Was it good for you?

We usually reserve the question contained in the title of this week's column for a certain activity between two people but that's not the nature of the question today.

Recent reports in the national news contain research that says we're living in the most narcissistic times since research began on the subject. The focus of our daily lives, activities, experiences, and relationships tend to revolve around our own needs, wants, and desires rather than the needs ofothers. We want what WE want and we want it WHEN we want it.

Using a term coined by Dr. Wayne Dyer a couple of decades ago, we have become inner-directed rather than other-directed. Instead of putting others first, we put ourselves first and it is this columnist's opinion that this does not bode well for our future, either individually or societally.

This is especially significant when it comes to the intimate relationships we have with others. I have long taught, written, and literally preached that the best way to foster and nurture a mutually satisfying relationship between two people is to always put the other person's needs ahead of our own. If we do and say things that makes the other person happy, the liklihood is great they they will give us the same in return. In those rare events when the other person DOESN'T respond in kind, that means we have developed a relationship with a taker instead of a giver and we need to run, not walk, to the nearest door and get out of there because they're ALWAYS going to take and take and take without ever giving anything back.

I believe we've gotten things seriously wrong if we have, in fact, incorporated narcissism into our personal lives to the extent the research indicates because other words for narcissism are selfish, self-centered, self-absorbed, conceited, egotistical and vain. This is not the emotional state of mind that fosters a long-term happy relationship with another person. Someone who is narcissistic remains outside the relationship rather than becoming a part of the relationship. They tend only to their own needs without much, if any thought, of the needs of the other person. They look out only for themselves, they care only about themselves, and they want the world ordered and constructed based on THEIR desires and specifications without taking into account the desires of others at all.

For a relationship to work, for it to prosper and grow and develop in love and intimacy and caring for one another, you and me have to become we. Two people have to become as one. That's why I've often recommended in this column that the very best thing we can ever do to give us the best chance at having a long-term happy relationship is to not only marry the person we're in love with but the person that's our best friend as well. Nothing guarantees happiness, of course, but taking care of these two conditions before you enter into a relationship certainly increases your chances.

I would hope all of us would give some thought to the nature of the relationship we're in and whether or not we think more about our own needs than we do the needs of the other person or vice versa. If the answer to either question is yes, we either need to reorder our own priorities and way of thinking that allows us to put the needs of others ahead of our own or, if the reverse is true, we need to find someone that thinks more about us than they do about themselves.

Because only when we're doing everything we can do to make the other person happy will we ever experience the true joy of giving, and giving with the right heart and the right spirit and watching the appreciation of the other person is always more rewarding than taking and taking and taking with no thought of anyone else's needs, wants, or desires but our own.