When starting a new friendship relationship with someone, things do not always turn out as we imagine. Sometimes interpersonal relationships last less than expected, and part of the causes that lead to this outcome may be poor social skills management.
The idea is not to stop being who we are to fit into friendships, but it is important to know how to properly express our positive attitude towards other people.
Why are social skills important?
It is proven that a large part of a person’s success is based on the ability to relate to their peers. Technical knowledge, study, and talent are important to function in life, but it is thanks to interpersonal relationships that we manage to achieve our objectives. The individual does not exist without the collective.
Many people have great talents and impressive abilities but fail to prosper or establish stable, friendly, or emotional relationships. On the other hand, to know how to maintain good relationships with others, it is necessary to also know the importance of social skills; and it is thanks to them that we can establish and properly maintain our bonds of friendship or fellowship with others.
By this, I do not mean that the only thing that counts for success in life is meeting the right people and taking advantage of their friendship. If you do not have the necessary preparation and desire to succeed, the ability to relate to people is irrelevant.
It is a debate between ability and sociability; if we can achieve a proper balance between these two variables, we will be better on our way to a promising future.
Tips for maintaining good relationships with others
The following list shows a series of effective and practical tips to maintain good interpersonal relationships with others.
Be true to your principles
When we can show other people that we are willing to respect their points of view as long as they do the same with ours, we are on the way to developing a more transparent and sincere friendship relationship.
Practice honesty
Whenever we get involved in a friendship relationship, it is important, to be honest with others, bearing in mind that honesty is not about always saying everything we know but simply not misleading others.
Another important aspect of honesty is saying things directly and avoiding using intermediaries to communicate our opinions. It is common for information to be distorted when it is not told first hand.
Show confidence
An essential aspect of strengthening and maintaining relationships with others is to be trustworthy. To achieve this, we must maintain integrity in terms of our opinions and actions, avoiding constantly changing ideas about what we say or do.
Another thing that works well to create bonds of trust with people is to show a certain level of vulnerability. It tells some anecdotes about ourselves where we have seen ourselves in difficult situations and makes others empathize with us.
Practice spontaneity
Hardly anyone could plan exactly how he behaves when he is with his friends; the ideal is to be ourselves, without fear of being judged. Spontaneity refers to behaving freely without the need to use rigid social protocols to fit in with the group.
Stay humble
Good friends do not approach you because of the things you have, but because of your virtues as a human being.
Be polite, be polite, and avoid showy behaviors so that the people around you feel better. And don’t do it just to please, do it because you know it is the right thing to do, practice humility as something natural.
Stay in touch
Something important to get along with other people is to take the time to see how others are. Although it seems like a fairly obvious question, sometimes the days go by, and we don’t hear from our colleagues, neighbors, or friends … You can make a call, write them some messages, or go visit them to check that they are okay, yes the deal is close.