Failing to be the Author

Sometimes you fall into relationships or they happen to you because others initiate them or they come with being part of a team or group. That’s always nice, but that needs to be complemented by you being the author of your life and your web of relationships – actively networking, which means establishing relationships and maintaining them.

You won’t always be successful – no one is – but the key is to keep working at it and getting better and better as a friend, teammate, colleague or family member. It’s a journey and there will be ups and downs, so being the author isn’t always easy – but it’s the only way to be successful over time. The pitfall is becoming discouraged or allowing setbacks to undermine your confidence and resolve – taking you out of the author posture and becoming passive.

• Developing your web of relationships is a heroic journey – by definition – and it takes time
• The journey is a rollercoaster experience with lots of ups and downs.
• The key to a relationship is the “fit” of the partners and that is a challenge during the teen years as everyone is changing – lots of moving targets – so “fit” can be a challenge.
• If you’re struggling with relationships, you are part of the largest club in the world – teenagers struggling with relationships. It’s just a natural part of the journey.
• Your relationship with your parents will change significantly as you go from a parent-child relationship to an adult-young adult relationship
• The key will be your willingness and ability to take on responsibility and your parents willingness and ability to let go of control
• It can be a weird dance with lots of awkwardness and missteps and the need for forgiveness and trying again and again to find the new “fit”
• There are very clear characteristics of healthy relationships and very clear characteristics of unhealthy relationships
• Romantic relationships may be a major part of the journey early or they may become significant later in the journey
• Romantic relationships can bring a bunch of benefits and they also come with some pitfalls
• Whether to have sex or wait can be a difficult and confusing decision. The key is to make a conscious choice and there are guiding questions to help with that choice
• Endings in relationships are inevitable and they can be difficult and painful – whether initiating the ending or having your partner end the relationship
• Emotional intelligence (EQ) is key to being a good partner in a relationship. It is the ability to identify, understand and manage emotions in order to relate effectively with others.
• There are three basic competencies that support good relationships – communicating out to others, active listening, and effective conflict resolution and problem solving
• You have a whole web of relationships – and you are like a spider in a web, making the connections and taking care of the web
• Some people will be in your inner circle of relationships and some will be in outer circles, but they are all important
• You build your web by networking – working at forming relationships with individuals, groups, teams, neighborhoods, faith communities, etc. It’s a web.
• Key to networking is being interested in others and remembering the value you bring to relationships
• Social media offers a lot of opportunities to connect with others as individuals or in groups – and it poses some serious threats if not managed well. Manage it.
• There are some natural pitfalls on the journey – giving up too much of yourself to be in a relationship; having too small a web of relationships; failing to realize the value you bring to relationships; and failing to work at networking and building the web (being the author).