Healthy Relationships Quotes

“When you notice someone does something toxic the first time, don't wait for the second time before you address it or cut them off.

Many survivors are used to the "wait and see" tactic which only leaves them vulnerable to a second attack. As your boundaries get stronger, the wait time gets shorter. You never have justify your intuition.”
― Shahida Arabi

“In a healthy relationship, vulnerability is wonderful. It leads to increased intimacy and closer bonds. When a healthy person realizes that he or she hurt you, they feel remorse and they make amends. It’s safe to be honest. In an abusive system, vulnerability is dangerous. It’s considered a weakness, which acts as an invitation for more mistreatment. Abusive people feel a surge of power when they discover a weakness. They exploit it, using it to gain more power. Crying or complaining confirms that they’ve poked you in the right spot.”
― Christina Enevoldsen, The Rescued Soul: The Writing Journey for the Healing of Incest and Family Betrayal

“This is one of the marks of a truly safe person: they are confrontable.”
― Henry Cloud, Safe People: How to Find Relationships That Are Good for You and Avoid Those That Aren't

“As you remove toxic people from your life, you free up space and emotional energy for positive, healthy relationships.”
― John Mark Green

“Through my writing, I aim to highlight the significance of fostering healthy and fulfilling relationships and inspire others to cherish the bonds they share with fellow human beings.”
― Suman Pokhrel

“... to be in any sort of relationship where you do not express yourself, simply to keep the peace, is a relationship ruled by one person and will never be balanced or healthy.”
― Bronnie Ware, The Top Five Regrets of the Dying: A Life Transformed by the Dearly Departing

“make an agreement to exercise mutual control over each other. The unspoken pact between them is, “It’s my job to make you happy, and your job to make me happy. And the best way to get you to work on my life is to act miserable. The more miserable I am, the more you will have to try to make me feel better.” Powerless people use various tactics, such as getting upset, withdrawing, nagging, ridiculing, pouting, crying, or getting angry, to pressure, manipulate, and punish one another into keeping this pact. However, this ongoing power play does nothing to make them happy and mitigate their anxiety in the long term. In fact, their anxiety only escalates by continually affirming that they are not actually powerful. Any sense of love and safety they feel by gaining or surrendering control is tenuous and fleeting. A relational bond built on mutual control simply cannot produce anything remotely like safety, love, or trust. It can only produce more fear, pain, distrust, punishment, and misery. And when taken to an extreme, it produces things like domestic violence.”
― Danny Silk, Keep Your Love On: Connection Communication And Boundaries

“Denial of one's need for others is the most common type of defense against bonding. If people come from a situation, whether growing up or later in life, where good, safe relationships were not available to them, they learn to deny that they even want them. Why want what you can't have? They slowly get rid of their awareness of the need.”
― Henry Cloud, Changes That Heal: How to Understand the Past to Ensure a Healthier Future

“We are all deceivers to some degree. The difference between safe and unsafe “liars” is that safe people own their lies and see them as a problem to change as they become aware of their deception.”
― Henry Cloud

“Healthy people don’t stay in unhealthy romantic relationships. Healthy people don’t ignore red flags when they’re falling for someone, they acknowledge the flags like there’s no tomorrow. Healthy people don’t let go of their boundaries because they make the person they are interested in uncomfortable, they stick to them. Healthy people aren’t passive-aggressive with their partners, they communicate effectively and affectionately. Healthy people don’t change their identity because their partner doesn’t like it, they stay true to who they are. Healthy people don’t tolerate abuse from their partner because they love them, they leave them instead”
― Farah Ayaad

“Both parties can consent to one-sided sex, but that should not be the bar set for a healthy relationship.

Just because it's not rape doesn't mean it isn't dehumanizing.”
― Zachary Wagner, Non-Toxic Masculinity: Recovering Healthy Male Sexuality

“You deserve the level of peace you give to others.”
― Kierra C.T. Banks

“Healthy people don’t stay in unhealthy family dynamics. Healthy people don’t allow their parents to control their life, they live for themselves. Healthy people don’t follow the career path their parents want them to take, they choose the right path for themselves. Healthy people don’t marry someone to meet the expectations of their family, they commit to someone who they love and makes them happy. Healthy people don’t let their abusive family members define them, they seek help and build a better future for themselves”
― Farah Ayaad

“Happiness is abundant if you know how to find it. It is contagious but can easily be destroyed by people who lack it. Be mindful! Draw your boundaries!”
― June Stoyer

“Heal the masculine and feminine energies within you, so you can cultivate healthier relationships with both in your life.”
― Robin S. Baker

“As concepts like people-pleasing and self-care become more mainstream, complex ideas like boundaries are often diluted in ways that ultimately discourage us from building healthy relationships. We’re told that if someone doesn’t bring us “love and light at all times,” we should “cut them out.” We’re told that if someone disagrees with us, we should leave them behind to “protect our peace.” We’re told that if someone can’t meet every single one of our needs, we “deserve better.”

These one-dimensional platitudes ignore the reality that human relationships are complicated. They impede our healing by encouraging us to seek an unattainable standard, and they prevent us from looking inward to assess how we may be contributing to our own unhappiness or disempowerment.”
― Hailey Paige Magee, Stop People Pleasing: And Find Your Power

“Healthy people don’t stay in an unhealthy relationship with themselves. Healthy people don’t talk badly to themselves, they practice positive affirmations. Healthy people don’t beat themselves up, they practice self-compassion. Healthy people don’t compare themselves to others’ perfections, they embrace their flaws. Healthy people don’t self-harm, they go to therapy. Healthy people don’t abandon themselves, they show up for themselves every single day”
― Farah Ayaad

“Obedience can cost you your life or give you life, you choose”
― Raynetta D. Bradley, Journey To Peace And Love: Experiencing Peace And Love In A World Of Chaos

“I was 29 years of age and that was the first time I had experienced true love. Even the love of a Father!”
― Raynetta D. Bradley, Journey To Peace And Love: Experiencing Peace And Love In A World Of Chaos

“A key to whether friendship is good is: Who am I being in this connection? Do I like me? (Never mind do I like you!) Am I liking how I'm showing up? Does this feel good to me?”
― Sonia Choquette

“[Love Wasn’t as They Said]
Love wasn’t as they said…
It didn’t last forever as they claimed…
It is fleeting moments only recognized
By those with sight and insight…
And perhaps only captured
By those patiently waiting as if to see a lightning in the sky…
And, like lightning perhaps, we never know
Where love goes after it strikes…
And perhaps the only love that lasts
Is one that know when to stay and when to walk away…
**
Love wasn’t synonymous with honor
As they defined honor...
It is often the awareness that falls upon us
After betraying or letting down the loved ones…
Love wasn’t holding hands forever,
It is boring afternoons spent together
With no words
And no activities…
It wasn’t lifetime sexual attraction
As many claimed…
It is the companionship that remains
After the hormonal fires are put out,
When the noises of immaturity go silent,
And after the childish quarrels and squabbles stop…
It is the home that remains erected
Long after getting erectile dysfunction…
It that appetite for life after the last egg from the last period…
It is that strange feeling of elation
That may come after what is mistakenly called a “midlife crisis”,
To fill that frightening gap between hope and reality…
**
Love a widow brushing her hair,
On a bus or in a public place,
Unbothered by onlookers or passersby,
As she opens her shabby handbag
And takes out an apple to bite on
With the teeth she has left…
Love is an eye surrounded with wrinkles
But is finally able to see the world
Sensitively, insightfully, and more realistically,
Without exaggerated embellishment or distortion…
**
Love is shreds of joy
Interspersed with long intervals
Of boredom, exhaustion, reproach, and disappointment…
It’s not measured with red flowers, bears, and expensive gifts in shiny wraps,
It is who remains when the glucose, blood pressure and cholesterol numbers are high…
It’s those who stay after the heart catheterization and knee replacement surgeries…
Love gets stronger after getting osteoporosis
And may move mountains despite the rheumatism…
**
Love is the few seconds when our eyes cross with strangers
Who awaken in us feelings we hadn’t experienced with those living with us in years…
Or perhaps it’s rubbing arms and shoulders with a passenger
On a bus, in a train, or on a plane…
It is that fleeting look from a passerby in the street
Convey to us that they, too, have understood the game,
But there’s not much they can do about it…
**
Love wasn’t as they said
It wasn’t as they said…
It is not 1+1=2…
It is sometimes three or more…
At other times, it grows at point zero or lower,
In solitude, in loneliness, and in seclusion…
Isn’t it time, I wonder,
to demolish everything falsely, unfairly, and misleadingly
attributed to love?
Or is it that love burns and dies
Precisely when we try to capture it in our hands?

[Original poem published in Arabic on October 27, 2022 at ahewar.org]”
― Louis Yako

“Most people don’t really understand why love makes us vulnerable, or open. It’s because love, to be fully expressed and through your being, begins to eliminate all the fears, all the insecurities and all the anxieties that are inconsistent with itself.”
― Betty Bethards, Sex and Psychic Energy

“We are never so spiritual that we don't need the encouragement that God provides through other people.”
― Dr. Henry Cloud, Dr. John Townsend

“Both parties can consent to one-sided sex, but that should not be the bar set for a healthy relationship.

Just because it's not rape doesn't mean it isn't dehumanizing.”
― Zachary Wagner, Non-Toxic Masculinity

“In a review of research on relationships and mental health, researchers found that “improving relationships improves mental health.”
Your partner can help you get through tough times and provide stability in your life. Studies show that people in happy relationships have fewer depressive symptoms than those who are single, divorced, separated, widowed, or in troubled relationships.”
― Jaslin & Yusuf Varzideh, Learn to Love: A Couple's Guide to a Healthy Relationship: How to Cultivate Intimacy, Enhance Passion, Strengthen Commitment, and Improve Communication While Resolving Conflict With Your Partner

“Gardens are like relationships. If all is going well, they will constantly change and grow. If we are obsessive and controlling, we will lose the joy in it and miss out on all the unexpected and fantastic things that we neither planned nor even knew were possible. Care without compulsion is the key.”
― Donna Goddard, Geboor: Spiritual Fiction

“We are like a flower that has twelve petals. Each petal represents a relationship type that we need to grow and feel whole. Thus, just like a petal contributing to the wellness of a flower, all relationships contribute to our wellbeing. Healthy relationships are important.”
― Mitta Xinindlu

“Always maintain a separate life that includes hobbies, healthy friendships, some adventures, and self-care while in a relationship. This will make your love connection much more fulfilling.”
― Robin S. Baker

“Healthy people are attracted to those who prioritize and take great care of their own well-being.”
― Robin S. Baker

“Non Toxic Masculinity - Redefining what it means to be a “sexy man” in a relationship and normalising non-toxic masculinity. EYO! Educate Your Opinion.
Steadfast in his love and courageous in upholding good values
Unabashed in showing his affection
Nurtures his partner’s growth
Jubilant in relationships
Accepts and atones for his mistakes
Exudes a beautiful mindset.”
― Mystqx Skye, EYO! Educate Your Opinion