21 Things To Talk About To Keep A Healthy Relationship

We’ve once established that healthy relationships almost all of the time will lift you up and not pull you down. Of cause there’re no perfect relationships, but healthy relationship has a way of making you feel good with yourself.

There’s an inner feeling of excitement that can’t be explained sometimes and this unexplainable feeling of excitement keeps you going.

Being with a partner who endlessly disrespects you could be harmful and one of the ways to avoid such disrespect is to talk about the following:

Read 11 Ways You Might Be Disrespecting Your Husband

21 important things to talk about for a healthy relationship

1. Emotional growth.

We all grow emotionally at some point and it’s important to share this information about your emotional growth with your partner. If you notice you’ve become wiser, less reactive, more or less sensitive to touch, more compassionate, etc, share that with your partner. This will help them understand you ad be of great help to overcome or challenges. Point out the emotional growth you see in your partner as well.

Read Emotional Intelligence

2. Places you would love to explore.

Do you know a discussion about travel can spark a lot of new conversations? Start a conversation about the places you’d love to visit soon or sometime in the future.

Read Why Are Date Nights So Important

Though it will be more interesting if your partner is a travel enthusiast. Maybe you want to travel to your grandmother’s house, your parents’ house or you want to go on a cruise round the world, just mention it to your partner. This is one other sure way of reconnecting and staying stronger as couples/partners.

Read How To Reconnect with Your Partner For Sparkling Romance

3. Your everyday activity.

This tip is very important for any serious relationship. If you want your partner to understand and trust you, then you must spend time talking about your day-to-day activities. Don’t feel bad to discuss what time you woke up, what you ate for breakfast, lunch or dinner. What you discussed with your colleagues at work, etc and this will help your partner understand what happens when you’re way apart.

There’s no better way to make your partner understand your environment other than talk about what you do every day and when your schedule changes, do well to let them know there’s a change in your schedule.

4. Personal goals.

Collective goals are important in relationships as well as personal goals. It’s healthy and as well important to have individual goals. Note that we all have our hobbies and being in a relationship doesn’t mean the end of your hobby or goals. In fact, your partner should be a driving force to achieving your personal goal. If they’re not, then there’s a question mark somewhere.

Probably you want to lose weight, learn how to prepare Ghana jollof, or learn how to dance, or learn other languages, go ahead and set those goals for yourself and discuss them with your partner.

5. Collective goals to address.

With reference to #4, discuss the goals you want to reach together. Relationships won’t be adventurous without setting collective goals and see yourselves accomplishing those goals together. All healthy relationships should include shared goals for the future.

Whether your goal is to volunteer at an orphanage together or save enough money for a new car, or volunteer for community service, working together to reach your goal can help you stay close as a couple. Happy couples work as a team.

6. Your dreams and aspirations.

With reference to #4 and #5, daydreaming together can be a great activity in any healthy relationship. Discuss dreams you had as a child, dreams you’ve let go, and dreams you still hold onto and not just holding on to them, but working to achieving them.

If you forget your dreams and aspirations because of your partner, I’m most certain you’re in a wrong relationship. Relationships should help us become better. You’re in a relationship to help your partner achieve their goals just as they help you achieve yours while working together towards achieving your collective goals.

7. Your feelings and thoughts.

Note that your significant other is not a magician or a super hero and so cannot read your mind like the ‘Professor in X-men’. Talking about your feelings and thoughts is crucial because it’s an important part of communication.

Be willing to share your joys and sorrows with your significant other. Be willing to talk about what makes you feel angry, when you’re disappointed about whatever, when you feel embarrassed, hurt, etc.

8. Family.

Talking about family can be important. In a nutshell, it will tell a lot about your background and what or how you want your family to look like. So whether you have a close relationship with your family or not, let your partner know. It will give your partner a pictorial view of your childhood experience as well as what type of relationship you have with your family members and help you make positive adjustment or moves to reconcile with them if it was a bad one.

Discuss with your partner how you want your family to be different from your family of origin, as well as which aspects you want to replicate if there are.

9. What you’re watching on TV.

Although watching TV isn’t an active way to grow together as a couple, but discussing what you’re watching can help you learn something new about each other. Talk about your favorite TV series, documentaries, etc. You can calm your significant other by tuning to their favorite TV show. You won’t know their favorite shows if you don’t talk and sometimes watch with them.

10. Values.

It’s essential to share your values with your partner as theirs might be greatly different from yours. You need to also talk about your priorities in life and also letting your partner know how you feel about work, family, education, friends, and leisure time. For instance – what they like to do during leisure. Some do movies, some road trips, some go hiking while some just want a serene environment just for two.

It’s good you let your partner know the things you value the most and what changes you may want to make to ensure that you’re living according to your values. It could be difficult for some to leave up to their values without the help of their partner.

11. Your current relationship.

This might be new to most of us. It has become a necessity to discuss the aspects of your relationship that are working well and also discuss areas that don’t seem to be working. Openly talking about your relationship can ensure your relationship stays fresh and exciting keeping the vibes strong.

12. Vibes.

We all have and operate at different levels. It’s important to let your partner know the level at which you function and don’t drag them into your zone. If you drag your partner to operate at your level, you’ll ware them out quickly and you won’t get the best out of them. Don’t force your partner to listen to loud music if they don’t feel like. If you’re an extrovert don’t force your introvert partner to be like you. It doesn’t work that way.

13. Your past.

Sharing information about your past can be very helpful. Talk about your childhood, past experiences, etc. You can also share how much you’ve learned and changed over the years. Your partner doesn’t need to know every skeleton in your closet. However, we learn from other people experiences and we should endeavor to sieve what we take in.

14. Money/financial responsibilities.

Budgets are necessary for proper spending. You need to talk about your budget/spending with your partner. Discuss your saving and spending habits so they could help monitor how you spend. But you must be open to correction if you have a bad spending habit otherwise you’ll see your partner as an enemy. If you combine your finances, set some financial goals and discuss strategies to help you reach those goals. Else, what’s the point of combine finance without financial goals.

15. Spiritual beliefs.

It’s important to have conversations about your spiritual beliefs especially if you don’t have the same belief. Also talk about your spiritual belief if you fellowship at different center/places/ or different denomination. Be willing to listen to your partner’s beliefs and be open to talking about the similarities and differences in your beliefs because there’re differences. Don’t express shock at what there revelations as they will withdraw immediately.

16. Political view.

You don’t have to be a politician in order to have a discussion about it. You can learn a lot about your partner if you have a conversation about politics. Don’t oppose your partners’ political party if they belong to any but you can discuss as two mature adults. Any healthy relationship should allow each partner to feel respected enough to share an opinion, even if it opposes the other partner’s opinion.

A friend Omonode Nyerhovwo share more on this.

17. Number of kids to have.

With reference to #8, they need to come to an agreement on how many kids they'd have. They can also go further to talk about the spacing and the best family planning method to adopt as it has become a necessity in our era.

Read Accepting Defiant Child's Anger But Not Violence

18. How to cater for kids.

With reference to #17, emmm...I know of a family that shared responsibilities towards their children. The father took up catering for the boys n the mother for the girls. Not saying it should be so but it's an instance.

They could plan what methods to use in instilling discipline so it won't be a case of 'hubby leave Dan alone and Dan ends up feeling daddy hates him and vice versa'.

Read 7 Parenting Strategies for Dealing with Defiant Children

To a larger extent, instilling discipline in children falls largely on the woman but this does not mean the man should be left completely out of the picture. He still has vital role to play in terms of instilling discipline.

Read Model Appropriate Behavior for Your Children

Read Steps To Resolving Conflict With Your Strong-Willed Child

19. Location.

This one is important especially if they're working at different locations. They’ll have to decide who will have to relocate and all. Sometimes, they might be in the same location but would love to settle down and raise a family in a different place.

They can also talk about their career choices. Sometimes this becomes expedient if both parties are career people and have jobs that are demanding.

20. Friends.

It’s good to have friends but well mannered friends would be preferred. Know who your partner hangs out with. Decide on the time to spend with friends together or when you invite them over at you place. You can’t invite friends over without informing your partner beforehand.

21. Likes and dislikes.

Your partner is not in your head and can’t know all your likes and dislikes without you telling them. So you need to talk to your partner about things you like and how you like them as well as those things you don’t like.

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