I am sure that at one time or another,
you have had a relationship (or two) to fail. On many fronts, you have been
perplexed as to how and why your relationship failed in the first place. The
question you must ask yourself and at some point answer for yourself is, “How
did I get to the point of being involved in a failed relationship?” Once you
realize that for too long, the problem has been that you have allowed others to
choose you to be a part of their relationships, rather than you having a say
and control over who engages in your relationships with you. You have rarely
made the choice to be in relationships with others, allowing them to choose you
to be in their relationships.
When others choose you to be in their
relationships without you being a part of the choosing process, you allow them
to contribute what they want to contribute to the relationship, as well as how
they want to contribute, and when they want to contribute. After all, the
relationship does belong to them; they chose you! What you allow them to
contribute just might not be healthy for you or the relationship, resulting in
hell on earth and eventual failure.
Once you have asked and answered the
preceding question, hopefully, you will come to realize that what you allow
others to bring into and contribute to your relationships will be based on
their terms, rendering you helpless in making contributions to your own relationships,
based on your terms. You will come to recognize the failures of your
relationships, instead of the healthiness and longevity of your relationships,
all because they are truly NOT YOUR relationships.
Just as you
work hard in deciding the kind of work you do on your job, ensuring that your
boss and your coworkers approve of you, providing you with an excellent and
favorable evaluation, and an eventual nice raise and bonus, you must work even
harder in ensuring that there is harmony, happiness, honor, and approval in
your relationships, by managing what and whom you allow to contribute to your
relationships. If you continue to allow individuals who are observable wrecks, “slackers,”
and “lackers,” including those who lack boundaries, are unstable, and are directionless,
to contribute to your relationships, the outcome of your relationships will be
based on the contributors and the contributions that they make. Whatever you
allow to cross the threshold of your life will infiltrate the very fiber of
your relationships, whether good or bad, negative or positive.
If you allow
others to contribute nothing to your relationships, you will receive absolutely
nothing as a result! If you expect nothing from those you allow into your life
and into your relationships, you will still receive absolutely nothing! On the
other hand, if the contributions of others are based on the horn of plenty, the
results will be plenteous. Your relationships will be filled with all that is
great and good. You must remember that people can only contribute to your
relationships what you expect them to contribute and what you allow them to
contribute. But you can only control the contributions if you choose the
relationships in which you engage, as well as the people with whom you choose
to engage. Your relationship choices should never be based on a game of chance
or checkers, but a game of choice and chess. It’s all about the strategy!
It is important
for you to identify and develop the ingredients, as well as the overall recipe
for what and whom you want in your life and in your relationships. Although God
is the author and the finisher of your life, you are the author and the
finisher of how your relationships will start, continue, and end. You have the
power and the authority to mandate and dictate what it will take for the people
you invite into your life to earn and maintain the love, respect, commitment,
positive communication, trust, and other favorable attributes necessary for them
to engage in a healthy relationship with you. In essence, you will determine
what you will allow into your relationships, what you receive from your
relationships, and begin to dictate the outcome of your relationships.
How do you
allow someone to tell you that God told him/her that you are meant for him/her,
when supposedly you know the same God and He did not tell you that that person
was meant for you? And God will not tell you to allow a fool to direct your
life! How do you allow someone to fill your life with bags containing rocks of
anger, confusion, animosity, hatred, and abuse, when you know that eventually
you will sink? What you allow into your
life, based on the contributions of others will determine what you
receive…exactly what was contributed.
You must decide
to work hard at investing the time necessary for you to ensure that the measure
of the people you invite into your relationships actually fit your needs and
that they accentuate and enhance your life and your life directions. It is
important to recognize that oil and water don’t mix. Toxicity is never an
option and will never result in positive and healthy relationships. If you are
not willing to drink from bottles with cross bones and skulls on them (poison),
why are you allowing others into your life who are offering these bottles of
poison to you? If you allow the poisons of negativity, jealousy, infidelity, control,
and other infiltrators to dictate and orchestrate your relationships, your
relationships will surely fail.
In order to
ensure that your chosen relationships are healthy, positive, and long lasting,
it’s imperative that you work hard on a daily, weekly, and monthly basis to
establish your relationship expectations and for you to become aware of and
wise enough to recognize the “relationship slackers,” prior to allowing them
into your life and most certainly prior to them contributing to your
relationships. The same fervor you display on your paid job must be displayed
on a daily basis in the work needed for the success, health, and wealth of your
relationships.
Although it is
imperative that you work at your relationships, work on your relationships, and
work in your relationships, you cannot downplay the reality that you must also
have people who are contributing to your relationships positively. Along with
many of the aforementioned attributes that you must allow others to contribute
favorably to your relationships, financial resources are also important.
Why are you
allowing your mate, your friend, or your family members to live in your home
without healthy and positive contributions to the relationship? What you allow
them to contribute to the relationship will determine what you get out of the
relationship. And if they are “relationship slackers,” refusing to work or
refusing to financially contribute to the household and to the relationship
itself, you are receiving the short end of the stick. It is time for you to
require those around you to work and contribute financially to your home and
your relationships, just as you contribute to them.
It is also time
for you to require your grown ‘children’ to get off their butts, engage their
feet, their minds, and their abilities to not only find a job, but to also
maintain a job and contribute to the household expenses. Stop allowing your
chronically unemployed mate and/or chronically unemployed adult children to
contribute absolutely nothing to their relationships with you. Stop allowing
them to take up space in your home and in your head, while paying no rent, while
eating your food, and while usurping your time, your energy, and your emotions,
as they display daily levels of disrespect and bad attitudes.
In other
words, it’s time for you to stop putting up with the “relationship slackers” in
your life! Stop enabling your lazy mate
and your lazy adult children in their refusal to take responsibility for the
role they play in their relationship with you. If you have to work inside and
outside of your home and work in your relationships, everyone in your household
should also do the same! What you allow others to contribute to your
relationships will determine what you receive from your relationships!
You now have
the awareness, insight, and understanding as to why it is important for you to
choose the people in your life and to choose what you allow them to contribute
to your relationships. It is now up to you to muster the confidence, the
strength, and the tenacity for you to decide when enough is enough, as well as
when to draw the line regarding whom you allow to contribute to your
relationships, as well as what you allow them to contribute.
Take back your
control, take back your household, take back your zest for life, and take back
your healthy and positive relationships! And if you can’t do it alone, seek
professional help from a licensed relationship/mental health professional. You
deserve the best! However, you have to request the best, expect the best, and
only allow the best to enter into and permeate throughout your life. When you decide whom you will allow to enter
into your life and into your relationships, as well as what and how much you
will allow them to contribute to your relationships, you have made the decision
that you will only settle for what’s right, what’s healthy, and what’s best for
YOU! The ball is in your court; now make your goals!
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