Articles on Relationship

2. Be Honest
Want the truth? Happy couples think being genuine keeps their marriages rock solid. Some of you, like Sue Griffith, 42, of Rochester Mills, Penn., were candid enough to say that you do "sprinkle the truth with little white lies." And others, like Debra Reinert, 42, of Alburtis, Penn., noted that for those times when the truth may be hard to hear, honesty works best, especially when it''s accompanied by lots of touching or followed up with a hug.

3. Trust
In marriage, you trust because, well, as LaVawn Taylor, 31, of Moon Township, Penn., so perfectly puts it: "I''m too busy to worry about petty secrets and lies. I know that if my husband tells me he is going to be somewhere, he is. If he''s running late, I know he''s stuck at a meeting."

4. Laugh
No joke, happy couples say keeping their sense of humor is the key to joyful matrimony. They use humor in many ways -- to laugh off upsetting situations and to shake off embarrassing moments. Nicole Miller, 22, of Palos Hills, Ill., uses it just to have fun with her husband. "We do funny voices or make funny faces to make each other laugh. If music is on, we''ll dance in a weird way to crack each other up. A marriage doesn''t look healthy to me when the couple doesn''t goof around together."

5. Be Friends
Here, Ondine Devenport, 30, of Akron, Ohio, tells you why chumminess equals happiness: "Let''s face it, love is an emotion most people feel at one time or another. But the combination of being in love with someone and really liking them is far more rare. After my first marriage failed, my few years of dating taught me that without this combination, you are settling for less than you truly deserve."

6. Respect Each Other
To do this, say happy couples, you must respect yourself first. "This helps you maintain your identity as your marriage changes and grows," says Janet Tower, 38, of Northwood, N.H. "My husband and I have vastly different views on a lot of things. We have learned to express them and to respect each other for standing up for what we believe in."

7. Love Uncon***ionally
For many happy couples, the L-word -- spoken loudly and often -- is strongly associated with commitment to each other. Even on those days when it''s obvious that he''s driving you crazy, Ann Rosenberg, 55, of Scottsdale, Ariz., suggests you "make sure he knows you still love him."

8. Compromise
Sometimes you need to give a little to get a lot of happiness. Deb Madsen, 21, of Miles City, Mont., says compromising helps you feel like you''re on the same team. "When we have our little disagreements, we are willing to openly admit where we''re wrong, and can then compromise on situations together," she says. "When our work schedules conflict, we compromise about caring for the children and doing household chores."

9. Forgive
Happy couples are not grudge-holders. Shannon Jones, 26, of Clarksville, Tenn., says, "Forgiveness means letting go of the small, petty annoyances. For the larger wrongs, it must be total forgiveness. You can''t harbor anger or throw it back in his face."

10. Pray
You gotta have faith, and most happy couples have learned this lesson from their parents. Patricia Williams, 31, of Wataliga, Tex., has this formula: Praying with your husband helps you respect and appreciate him, which helps you brag about him!

Compassion: Why Taking Care of Yourself is the Best Way to Help Othersby Katherine Martin
Compassion is a heightened sense of understanding of or empathy with another person. ?oSympathetic consciousness of others?T distress together with a desire to alleviate it,? says the dictionary. When we deeply feel another?Ts sorrow or are outraged by injustice, we are often compelled to action that takes us outside our comfort zone. Our courage is grounded in this great compassion, for others as well as for ourselves.
Dr. Janelle Goetcheus spent a year in preparation for missionary work abroad, but was struck with such great compassion for the homeless in Washington D.C. prior to her departure that she changed course. How could she go abroad when she was so needed on the streets of D.C.? For her to follow this compassionate calling made her feel ?oa little looney,? because she had no answers to all the questions people asked when she returned home to tell her sponsoring churches that she had changed her mind. All she could say was that she knew she must do this thing. She moved her family to D.C. and, without knowing how it would come together, began treating the homeless, eventually founding a medical center there called Christ House.
Compassion for others leads us to take stands against injustice, to fight for peoples?T rights, to reach out, to give. It leads us to what Riane Eisler calls a courage born out of love. Riane wrote the incomparable book, The Chalice and the Blade, which was deemed by anthropologist Ashley Montagu to be the most important work since Darwin?Ts Origin of Species. It gave women a deep spiritual history. ?oSo many of the models of courage we''ve had, ones that are still taught to boys and girls, are about going out to slay the dragon, to kill,? she says. ?oIt''s a courage that''s born out of fear, anger, and hate. But, there''s this other kind of courage, the courage to risk your life, not in war, not in battle, not out of fear ... but out of love and a sense of injustice that has to be challenged. It takes far more courage to challenge unjust authority without violence than it takes to kill all the monsters in all the stories told to children about the meaning of bravery."

And, what about compassion for ourselves? We have compassion for ourselves when we listen to what our hearts are telling us, when we become still and quiet and pay attention to what truly matters below the surface. Having compassion for ourselves means feeling our own sorrow, our own remorse. It means facing our failures, our inadequacies, our weaknesses. It means having the courage to turn around and look upon our shadow, to not back away from knowing our shadow self but to understand what drives it, so that we can forgive ourselves and change. One of the most courageous things we do is to change.
Having compassion for ourselves is hard. We may think that wê?Tre being ?oselfish.? We may feel unworthy of such deep consideration. Having compassion for ourselves as richly as we have for others may be so unfamiliar that we brush it off. It may stir feelings that make us uncomfortable.
Therê?Ts that word, ?ouncomfortable.? Which is sure to accompany self-compassion and courage. Because courage is stepping outside the box wê?Tre in, outside our comfort zone. Lourdes Saab, former chief of protocol for the mayor of Los Angeles, put it this way: ?oYou have to risk stepping outside the circle that has been drawn around you.? I would add to that, ?o ? whether drawn by yourself or others.? Stepping outside our own self-imposed circle is equally risky and requires that we have compassion for the part of us that wê?Tre leaving behind, the part that?Ts become settled and comfortable. Stepping across the line is scary and exciting and frightful and exhilarating, because wê?Tre in unfamiliar territory, in places we never thought we could go, where things are messy, not so comfortable, predictable, where we don?Tt know what to expect.
Once across that line, we stretch to become more of who we truly are, who we can be. Compassion connects up deeply to ourselves, deeply to others, deeply to spirit. And, out of that connection, we dare to challenge, we dare to live more boldly. In the name of others. In the name of ourselves. In the name of spirit.