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Welcome to another of my guide Melinda’s Friday messages about how to live life. If you’d like to know more about her and what she has to say you can find more in the first post in this series.

Should you Stay or Should you go? – Melinda’s Friday Message

I know that some of you are hoping for more guidance on finding love but you will have to wait. This must unfold a certain way or it will not make sense or help you.

So there are two troubles that get in the way of finding happiness in love once you have met someone. One is putting up with too much and the other is not working enough to keep it alive.

The worst problem is putting up with too much. Nothing will kill fondness in the heart as certainly as living daily with some thing you do not like. How can you even love the person you are with if you do not like their behaviours. How can you even like yourself in the end if this is your life? You cannot. I am sure you know bitter old people who only seem to live to spite their partners. It all started by putting up with things that they did not like once upon a time. Do not let this be your life.

Let me be clear that I am not talking about mundane and largely irrelevant matters like where they leave their toothbrush or if they misuse grammar. If you are in a relationship and these things are bothering you they are only a clue that something deeper is going on. Be mindful these kind of mundane criticisms might be masking your lack of love for this person. I am talking about disrespect, unsatisfying sex life, dishonesty, not putting you and your family first, looking down on you, not supporting you. Let me also be clear to say that problems that go beyond this first level of challenge like physical or verbal abuse, infidelity, addictions and destructive behaviour to the family do not fall into the value range I am talking about either. My advice in these situations is to free yourself as quick as you can. I do not have much faith in the more modern ideas of working on these more severe situations.

Relationships are like magnifying glasses over time. The good can become better and the bad can become worse. Success in relationships comes from either being willing to work on them or let them go. It cannot come from enduring and wishing for change. That is a road with no happiness. It cannot come from working to prevent the end of the relationship. The harder we contort to hold things together the more deeply we wound ourselves. The solution is to speak up about troubles as they arise. To speak about things that are difficult before they swallow the love and bury it away forever. Do you see not tolerating things and working combined as the solution.

It may be a narrow high wire in some relationships or a vast thoroughfare in others. You have to know the boundaries within the relationship and determine if it is worth keeping.

I have much to say about working on relationships but this will have to wait for next week.

Thank you for listening.
Melinda

PS If you would like to receive my guidance and advice on your life please schedule a reading with Andrew. I am always speaking with him when the cards are on the table.

If you enjoyed this post you might also enjoy:
Interviews about change with Nancy Antenucci
Truth & Honesty – Part II

The Hermit’s Lamp is the blog of Andrew McGregor – Toronto Tarot reader, artist and teacher. The Hermit’s Lamp is also a storefront in Toronto selling metaphysical and spiritual supplies. Please visit The Hermit’s Lamp website for more information on readings and classes both online and in Toronto. You can also listen to the Hermit’s Lamp podcast here.

Love image by http://www.flickr.com/photos/ex_magician/