Risks And Benefits Of Relationships

We are fundamentally social beings. We need people. We can’t exist outside of the social context. It is very hard to live all alone. It is next to impossible to succeed alone. It is impossible to be truly happy alone.

We can’t live without love. Love involves other people. So does friendship. So do other relationships.

People have the power to make us happy, to validate us, to affirm us, to support us, to inspire and motivate us. Only others can give us the comfort of belonging. But there is also betrayal, disappointment and abandonment, and death.

People are the greatest blessings and also the greatest threat to our well-being. No, not necessarily the same people. The problem is that we don’t know the true nature of a person just by looking at them, and we never know someone completely.

How to balance the risks and benefits of relationships?

Relationships are complicated, and no relationship comes with a guarantee that it won’t change over time or end altogether.

We need people. Still, I exalt the virtues of the self, planning for yourself, accomplishing for yourself, and living for yourself, because as much as people can make us very happy, they also have the ability and power to destroy us.

All people are transient, except you. How should YOU balance the risks and benefits of relationships? By prioritizing the most important relationship of your life: your relationship with yourself.

It may not protect you from pain or disappointment entirely, but you would survive a change or the end of a relationship emotionally and financially whole.