As a child, I remember wanting things other people had—families that took fancier vacations, looked happier, and relationships that seemed easier. When I voiced that envy, I’d hear the familiar reply: “The grass just looks greener on the other side.”

Now that I’m older (and hopefully wiser), I know two things.

First, sometimes the grass is greener on the other side.
Second, there’s usually a reason.

People with healthier lawns—and healthier relationships—aren’t just luckier. They’re using better fertilizer.

The challenge for you and me is to stop wasting our time gazing at our neighbor’s lawn. We need to spend more time tending our own lawns and relationships.

Because relationships aren’t static. They’re never on pause. They’re either getting better or getting worse.

If you don’t invest in your relationships, they slowly deteriorate. Love moves from three stages: lust, rust, and dust.

The same principle applies at work.
Stop building your team and it begins to fragment.
Take customers for granted and they quietly start looking elsewhere.

You’re either investing in relationships—or divesting them.

Why Do So Many Relationships Fail?

There are two reasons.

The first is a lack of effort. Because here’s the uncomfortable truth: relationships are work. Real work. That’s why so many fall apart. Some people simply underestimate the effort required.

Comedian Rodney Dangerfield joked, “We sleep in different rooms. We eat apart. We take separate vacations. We do everything we can to keep our marriage together.” Funny—but painfully close to reality for some.

As I tell the people who take my classes or the leaders I coach, “Relationships are hard. It’s like a full-time job, and you should treat it like one.”

The second reason is a lack of know-how.

Some people don’t know what works and what doesn’t work in relationships.

I tell those people that luck, beauty, and charm will get you through the first fifteen minutes. Maybe fifteen months. After that, you’d better know something—about relationships and the fertilizer that keeps them alive and growing.

The Relationship Fertilizer That Works

From my program The Power of Partnership,  here are four proven ways to fertilize any relationship—at home or at work.

►1. Acknowledge the Awesome Significance of Relationships

Nothing matters more than relationships. Not your career. Not your money. Not your possessions.

If you had everything else but no meaningful relationships, you’d soon question the value of life itself.

 

Actor Yul Brynner said it powerfully: “You’re born alone. You die alone. And if you accept that as total reality, any relationship you have along the way will never be taken for granted and will truly be a gift.”

► 2. Honor the Other Person

Honor simply means this: decide that the other person is highly valuable.

Researcher Dr. John Gottman says no relationship skill works without honor. In fact, when honor drops too low, relationship failure is almost guaranteed.

Here’s the key insight:

Honor is something you give. Not something the other person earns.

Yes, some people are easier to honor than others. But if you want a stronger, more positive relationship, you must choose to honor the other person—especially when it’s hard.

One powerful way to do this:

Write a list of everything you admire about them. The longer the list, the stronger your sense of honor becomes.

► 3. Give—Without Expectation

Giving is at the heart of every successful relationship and every successful business. When people see you as a genuine giver (not a pathetic doormat), they want to be around you, work with you, and buy from you.

Give encouragement.
Give attention.
Give service.

Give a solution to their problem.

Give self-esteem.

But here’s the catch:
Give without strings attached.

If you give expecting something in return, you may get disappointed. Even bitter.

You give because it’s the right thing to do, not because it’s the easy thing to do.

For example, if you say “Good morning” to someone, day after day, expecting him to respond in kind and he doesn’t, you’ll get all bummed out. You’ll probably be telling yourself, “I shouldn’t waste my time on him.”

No! That’s the wrong approach.

You give because it’s good for you.  As the noted psychiatrist Alfred Adler said, “All human failure can be attributed to man’s inability to grasp that it is better to give than to receive.”

And you give because the chances are pretty good that it will fertilize and eventually enrich the relationship.

► 4. Speak Words of Kindness

Words are fertilizer—or poison.

Mother Teresa said, “Kind words can be short and easy to speak, but their echoes are truly endless.”

The same is true of unkind words. Someone asked his spiritual advisor how he could make amends for falsely accusing a friend, for saying unkind words about the other person. His advisor told him to put a goose feather on each doorstep in the village.

The next day the spiritual advisor told the man to go and collect all the feathers. “It can’t be done,” cried the man. “The wind blew all night and the feathers have scattered everywhere.”

“Exactly,” said the advisor, “and so it is with the reckless words you spoke against your neighbor.” They can’t be taken back.

So choose words that nourish. Choose words that build.

Your Relationship Action Step

Choose one relationship that needs strengthening.

1. Write a list of at least 20 things you genuinely admire about that person.

2. When the timing is right, speak words of kindness—share some of what you wrote.

Watch what happens when you change the fertilizer.

One Last Thought

These principles—honor, giving, kindness, intentional investment—are just a few of the skills that make relationships thrive.

In my upcoming NEXT-LEVEL YOU online community, we’ll go deeper into the 12 Pillars of Personal Peak Performance and Thriving Relationships, giving you practical tools you can apply immediately at work, at home, and in every important connection in your life.

Because great relationships don’t happen by accident.
They happen by intention.

Dr. Zimmerman’s Tuesday Tip Issue 1332 [Tuesday Tip] ) The Secret to Strong Relationships (Hint: It’s Not Luck)

To ask Dr. Z any question or to schedule a free consultation, email him at Alan@DrZimmerman.com.

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To receive more information on Dr. Z’s speaking, training, and leadership coaching, go to https://www.drzimmerman.com/.