Relationship Advice - Don't Compromise Your Values

Relationships are an important part of our lives. Having good relationships with our friends and family and the interaction with other people is one of the things that make life interesting and fun. When issues or problems come up in a relationship, many of us will look for some good relationship advice.

There is no shortage of relationship advice out there today. There are tv and radio shows, websites, online forums, books, and magazines which all claim to have the answers to your relationship problems. Some of them do give out solid and useful advice, while some are merely in it for the money. Be very careful who you listen to.

Let me give you one piece of relationship advice here. I hope you take it to heart and use it:

Don’t compromise your deeply felt beliefs for another person. It will completely ruin your relationship.

You may be wondering what I mean by that, so let me explain. Relationships will have a certain amount of give and take involved. There are going to be times when a sacrifice or compromise is necessary to help resolve a situation. So there will be times when we accept what the other person wants, even though we don’t feel it’s the best solution.

We all have a certain set of deeply held core values. They are there, even if you are not completely aware of them. These are the things you believe are just wrong and that you would ‘never’ do. For example, vegetarians have certain things they just don’t eat. For them, this is a non-negotiable adjustment. Other people might feel that having sexual activities with people outside of their primary relationship is wrong. This is one of their non-negotiable items.

What happens to the relationship when the limits of what’s acceptable get blurred or broken? Perhaps someone asks you to cross the line and they are very persistent about it. You have two choices here, compromise your values or end the relationship. If you decide to cross the line and compromise, you are actually choosing to end the relationship anyway.

Compromising a core value is going to make you very angry with the person who insisted on the compromise. You will also be angry with yourself. You are going to feel as if your values and opinions don’t matter at all to them. The hurt and anger you will feel is going to destroy the relationship. So both of you lose.

Let me leave you with one last bit of relationship advice. Stick to your guns when it comes to your core values. Anyone who tries to badger you or talk you into doing things you know are wrong for you doesn’t have your best interests at heart anyway. They are being selfish. Someone who truly cares for you will be able to accept a ‘no’ answer if means that much to you.