Unhealthy Vs Healthy Relationships
As human beings, each of us has the innate disposition towards survival, and the relationships we engage in, impact not only our levels of functioning in the world, but can also become the deterministic factor of how well we progress ourselves.
When family members and friends provide us with the psychological, material, emotional and spiritual support we need to thrive, we have a better sense of what benevolent socialization looks like and are better apt toward developing the tenets of healthy social habits. We also have better physical and mental health than when we are entangled in social groups who use, abuse, exploit, extort, and emotionally or psychologically harm us[1].
Negative or unsupportive social structures and social group entanglements are more harmful to us than healthy social support is helpful or beneficial, evidenced by the damaging trends we witness resulting from broader sociological anomalies, such as racism and oppression, homophobia, and gender or religious discrimination[1].
There is a far higher degree of familial degradation and poor social and psychological functioning of those who are subjected to cruel, inhumane, abusive, or otherwise destructive socializations, whether carried out by individuals or collectively within groups. And if subjected to harmful relationships long enough, they can permanently impede or stifle our developmental, and psycho-social functioning.
In fact, mortality, morbidity, depression and other undesirable health related outcomes have been widely associated with the lack of healthy relationships and supportive social groups[1].
In understanding what supportive healthy relationships are and likewise what they aren't we are better equipped to foster relationships that allow us to meet not only our survival needs, but also our need to self actualize - making way for us to thrive in the world and reach our highest potential with a sense of wholeness and wellness.
Tenets Of Healthy Relationships.
Healthy Relationships and socializations are relationships with others that promote:
A Healthy Sense Of Self– Healthy relationships help promote and cultivate a sense of well-being, by encouraging a healthy sense of self-identity and self-esteem within the relationship. Those who love and support us act in ways that help us to preserve our individual nature.
Open Communication– Being able to openly express when something is hurting us or is harmful to us, or when someone has violated our boundaries, is respected in healthy relationships.
Likewise, feeling safe enough to openly communicate our needs so as to resolve conflicts without hard feelings, resentments, or the fear of retaliatory actions being waged against us are all signs of healthy relationships.
Reciprocity– There is equity within the relationship where everyone is getting there needs met. Resources shared aren't used to enslave, entrap, or otherwise entangle or create servitude scenarios.
Team Work Principles– Those within the relationship function from the principles of teamwork, where there is a collective effort to ensure that each member within the group succeeds and is supported in a way that helps them to accomplish both individual and team or group-oriented goals.
Economic Stability– When we are constantly in survival mode, it is significantly harder for us to self actualize and use our natural graces and talents to progress ourselves towards meeting our personal and professional goals. Relationships that help us to achieve economic stability, give us the chance to focus our energy not only on those things that strengthen our survival efforts, but also allow us to cultivate a sense of satisfaction, pleasure and well-being in life, that we can share with our loved ones, as opposed to exhausting our energy on meeting our primitive needs.
Learning And Self Improvement– Those who genuinely love and care for us, support our efforts to sharpen and improve our talents and abilities in both personal and professional arenas. When our friends and family support and encourage our personal growth and development or the educational or professional training goals we seek to help ourselves build pliable talents, they are jointly supporting our efforts to equip ourselves with the faculties necessary to help us prosper in the world.
Unconditional Communal Support– It is inevitable that we face trials and tribulations, as we seek to progress ourselves. Having the support we need when we face life's challenges can mean the difference between successfully overcoming our challenges versus succumbing to them.
The support we receive from benevolent social groups, helps us to maintain healthy levels of self-esteem and can even give us the strength and support necessary to overcome difficult or adversarial circumstances.
Trust– Relationships built on the principle attributes of honesty and integrity, promote trust. In healthy socializations, there are no hidden agendas or facets that seek to cause harm to anyone within the group.
Unhealthy Relationship Dynamics
Efforts To Manipulate, Control , Or Strip Personal Identity– When we are engaged in healthy relationships, we should feel comfortable enough to express the authenticity of who we are within the relationship. It not only allows for authentic connection, but also allows us to maintain our sense of personal identity. In unhealthy or abusive relationships, the social dynamics within the relationship are those that seek to manipulate or control other members within the relation or group, in ways that violate our distinctive characteristics or attributes, in an effort to maintain an uneven exchange of reciprocity within the relationship. In other words, the person or group within harmful relationship dynamics seek only to get their own personal needs met, while other members might be denied their specific needs, made to believe that their views, opinions, or ideologies are inadequate, or drained of their energy and resources. The dynamics of manipulative or exploitative relationships are almost always one-sided.
Lack Of Respect– In a relationship where there is a power struggle or where the equality and equity based on mutual respect for one another within the relationship is diminished, there are tenets of a lack of respect within the relationship. This can promote resentments, rivalry or otherwise competitive and harmful behavior to be carried out against one another within the social dynamic.
Slave-Master Dynamics– Oppressive and exploitative relationships or relationships built or forced with the aim to abuse, use, extort or otherwise drain a target of resources are examples of unequal or vampiric relationships. In this dynamic, others within the group seek to maintain a sense of power, entitlement or to create and maintain a caste dynamic within the relationship. Usually targeted members within these groups are viewed as unequal, making way for abusive or otherwise unhealthy or unfair treatment to ensue.
Misogyny, predatory feminism and romance scams are all examples of this dynamic. There are usually high levels of manipulation, overt or covert abuse tactics, triangulation and deceptive behavior hidden beneath the surface within the relationship - and coercive control is almost always the primary goal.
Minimization– In unhealthy relationships, predatory or abusive behavior is minimized, either by the person or group, in ways that act to subvert normal responses to abusive behavior and can diminish our perception of what acceptable versus abusive behavior is. This can have a profound impact on a targets self-esteem, as it distorts both the reality and severity of harmful social structures.
The health of a relationship should never be defined by how well we tolerate abusive, threatening or otherwise disrespectful behaviors from others. When we aren't getting our needs met within a relationship or when others within the relationship minimize or deny our feelings and social needs, they are sending us the signal that our thoughts, ideas, likes or dislikes don't matter.
Minimization Can Look Like:
Avoiding responsibility or denying harmful actions.
Challenging or seeking to sway or change socialization habits or views.
Instilling fear or apprehension of expressing disagreements.
Offering apologies without changed behavior.
Sabotaging or minimizing personal or professional goals.
Forced unhealthy gender roles or ideologies contrary to our own beliefs.
The Power To Choose
One of the best things we can do for ourselves is to avoid relationships that hurt us. Learning to foster healthy relationships can give us a sense of security and happiness, while also helping us to progress our personal and professional goals, while nurturing our physical, physiological, psycho-emotional and spiritual wellness needs in ways that volatile or unhealthy relationship dynamics simply can't.
In being able to gage relationships that can meet us where we are and help us expand, we foster so much more than mere socializations with others, as they serve to significantly help us increase our survival efforts.
The tenets of benevolent relationships with others are those that we not only share emotional connections with, but likewise those who we share personal and professional values with as well, as these factors reduce the risk of “tug of war” types of socializations where there are conflicts in the fundamental goals of its members, causing unfavorable social strain, that can prove harmful in many ways.
Unhealthy, toxic or otherwise volatile friendships and familial socializations have the ability not only to bring out the worst in us, but they can also stifle and hinder our personal and professional progressions in ways that can prove irreparable. The rule of thumb is that we learn good values and life skills from healthy people, and we learn unhealthy and dysfunctional habits from unhealthy people and relationship dynamics.
Our friends and family, or those who we rely on for psycho-social and economic support, should prove to be benevolent forces in our lives. And while there isn't necessarily a one-size fits all protocol for what supportive relationships look like, good natured socializations encourage us to be ourselves and help to bring out the best in all we do, as those who recognize and foster the good within themselves, help us to do the same.
It is imperative that we choose our relationships with prudence and care, as the quality of the lives we live depends on them.