How to ruin your relationship in few simple steps

So, about that title: I’m a marriage and family therapist whose goal is to help people improve their relationships. So why am I providing a foolproof guide to assuring the destruction of your partnership? Because day after day, I see clients who are sabotaging their relationships. And most of the time, they don’t even know it.

In essence, this is a guide teaching you how to protect, care for and improve your relationship. Because if you want to be a force for good in your partnerships, do the exact opposite of these harmful behaviors that I see every day:

1. Frankenstein your partner: Often, someone in a relationship will secretly (or even worse, not-so-secretly) wish their partner were, for example, more outdoorsy, more fit, more sexual, more intellectual, more spiritual or more affectionate. Instead of (a) admitting I partnered up with the wrong person, or (b) learning to appreciate and love my partner for who they are, I should attempt to stitch together the perfect partner — with this one's looks and that one's emotional maturity — until I've assembled a beautiful monster of a relationship problem.

2. Quash fantasy talk: Most people buy into the naive narrative that if your partner shares sexual fantasies that are different from yours (or that may not even include you), then that inherently makes him or her pervy. Not true. We are all sexual beings, and just like fantasizing about bank robbing or jewel theft doesn't cause crime, encouraging talk about fantasies doesn't cause affairs. Instead, such openness can dramatically increase the depth of intimacy in a relationship, so that we both feel closer in sharing who we are with one another.

3. Mistake the identical for the intimate: Many people in relationships assume that if their partners don't share the exact same faith, passions, politics and opinions, then they're really not cut out to be a long-term couple. Nothing could be further from the truth. In your alliance with another person, consider the strategy corporations use when they make a merger and try to find complementary (not overlapping) areas of strength/ability/interest.

4. Rigidly enforce the nuclear option without exception in order to scare them straight: Have you ever thought, "If he/she cheats, it's over"? This may seem to work, but what this typically does, instead of inspiring fidelity, is to make them really, really motivated to hide who they are. Acknowledging that we are all highly flawed and capable of great failure will encourage conversation when things feel “off” and affirm that we are loved even when we're imperfect.

5. Disallow, discourage and sabotage outside friendships: It’s fairly common for couples to call one another their own “best friends” in life. And while it’s fantastic to have a partner who is your best friend, it’s also important to encourage friendships outside of your relationship.  Being jealous of our spouse having friends is self-defeating, as people who have loving friends are happier, more well-adjusted and more engaged in other aspects of their life, including romance. None of us can be everything to our mates, and love is never a zero-sum game.

If our goal is to create real intimacy and become able to share our lives safely with one another, then we have to create an environment where our partners feel safe simply to be themselves and to share who they really are with us.