Do You Want Your Relationship To Thrive Abroad?

When one or both spouses live in a country (sometimes even city) that’s not their own, they are exposed to different circumstances and conditions, leading to a shift in their relationship dynamic. My clients are, in their vast majority, women who moved abroad for their significant other, and by doing that they’ve put themselves in a vulnerable position:

unconventional advice to make your relationship thrive abroad

They left their family and friends behind, who love and cheer for them; they’ve sacrificed jobs and careers, speaking in their native language (which is closely tied to our self-esteem), yes, in many cases even “blending in”. Essentially, they leave the life they’ve known behind for love. This can lead to a sense of loss of identity and safety and feeling lost, lonely and isolated. All of which will inevitably affect their relationship.

When your relationship is going through a rough patch while you’re far away from home, it’s harder to deal with. There’s an added sense of urgency to the situation, as your spouse is often the main reference for you abroad and thus, being a team is important.

So in this post I want to share 6 pieces of unconventional relationship advice that, quite possibly, no-one has ever told you. And yet, in my work with my clients, I found they work everytime! Ready? Let’s go:

1. If you want to improve your relationship, think about yourself first.

Us women have traditionally been taught that it’s selfish to take care of ourselves first and still many of us are struggling with feelings of guilt when we put our own needs above the ones of our family. So let me offer you a little reframe for this: it’s only when you have nurtured and taken care of yourself that you can truly nurture and take care of others.

We all have certain unresolved issues, baggage and insecurities. They come out at those times we overreact, those days on which we feel “not quite ourselves” and those moments we feel triggered, defensive and emotionally charged. Why? We might not know. But we expect our partner, our “other half”, to know how to deal with it and to make us feel good. In fact, we need our partner to be a certain way, to do and say certain things in order for us to feel loved and validated. This is essentially self-centered and leads to a very transactional and co-dependent kind of love, disappointments guaranteed.

Self-care has a lot to do with Self-Awareness: as you start to do inner work and grow more conscious and connected to yourself – to your thoughts and feelings, your triggers, your go-to reactions – you become more centered, less reactive. As you start to understand yourself better, you learn to understand the ones around you better, and you show up as a whole new, empowered version of yourself that doesn’t need your partner – or anyone for that matter – to fill up a  hole inside of you.

Furthermore, you teach people how to love and treat you by the way you treat yourself. Knowing where your limits and boundaries are, for instance, is vital. If you’re not totally clear about yours and able to convey them to others, you will find others abusing them and you suffering as a consequence.

Check out my recent blog post “7 Ways To Develop Your Inner Happy Place” if you’d like to read more about this.

2. When something’s not working in your relationship abroad, focus on what IS working.

Sometimes we get so hung up on one very disturbing thing in our relationship that it really clouds the whole atmosphere and only distances us even more from our partner. In order to be able to overcome a challenge together, there needs to be love and respect, team spirit, intimacy, vulnerability and authenticity. 

So if there’s a lingering, painful trigger that’s causing arguments and just won’t go away, I want to suggest to agree to disagree for the time being. Then, actively focus on the things that work well in your relationship and on making those better. Brainstorm the areas in your relationship that are going well, the activities you enjoy doing together and then do more of them, or do them in a more special way.

This way, you’re strengthening the bond to your spouse, creating happy memories and nurturing the relationship. Once you’ve increased or restored intimacy and team spirit, you can go back to that nagging issue and address it again. You’ll often find that the problem has miraculously improved by then anyway, sometimes even lost importance altogether.

3. If you want to grow closer, look at your partner as if you didn’t know him.

Have you ever gazed at your spouse from the other side of the room at a cocktail party, and all of a sudden remembered why you fell in love with him in the first place? Moving abroad and into a new environment can feel like that, too. Take a step back and curiously watch yourself and your partner as you adapt and evolve in your host country.

As I always say, this is one of the beauties of living abroad, because the standards you typically had for yourself and your family back home, become blurry. You stop comparing yourself so much to your peers, your husband to other husbands and your kids to other kids because the context is different!

This is a great opportunity to see things in yourself and in your family members you hadn’t seen before, and to grant each one the space to develop some new traits without being held back by previous labels.

This is also the time to create new traditions together, away from the shoulds and musts you may have encountered back home. What feels really good to you, as a couple and family? Think about it and put it in action!

4. If you want your partner to change, don’t ask him to.

Nagging your partner to change a certain behavior doesn’t work. But that doesn’t mean you have to put up with everything, after all, living together and sharing your life with one another requires some level of thoughtful consideration!

A much more effective way is to reinforce the good in your significant other, to look at him with benevolent and not critical eyes. It has been well documented that humans will work hard to uphold the positive image another has of them; whereas their motivation to make an effort decreases when they don’t feel valued by another.

So do call your partner out on what (you consider) he does well much more often than on what he doesn’t. Relationship expert Dr. John Gottman talks about the “magic ratio”, according to which positive interaction should be 5 times as high as negative, in order to have a happy relationship.

This is especially important when you find yourself abroad and outside of your comfort zone, spending more time alone together than you might have back home (with friends and family nearby). Be kind to one another. Be generous with compliments. And watch what happens. I believe this is your best chance at inspiring positive change in your significant other.

5. If you want to work on your relationship abroad, don’t try everything.

In my work as a coach I’ve come across this statement several times: “I’ve tried everything. It’s hopeless.” To which I like to respond: “You’ve tried everything you could think of. But you haven’t tried what’s needed to create a change.”

When it comes to improving our relationships, we are likely to do the things that we’d personally appreciate ourselves. But our partner is not like us. It’s a completely different person, with different sensibilities, modalities and preferences. In order to get inside his mind and heart, be curious and put your detective’s hat on. (Disclaimer: As explained in Point 1, you need to know all of these things about yourself, first!)

• What is it that your partner needs, even if it might seem “silly” to you? Finding out what his love language is, for instance, can be very revealing – you can read more about this in Gary Chapman’s book “The 5 Love Languages” or on www.5lovelanguages.com
• What gestures, words and things make him feel loved, respected and happy?
• What do you think are his main values? (E.g. someone who values Peacefulness will act and react very differently than someone who values Power)
• What are his top two Human Needs? (Listen to our “Intentional Life Podcast” episode about this subject)
• Reflect on your happiest times together or on the beginning of your relationship. What’s changed? How are you treating him differently now than before?

Reflecting on these questions and observing your partner closely will give you important clues on how to most effectively bring about positive change in your relationship. You don’t need to try everything. Just the things that’ll really work!

6. Watch your thoughts – they CAN be read!

We tend to think that our thoughts are private and as a result may occasionally engage in a big and juicy internal rant about our significant other. “It’s not like I’d actually tell him that!” you might argue, but the truth is that our thoughts do matter and in a way, they can be read.

First of all, when we’re very close to someone and know them very well, we intuitively read between the lines. Body language, pauses, looks, the way in which a question is formed or the fact that it’s being asked at all… our thoughts are being transmitted to the other, even if our words say something else.

Secondly, repeatedly thinking negative thoughts about a person or incident creates a negative, energetic charge that will manifest in your behavior. You intensify the negative feelings associated to your partner by dedicating so much time to stew over them, even if only in your mind. This will not go unnoticed and make you feel even worse about the situation, causing you to feel more stressed about it. In such a state of mind, it becomes difficult to come up with constructive and creative solutions and you’ll likely feel stuck.

And thirdly, we must not forget that our view of our relationship and of our partner is just that: our view of it. It may seem very real, it may hurt and it may affect you profoundly. But there are many different sides to any story. There is no one, absolute truth – much rather, a bunch of “subjective, co-existing realities”. By feeding your mind with your side of the story only, you make it very difficult to see other aspects to it, to see the positive or even the exceptions in your spouse’s behavior.

So be careful about how you think of your significant other daily and regularly. Because thoughts become things, and they can be read. (Read more about the Power of Words here)

________________________________________

I hope these unconventional tips will help you to create a positive change in your relationship and to overcome the struggles you’re facing as a couple abroad! Feel free to contact me in case of any questions and let me know how these tips are working out for you!