If you’re looking for a book on what it takes to find a meaningful long lasting relationship, then go no further in this “Relationship. Are You Sure You Want One?” book review. This book is not for people looking for a guide on how to un-muddy the murky waters of dating and trying to find a partner.
Instead, the book is actually not so much about relationships and dating as much as looking at yourself first. The thesis of the book is that while having a primary romantic relationship is, of course, a necessary thing and a good goal, merely having one isn’t going to be as fulfilling as it could be (or as you imagine it) without first learning how to be fulfilled with yourself.
After all, another person isn’t going to make you happy or make you fulfilled unless you are happy and you are fulfilled with yourself. If you are happy and fulfilled, and seeking the best you there is, having a relationship with another person is going to be able to enhance those things…if, that is, YOU are willing to commit to one.
About The Authors Of “Relationship: Are You Sure You Want One?”
The authors of “Relationship: Are You Sure You Want One“? are Brendon Watt and Simone Milasas, and they present the book from male (Watt’s) and female (Milasas’s) perspectives.
Brendon Watt is the CFO of Access Consciousness Australia, the Australian branch of the Access Consciousness personal development philosophy that has worldwide distribution. He also engages in speaking engagements worldwide with a focus on parenting and personal development.
Find more at www.brendonwatt.com. Follow Brendon.
Simone Milasas also works for Access Consciousness, as a global coordinator. She is also a published author, having authored three books prior to this one. You can find Simone every week on her podcast, The Art & Industry of Business. Learn more about Simone at https://www.simonemilasas.com & Follow Simone.
Both have international backgrounds in public speaking as well as personal development and business development consulting, so they are well aware of what it takes for people to succeed in business and in life. Their focus, for this book, turned to the problem of success in personal relationships and what was clear was that the ideas of what makes a successful relationship are almost all wrong.
“Relationship: Are You Sure You Want One?”
The thesis of the book is not so much to talk you out of wanting a relationship, but rather trying to get you to set yourself up for a more successful relationship by focusing on yourself first. It does so by presenting both male and female perspectives, so both genders are represented.
A romantic relationship isn’t an end in and of itself. It isn’t even a means. Instead, it’s two lives running parallel to each other and it takes a lot for them to run right.
Instead of hackneyed tropes from religious texts or psychobabble, the authors instead invite you to examine everything you think about relationships from the ground up. Why do you want one? Is it because you want a life partner that will enhance your human experience and share in your life? Or are you after one because it’s the done thing?
One aspect of relationships that it addresses are unrealistic expectations.
If you aren’t “whole” without a relationship, you won’t be whole with one. You aren’t completed just because you have a boyfriend, girlfriend, husband or wife. People are obsessed with the idea of relationships rather than reality. You don’t become “perfect” because of some man or woman, and no man or woman is going to make you into a better person.
People are inherently imperfect and so, of course, are our relationships. You can become better, but only by making yourself that way.
To have a better relationship, you need to have a better relationship with yourself. You have to feel fulfilled to BE fulfilled; you have to feel happy to BE happy. If you want a great relationship, you have to set about creating the things that you want.
Someone else is not going to give you those things. Also, you are not “lesser than” another person; another person is not a “better” half than you. You have a value that you bring to a relationship.
Instead, great relationships are greater than the sum of their parts, but it requires both people to willingly buy into it. To do so, you need to let go of judgment and a host of other negative emotions and open yourself up to being completely intimate with the other person for the good of the team.
The authors contend that, among other things, healthy intimacy includes the following attributes:
- Gratitude
- Allowance
- Trust
- Vulnerability
- Honor
In other words, you have to be thankful, you have to give other people the freedom to be imperfect, you have to trust the other person, you must be vulnerable enough to share your deepest thoughts and feelings as well as honor theirs. Which is scary! But unless you’re open to it, you won’t have a relationship that is as good as it could be.
To sum up, “Relationship: Are You Sure You Want One?” invites you to examine what you think about relationships, and also to examine yourself. By making you work better, you’ll be better prepared to make a relationship work better.
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