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With money tight and relatives all around, the holidays are prime time for relationship woes, according to Keith and Maura Leon, the husband-wife authors of Seven Steps to Successful Relationships. They've recently updated their website, onemillionlovenotes.com, to include dos and don'ts for the holidays. Maura Leon spoke to the Monitor about her tips for a happy holiday season.
Are the holidays a hotspot for relationship disasters? Yes, definitely. One (reason) is the stress that people tend to put on themselves with gift giving, with getting the shopping done, getting ready for family coming. . . . The ones we love most can often be the ones who push our buttons.
How do you know this is a tough time? Just anecdotally? Personal experience, really, and professional experience. It's not just the holiday season. . . . The main things that cause stress in relationships are family, finances, work, and all of them come up now.
Do you have any tips for avoiding relationship trouble? Appreciation. People think of it as a little thing, but it's really a big one. We've got a list of 10 things to make your relationship fail . . . and of course you try to do the opposite.
What should you do if you get dumped over the holidays? One thing is make connections with the people that you do have in your life, so again, it's not looking at the glass as half empty, it's looking at it as half full. When should you consider dumping your partner? When the stress does come up in the holidays, you can actually see it as an opportunity to see the things that are creating stress - and maybe that's the relationship. And that's not the end of the world.
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