Your Relationship Is Simply A Reflection Of YOU (Yes, Really)

When you search for the perfect partner, you look for someone with specific commendable, attractive and exciting qualities. You carry your list of standards everywhere when you're searching for The One.

You think about it every time you meet someone new. Is he/she the right one for me? Is he/she what I want?

If you haven't realized yet, here's the deal: A lot of those qualities you seek in your perfect partner reflect how you see yourself or want to see yourself. It's this super quiet subconscious push within you to seek out someone who will encourage you to be the person you want to be.

But just like your partner may have your good qualities, he/she will also have your bad qualities you hate. It's a mirrored connection.

YourTango SVP and host Melanie Gorman, board certified coach and radio show host Joan Jerkovich, certified coach Kathryn Brown Ramsperger, relationship coach Barbara Ann Williams, and counselor and therapist Dr. Pat Love sit down to discuss some ways to recognize that mirrored connection with your partner. 

Here's what these experts say will help you better understand and resolve your partner's issues and strengthen your relationship:

1. Compare And Differentiate Yourselves

What are some of your similar qualities? What are your differences? When you do this, you'll overlook those negative qualities and focus on what makes your partner great! Not only will you form a strong bond, you'll also learn to love those positive qualities in yourself.

Dr. Pat Love explains how she was able to do this with a coworker she was having trouble relating to. "I had to work with this guy one time, and he just annoyed me, a big part of it. And I thought, How am I going to do this? And finally, I thought, I'm going to find the part that I love and really care about, and that's the part I'm going to relate to. And as I started relating to that part, of course everything shifted," she says.

2. Find The Root Cause

If your partner did something that really hurt or frustrated you, seek the reason why your partner did that. You may think you're different in this situation because you would never harm your partner that way. Your logic — like negative personality traits or conditioned reactions to certain past situations — reflects something within you.

Joan Jerkovich gives a great example of this situation:

"[What] I think is difficult with when you say what you see in them, you don't like in yourself is hard when you take it too literal. For example, let's say you're in a relationship, and he cheats on you. And you're going, Well, how is this a mirror of me? I am not a cheater. I am not the cheater. I did not do that. I think that's being too literal with it. You maybe need to look deeper and say, What caused him to cheat? Was it something in his self-esteem, in his psyche, something missing from his background, in his childhood? Do you have similar traits? Does this person love themself? Do you love yourself? Is that why you're staying in this maybe toxic relationship?"

That way you'll realize you can solve this issue by changing that negative aspect in yourself. In turn, your partner will follow your lead in order to keep his/her connection with you. You can even help out with this growth process since you've done it yourself!

Do you need more ways to solve your shared relationship issues? Scroll up to hear these experts give more beneficial advice to strengthen the mirrored bond in your relationship.