{"id":256,"date":"2018-11-09T15:59:59","date_gmt":"2018-11-09T15:59:59","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/makeyourrelationshipwork\/?p=256"},"modified":"2018-11-09T16:08:40","modified_gmt":"2018-11-09T16:08:40","slug":"three-relationship-strategies","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/makeyourrelationshipwork\/2018\/11\/three-relationship-strategies.html","title":{"rendered":"Three Relationship &#8216;Strategies&#8217; That Don&#8217;t Work"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img decoding=\"async\" class=\" wp-image-260 aligncenter\" src=\"https:\/\/wp-media.beliefnet.com\/sites\/411\/2018\/11\/toa-heftiba-409692-unsplash-300x200.jpg\" alt=\"toa-heftiba-409692-unsplash\" width=\"489\" height=\"326\" \/><\/p>\n<p>Since I&#8217;m paid to give people advice on the Internet, I take some time out of my day on a regular basis to wander around and read relationship advice elsewhere in this great digital infodump of ours.\u00a0 And I find some truly great, informative information.<\/p>\n<p>I also find some really, really bad ideas, often from websites that look like they&#8217;re from 1996.<\/p>\n<h3>Crying<\/h3>\n<p>I&#8217;m not a guy from the &#8220;crying is blackmail&#8221; school of thought when it comes to relationships: if your feelings are hurt, your feelings are hurt.\u00a0 The problem is, and we&#8217;ve all met them, there are people who open the waterworks whenever something isn&#8217;t going their way or there&#8217;s a conversation they don&#8217;t want to have.\u00a0 Because that solves everything, not having a difficult conversation!<\/p>\n<p>To me, I find this idea problematic because honestly, not talking about a problem doesn&#8217;t make it go away.\u00a0 If it did, we&#8217;d have nothing but fluffy bunnies and surfing squirrels on the news.\u00a0 I&#8217;ve known a few criers in my time, and honestly, their relationships have ultimately not ended well because, well, you can&#8217;t talk to them about anything difficult, and in any relationship, difficult questions are going to come up.<\/p>\n<h3>Passive Aggression<\/h3>\n<p>&#8220;That&#8217;s fine.\u00a0 Whatever.&#8221;\u00a0 Three words any adult dreads hearing from whoever they&#8217;re dating.<\/p>\n<p>Being passive aggressive has two major drawbacks.\u00a0 First of all, when you&#8217;re not saying what you want and how you feel to who you&#8217;re with, odds are pretty good they&#8217;ll miss the hidden &#8220;NOT!&#8221; at the end of every sentence.\u00a0 &#8220;Oh, sure, you can go drink beer with your friends if that&#8217;s what you want to do.&#8221;\u00a0 &#8220;Great, thanks, see you later!&#8221;\u00a0 &#8220;No, wait, I meant-!&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Secondly, it&#8217;s just begging to start a fight over something stupid.\u00a0 I&#8217;ve seen this far, far too often; one person says something passive aggressive, and the second person chooses to either be passive aggressive right back or blows up at the other person for being passive aggressive.\u00a0 It&#8217;s a fun argument to be trapped by when your roommate and her boyfriend are having it in front of the bathroom.<\/p>\n<h3>Clinging<\/h3>\n<p>I have literally come across websites that state &#8220;never let your boyfriend out of your sight.&#8221;\u00a0 How?\u00a0 He&#8217;s got to pee sometime.<\/p>\n<p>In all seriousness, clinging is a bad idea and not just because it will annoy whoever you&#8217;re with into dumping you.\u00a0 It&#8217;s a bad idea because it&#8217;s emotionally exhausting.<\/p>\n<p>I&#8217;ve never gotten men or women who have to be in constant contact with their squeeze.\u00a0 Sure, checking in on Facebook once or twice a day, maybe a phone call, but constantly?\u00a0 How do you have time for anything else?\u00a0 Don&#8217;t you have a job?\u00a0 Friends?\u00a0 The interest in seeing a movie once in a while?<\/p>\n<p>And, of course, it can also turn into paranoia: &#8220;why hasn&#8217;t he\/she called me back?&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>In short, it&#8217;s too exhausting to be worth it.\u00a0 Although I suppose some people have limitless energy in this regard.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Since I&#8217;m paid to give people advice on the Internet, I take some time out of my day on a regular basis to wander around and read relationship advice elsewhere in this great digital infodump of ours.\u00a0 And I find some truly great, informative information. I also find some really, really bad ideas, often from&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":620,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-256","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v23.9 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Three Relationship &#039;Strategies&#039; That Don&#039;t Work - Make Your Relationship Work<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/makeyourrelationshipwork\/2018\/11\/three-relationship-strategies.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Three Relationship &#039;Strategies&#039; That Don&#039;t Work - Make Your Relationship Work\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Since I&#8217;m paid to give people advice on the Internet, I take some time out of my day on a regular basis to wander around and read relationship advice elsewhere in this great digital infodump of ours.\u00a0 And I find some truly great, informative information. I also find some really, really bad ideas, often from&hellip;\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/makeyourrelationshipwork\/2018\/11\/three-relationship-strategies.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Make Your Relationship Work\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2018-11-09T15:59:59+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2018-11-09T16:08:40+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/makeyourrelationshipwork\/files\/2018\/11\/toa-heftiba-409692-unsplash-300x200.jpg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Alex Wise\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Three Relationship 'Strategies' That Don't Work - Make Your Relationship Work","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/makeyourrelationshipwork\/2018\/11\/three-relationship-strategies.html","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Three Relationship 'Strategies' That Don't Work - Make Your Relationship Work","og_description":"Since I&#8217;m paid to give people advice on the Internet, I take some time out of my day on a regular basis to wander around and read relationship advice elsewhere in this great digital infodump of ours.\u00a0 And I find some truly great, informative information. 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I\u2019m Alex. I\u2019m just a normal guy like any other guy. But what makes me different, is what makes you want to keep your eye out for my blog. I\u2019ve been studying social dynamics and personal development for the last 15 years. I\u2019ve helped men in meeting women. I\u2019ve helped men reaching their goals in life and I\u2019ve helped myself develop the lifestyle that I want. You can learn all that and draw from my experience through my blog. Why should you read this blog? The goal is simply giving you the tools and knowledge in how you can change your life and create the lifestyle that you want. Do you want to improve your dating life? Do you have goals you don\u2019t know how to reach? Do you feel that your life is boring and feel stuck? I will share my years of experience and knowledge in exactly those areas. Areas in the past which I had trouble with too. However I\u2019ve found the key to solving those problems and I\u2019m sharing it all here, so you don\u2019t have to go through years of trial and error like me. What is lifestyle development? Lifestyle development deals with every area of your life whether it\u2019s being relationships, finances, health or personal growth. The blog\u2019s aim is to help you create the amazing lifestyle that you want. Through my blog you will be able to follow my experiences and lessons. Articles and videos aimed to educate and motivate you into taking the necessary steps in getting the life you deserve. 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