makes it possible for people to
> understand where they are coming from (making possible compassion), to
> express their perceptions and feelings, and to allow each other
> intimacy where there would otherwise be only battling. Communication
> means understanding own feelings well enough to express them and let
> the partners understand each other's point of view. This, in turn,
> makes possible both compassion and caring; it also makes possible to
> solve problems rather than get stuck in them perpetually. Lack of
> communication makes it impossible for people to understand each other,
> which in turn leads to needless conflict and frequent recrimination in
> place of knowing where each other is coming from. And learning to
> communicate - to understand the self, to try to understand the
> partner's perspective, and thus through mutual expression to
> understand one another - can solve most of the problems that arise in
> relationships. With good communication, it is possible to work through
> problems rather than letting them destroy everything in their path.
> Unlike caring (which comes naturally), or compassion (which can either
> be natural or developed deliberately), communication is in all cases a
> learned skill; and learning to communicate in relationships
> successfully is key to avoiding needless conflict and misery -
> conflict and misery that needlessly and unjustly destroy all kinds of
> relationships - and allowing love to grow in the nurturing soil of
> caring and compassion.
>
> Consideration is attentiveness to the partner's feelings and needs.
> That of course is a part of love; and a necessary component also of
> caring. Consideration is what makes it possible on a day to day basis
> for partners to get along. It is what avoids disagreements and fights
> over small things, which fights may turn into something larger as they
> build up. To be considerate of the partner makes it possible to
> anticipate many things that would otherwise lead to fights and to
> disagreements, and avoid making bad choices that wrongly affect the
> partner. All in all, it is a state of mind that makes it possible to
> get through the day without needless fights and resentments; and in so
> doing it makes daily living easier.
>
> Clarity is a matter of understanding emotions and motivations,
> especially one's own. Being able to do that, makes it possible to be
> compassionate to a greater extent. Being able to see self - and see
> the other - and love them for it, is to have contact with them at the
> deepest levels; contact that leads to a very profound and meaningful
> intimacy. Being clear in the mind of the person's attributes,
> motivations, goals and perspectives, it becomes possible to likewise
> do what affects them most beautifully - to be the best partner
> possible, and to direct efforts in the most effective possible manner.
> Clarity is a state of mind that enhances effectiveness; and in
> relationships it is
> a state of mind that enhances effectiveness of love.
>
> Compatibility means picking the right partner and being the right
> person for the partner. It means choosing the right person and being
> the right person. Compatibility does not mean similitude of ethnicity
> or religion or age or upbringing or geography; it means closeness of
> basic mindset and basic propensities. It means being close to the
> partner at the most fundamental levels - the levels, not of tradition
> or adaptation, but of the tenor of heart and mind. And it is
> discovered perhaps best through people finding each other based on
> similarity of interests - in forums (athletic, artistic, political,
> etc) that lend expression to those interests - rather than through
> people finding each other in bars, where the only thing they know
> about each other is that they are both drunks.
>
> Credibility means being trustworthy. It means fulfilling promises; it
> means being able to own up to mistakes; it means refraining from
> expressions of anger and violence that do injury to the heart of the
> partner. It means earning and keeping the trust of the partner, by
> being or else becoming a credible individual. Credibility means
> self-control; it also means character. All these can be developed, and
> there are many ways to do so in the world.
>
> Charitability is a state of basic generosity and openness to the
> partner. It is willingness to forgive; it is willingness to refrain
> from criticism and prosecution; it is a basic kindness and goodness of
> spirit that makes it possible for love to continue in spite of
> possible misunderstandings, arguments and mistakes. It is willingness
> to live
> and let live; it is willingness to be compassionate and forgiving. All
> in all, it is the essence of love - the love that makes it possible
> for goodwill to blossom and propagate and thrive in spite of anything
> that might arise between the partners. Once developed, charitability
> can then reach out to other areas of life and make possible more
> fulfilling existence and beautiful experience of life for self and
> others in it.
>
> Commitment means being dedicated to making the relationship happen.
> This is something that must be done by both parties - both must be
> committed to each other and to the love among each other. Commitment
> assures that people are determined to overcome whatever issues might
> arise, and are likewise determined to making love continue. It assures
> loyalty between the partners; it also assures determination between
> the partners toward making the love live and grow. It is an effort of
> will, by both parties, to persevere in love for each other and in so
> doing to overcome all possible obstacles while also sustaining and
> growing the relationship.
>
> The tenth C of relationships is creativity. Creativity makes it
> possible to come up with original solutions to problems and, rather
> than being bogged down by problems, instead stay on top of them. It
> also makes it possible to have a relationship full of fun and
> excitement in which nobody ever gets bored or settled into a rut.
> Creativity makes the relationship blossom and sparkle and produce
> beautiful fruit; it also makes it possible to innovatively solve
> problems that may arise unexpectedly, for which pat or methodical
> solutions may fail. It is thus the attitude and frame of mind that
> allows both to solve problems and to reach ever-higher into the place
> of ongoing love.
>
> Consistency that matters in relationships means not having only a
> single emotional tone or a single way of thinking or even a single
> view of the partner, but rather being consistent in one's
> determination to be loving to her. Whatever the mood, whatever the
> mind state, whatever the circumstance, consistency is a deliberate
> choice to remain loving and act in a loving manner to the best of
> one's abilities. It is not a matter of having a single mood; it is not
> a matter of having a single way of thinking; rather it is a matter of
> choosing deliberately to subject one's words and actions to scrutiny
> of, "Is this a loving thing to do?" Consistency is a matter of choice
> and a matter of will, that uses the mechanism of deliberate action to
> overpower any bad feelings or bad reactions, or if they do appear to
> make up and grow stronger in the love. Like growth in economic curve,
> consistency is an ever-upward pulling force, whatever the fluctuation
> of risk-based emotional, circumstantial or other factors. It is the
> will that guides and informs continuity.
>
> Finally, collaboration is just what it is: Being able to work
> together. This is something that any given couple has to work out for
> itself. Since people are different, and pairs of people more
> different, there is no single template for what kind of collaboration
> would work for whom. It is something that each couple has to figure
> out for itself as a calculus of their respective strengths, skills,
> likes, and requirements for what each needs to have done and what is
> required for both.
>
> There are probably other ingredients, but these are the main ones I've
> seen so far in successful relationships, and ones that I have been
> called upon to develop in myself.
>
>
> Ilya Shambat
>
http://ibshambat.blogspot.com
