1) BE PATIENT. Building a relationship is like growing and nurturing a plant. If you plant a seed and water it, the next day all you will have is a wet seed. Eventually the seed will grow. First the roots will get strong, then the plant will visibly grow above the surface. The same thing is true for relationships. In the first few years focus on strengthening the roots of your relationship. Patience is the name of the game.

2) BEING IN LOVE means being in acceptance. Acceptance is not easy. Sometimes you will feel like you’re living with a nut. At times you will feel it is just not fair. Accept the people in your life the way they are anyway. In that lies your extraordinariness, your greatness, your generosity. Remember – Resistance causes Persistence. Acceptance causes Disappearance. Accept everything you do not like about the person and it will eventually become a non issue. Resist it and you’re doomed to suffer. People say, “But Milind, I can always walk away – neither accept nor resist.” Sure if that makes sense for you do that, just make sure you don’t keep walking all your life.

3) EMPATHIZE. Walk in the other person’s shoes. Don’t just look at the behaviour of the person. Look at the person behind the behaviour. Who is he/she? What is he/she dealing with? Why is he/she behaving that way? What is missing in his/her life? You don’t have to agree with the other person. You just have to empathize. You have to relate. Get the other person’s world. It’s a recipe for magic!

4) GIVE UP. There are some things you should GIVE UP for the relationship to work. Give up your deep need to be right. Give up your need to win arguments. Give up your old and fixed way of seeing people. When you give up, you create a vacuum in which a new positive energy can come into your relationships.

5) NEVER GIVE UP. There are some things you should NEVER GIVE UP. Sometimes you will get fed up of trying. Sometimes you will feel burnt out. NEVER GIVE UP on your efforts. Never give up the lessons that come with the relationship. And if the person matters to you, I mean really really authentically matters to you.. never ever ever give up on the person.

By the way, you KNOW all this. There’s nothing new I wrote here. Still I hope it helps. Lots of love and respect to you.