The most accurate metric for your love of somebody is how you feel about their flaws.If you accept them and even adore some of their shortcomings and they can accept and even adore some of your shortcomings,  that’s a sign of true intimacy. And that things can work out.

Accepting your partner’s flaws

It’s important to occasionally get some distance from your partner, assert your independence, maintain some hobbies or interests that are just yours. Remember what made you attractive and what drew you to your partner in the first place. Without this space, you cease to be the person they fell in love with in the first place.

Spending time apart

Not only are we capable of finding multiple people attractive and interesting at the same time, but it’s a biological inevitability.What isn’t an inevitability are our choices to act on it or not.

Attraction outside the relationship

Romantic sacrifice is idealized in our culture. Sometimes the only thing that can make a relationship successful is ending it at the appropriate time, before it becomes too damaging. And the willingness to do that allows us to establish the necessary boundaries to help ourselves and our partner grow together.

Being willing to end it

The last person you should ever have to censor yourself with is the person you love.It’s important to make something more important in your relationship than merely making each other feel good all of the time. The feel-good stuff happens when you get the other stuff right.

Being honest

The idea that couples must communicate and resolve all of their problems is a myth. The truth is, trying to resolve a conflict can sometimes create more problems than it fixes.Some conflict is inevitable and there will always be certain things you don’t like about your partner or things you don’t agree with, and that this is fine. You shouldn’t let some disagreements get in the way of what is otherwise a happy and healthy relationship.

Unresolved conflicts

But the post also helped a lot of people. Since writing it, it's generated a staggering amount of thank you emails, and no less than 20 people notified me that it inspired them to end their relationships (or even in a few cases, their marriages).