How to Improve Your Relationship

How to Fix a Relationship in Five Steps

You can fix most struggling relationships by working through five steps in order. Each step links to the guide that covers it in depth.

1. Check that it is safe and worth fixing. If you feel afraid of your partner, or they control your money, phone or friends, stop here and talk to an advocate. The should I stay quiz helps you weigh effort, respect and the future you each want.
2. Name the main problem together. One or two sentences you both agree on, such as “We stopped spending time alone and fight about chores every week.”
3. Change how you argue. Start complaints gently, take breaks when a fight overheats, and drop contempt. Our communication guide has the scripts.
4. Repair any breach of trust. Lies, hidden money and broken promises need their own plan. See how to rebuild trust.
5. Rebuild the good parts. Daily attention, appreciation and time alone together. Our spice up guide covers bringing back romance.

If you try these for a few weeks and stay stuck, add a couples therapist. If you have tried with help and you still feel unhappy most of the time, our guide on how to save a relationship covers when to stop trying.

How to Improve Your Relationship When Nothing Is Broken

Improving a relationship that is basically fine takes the same habits as fixing one, done lightly and often. You do not need a crisis to start.

Small changes that make a difference in most relationships:

• Respond to bids. A bid is a small reach for attention, like “Look at this.” The Gottman Institute reports that in a six-year follow-up of newlyweds, couples who stayed married turned toward each other’s bids about 86% of the time, compared with about 33% for couples who later divorced.
• Say what you appreciate. Name one specific thing your partner did, every day.
• Hold a weekly check-in. Fifteen to thirty minutes on a set day. Our relationship check-in questions give you a script to start with.
• Plan time alone. A weekly date, at home or out, with phones away. The date night ideas list options at any budget.

Most Couples Start by Changing How They Argue

Changing how you talk is the usual first step in fixing a relationship, because the way you argue shapes everything else. John Gottman’s research names four habits that predict relationship trouble: criticism, contempt, defensiveness and stonewalling.

Each one has an antidote. Gentle start-up replaces criticism, daily appreciation replaces contempt, taking responsibility replaces defensiveness, and calming down before you continue replaces stonewalling. In Gottman’s research, stable couples kept about five positive interactions for every negative one during conflict.

Not every problem gets solved. The Gottmans report that about 69% of relationship conflicts are perpetual problems rooted in lasting differences. The goal for those is calm, repeated conversation. Our communication guide covers all of this with word-for-word examples.

Being a Better Partner

Being a better partner looks different depending on where you are in the relationship. We wrote three guides so the advice fits your situation instead of a stereotype.

All three apply to same-sex couples as well. Most of the advice in each one works for any partner, so read whichever matches your stage of life.

Rebuilding Trust

Trust breaks in many ways: a lie about where you were, hidden debt, promises broken over and over, or jealousy that led to snooping. The repair follows the same pattern each time. The behavior stops, the full truth comes out once, and the partner who broke trust keeps small, checkable promises for months.

Our rebuilding trust guide gives you six steps, scripts for the first conversation, and a free printable worksheet. If the breach was an affair, start with our guide to rebuilding after cheating, which covers the extra phases infidelity needs.

When to Get Couples Therapy

Couples therapy helps when you keep having the same fight, when trust is broken, or when one of you is close to leaving. A 2020 meta-analysis by Roddy and colleagues in the Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology found large improvements in relationship satisfaction for couples in therapy. Waitlisted couples did not significantly improve.

Video sessions make therapy easier to fit around work and children, and they let long-distance couples join from two places. Our online couples therapy guide compares ReGain, Talkspace and private therapists, lists the questions to ask before you book, and explains when therapy is the wrong choice.

When Fixing the Relationship Is Not the Goal

Some relationships should not be fixed. Couples counseling is usually not recommended while abuse is happening, and no amount of effort from one partner fixes control, threats or violence. If you are afraid of your partner, talk to an advocate at the National Domestic Violence Hotline by calling 1-800-799-7233 or texting START to 88788. Young people can reach love is respect at 1-866-331-9474 or by texting LOVEIS to 22522.

Other reasons to stop trying include a partner who refuses all effort for months, betrayal that keeps repeating, and life goals that cannot be bridged. Our guide to saving a relationship walks through those cases, and our toxic relationship guide describes the patterns that cross the line.

Start with the should I stay quiz if you are unsure, or pick the one guide above that matches your biggest problem and read it with your partner this week.