Making Great Relationships: Simple Practices for Solving Conflicts, Building Connection, and Fostering Love (Hardcover)

Description

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“50 simple, powerful ways to improve your relationships at home and at work” (Lori Gottlieb, author of Maybe You Should Talk To Someone), based on the latest findings in neuroscience, mindfulness, and positive psychology—by the New York Times bestselling author of Neurodharma and Resilient

Relationships are usually the most important part of a person’s life. But they’re often stressful and frustrating, or simply awkward, distant, and lonely. We feel the weight of things unsaid, needs unmet, conflicts unresolved. It’s easy to feel stuck.
 
But actually, new research shows that you create your relationships every day with the things you do and say, which gives you the ability to start improving them now. You have the power to make all your relationships better just by making simple changes that start inside yourself.
 
New York Times bestselling author of Buddha’s Brain and Hardwiring Happiness, Rick Hanson, PhD, brings his trademark warmth and clarity to Making Great Relationships, a comprehensive guide to fostering healthy, effective, and fulfilling relationships of all kinds: at home and at work, with family and friends, and with people who are challenging. As a psychologist, couples and family counselor, husband, and father, Dr. Hanson has learned what makes relationships go badly and what you can do to make them go better.
 
Grounded in brain science and clinical psychology, and informed by contemplative wisdom, Making Great Relationships offers fifty fundamental skills, including:
 
• How to convince yourself that you truly deserve to be treated well
• How to communicate effectively in all kinds of settings
• How to stay centered so that conflict doesn’t rattle you so deeply
• How to see the good in others (even when they make it difficult)
• How to set and maintain healthy boundaries or resize relationships as needed
• How to express your needs so that they are more likely to be fulfilled
 
With these fifty simple yet powerful practices, you can handle conflicts, repair misunderstandings, get treated better, deepen a romantic partnership, be at peace with others, and give the love that you have in your heart. Making Great Relationships will teach you how to relate better than ever with all the people in your life.

About the Author

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Rick Hanson, PhD, is a psychologist, senior fellow of UC Berkeley’s Greater Good Science Center, and New York Times bestselling author. A summa cum laude graduate of UCLA and founder of the Wellspring Institute for Neuroscience and Contemplative Wisdom, he has been an invited speaker at NASA, Oxford, Stanford, Harvard, and other major universities, and he has taught in meditation centers worldwide. He and his wife live in San Rafael, California, and have two adult children.

Praise For…

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“Rick Hanson has the profound ability to cut through the noise and confusion, providing practical, effective strategies and doable wisdom that will immediately make your relationships better.”—Marie Forleo, #1 New York Times bestselling author of Everything Is Figureoutable

“Written with grace, humor, and kindness, Making Great Relationships is a rare find. The culmination of Rick Hanson’s fifty years of work in mental health . . . this book is a practical guide for our highest selves. Read it, and your life and relationships will be transformed.”—Terrence Real, LICSW, New York Times bestselling author of Us: Getting Past You and Me to Build a More Loving Relationship

“Our relationships are more important than ever, but they can also be full of conflict, strained silences, and missed opportunities. Even if ‘they’ don’t change, he shows you how to step out of no-win struggles, respect your own needs, and feel at peace. A nourishing, useful, and timely book.”—Lori Gottlieb, New York Times bestselling author of Maybe You Should Talk To Someone

“Rick Hanson, who has educated us all about the brain, now brings his thoroughness and accessibility to relationships. Anyone reading this book will know they are in the hands of a master, and we encourage you to trust the effectiveness of the many practices the author provides.”—Harville Hendrix, Ph.D. and Helen LaKelly Hunt, Ph.D., co-authors of Getting the Love You Want and Making Marriage Simple

“The love, spontaneity and vitality of your relationships can continue to evolve in deeply gratifying ways. Rick Hanson—author, psychologist and wise, loving human—offers an amazing guide, filled with potent doable exercises that will bring fresh life to any and all of your relationships.”—Tara Brach, author of Radical Acceptance and Trusting the Gold

“Woven with love and deep concern for humanity, these short entries are packed with simple yet empowering messages that can help our lives, inside and out, flourish and thrive.”—Daniel J. Siegel, M.D., New York Times bestselling author of Interconnected

“Have you ever found yourself wondering how a conversation just went so wrong? Making Great Relationships is a wonderful guide to helping us understand the way to speak up and listen more fully.”—Sharon Salzberg, author of Real Change

“This brilliant new book offers science-based tools to help you thrive in your relationships. In Making Great Relationships, Rick Hanson offers deeply practical instruction on how to befriend yourself, cultivate kindness, and communicate more skillfully.”—Nate and Kaley Klemp, authors of The 80/80 Marriage: A New Model for a Happier, Stronger Relationship  

“Rick Hanson has offered us a treasure of practical wisdom, guidance, and inspiration. His years of hard-won insight shine through these pages like the voice of an old friend or a loving grandparent. I can’t recommend this book enough.”—Oren Jay Sofer, author of Say What You Mean