THE LOST ART OF RELATIONSHIP
of the signs, and was burned. Don’t get burned like me. You can know beyond any doubt that the forming friendship will be tested at some point. Expect it and pass the tests. It is better to interact in person. Online and emails do not count. I met my wife on AOL back in 1997. However, we quickly realized that to get to know each other, it needed to be through communicating voice-to-voice, and eventually face-to-face.
The relationship will continue to be tested throughout its duration, whether months or even years. But to continue on, you have to enter into the next levels, getting to know who they really are.
5. Get to know them
If at the last stage, you didn’t experience any significant red flags and you both have determined to move forward in the relationship, this is the point where knowing each other begins. You never really stop getting to know an individual. Why? Because, as time goes on, you both will mature as you experi- ence different things or you enter new life stages and so on. Your relationship will change too as it grows and ebbs and flows. It is inevitable that you and the other person will have to adapt to certain situations.
Also, people usually do not lay all their “personal cards” on the table at the beginning of a relationship. There may be areas they continue to hold close to them, and over time they may reveal them to you. This comes down to how transparent the person is, which usually comes down to a level of trust. More trust, more revelation.
This is the stage where you will begin to understand what kind of life this person leads, who they really are, and what makes them tick. What gets them up in the morning? What do they enjoy? What frustrates them? What kind of hobbies do they have? What are some of their pitfalls? What do they define as success in their life? What kind of friend or relationship do they need? What are the goals they have set for themselves? And the list can go on. The key here is to discover “what” are they all about.
Knowing what a person is about is all part of understanding who you are adopting as a friend, a companion. There will likely be many similarities between you, whether it is an opinion, history, philosophy, faith, culture, life stage, and so forth. You will also discover traits or characteristics you are not in agreement with, so when you do find these, you decide as to whether you will just accept a negative quality or try to influence this friend for the positive. Just keep in mind that your friend must know this negative trait exists in their life and they must desire to work on it or change it. Otherwise, trying to change