Mel Robbins shares a four-word mantra for relationships: "you're my favorite person." When stress and logistics take over, people become harsh with their partners. Ask yourself if you're treating them like your favorite person.
When life got hard, I became very hard on you. When life really started to beat me up, I started to take it out on you. One of the things that was— that I really struggled with in our relationship is how often when life hardened me, I brought that edge into our relationship. And if you're going to go the distance with somebody, it's really because you have picked somebody that you can do the difficult things with, that you can struggle with, that you can lean on. And if you stop and reflect and think about your own relationship, how often you've blamed stress of the day— in fact, I just did this last night— on how emotional or how volatile or how just mean you might be to the person that you love. And the first lesson that I really learned that is both the reason why relationships end, and it's also the simple lesson that brings you back to the person you fell in love with. And it's this: you're my favorite person. That is the best relationship advice I have ever heard. 4 words: you're my favorite person. If you're in a relationship, can you say that about the person that you're with? And if you're going through a very rough time, what I love about these 4 words, you're my favorite person, is this is the, like, lifeline. It's like a tow rope. that you can grab onto to pull you back to what is still true. Because even when life is hard, that person that you fell in love with is still in there. I just hate my life right now, but he's still my favorite person. And then you ask yourself the second layer, which is, am I treating him like my favorite person?
I think that's the key question. To the extent we can stop ourselves and ask, am I treating this person like my favorite?
It felt like logistics and life took over, and our connection. And this, these 4 words, you're my favorite person, stopped being the central organizing principle of our marriage. And being able to then go, how do I start treating this person like my favorite person again, even if things have gone down, even if there are still a lot of struggles, even if we are fighting about money, which we did for decades.
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