Moderation.

A healthy relationship means that everything should be in moderation.

A wise woman once said that the perfect is the enemy of the good. She was right.

People are flawed. They have their cracks and crevices, in personality if not in visage.

I find that too often people find others and fuck it up, because they believe that there is something in their loftiest dreams that should still be different in the person they have.

We're naturally greedy people, Americans more so than others: we want what we don't have, and we're willing to change it no matter the cost.

Because of this, we excell. We build skyscrapers, we write equations that destroy worlds, we create industries that never before existed, we produce faster and better than anyone, we are the giants that other nations stand on.

This is a fine quest in all regards except for people.

Because people aren't perfect. They have their good parts, and they have their bad parts.

In moderation, both can be fun. And in respecting a person's wholeness: that both parts are what compose them in all of who they are, you learn to realize who they are and respect them more.

It can be fun to party, and imbibe, and drive fast, and say 'fuck all' to responsibility, but in doing too much you can't create anything. You plant no roots. You leave nothing of yourself behind.

It can be productive to be responsible, look after everyhing, cultivate it all so it grows to the fullest, be friendly to everyone, but no one is perfect. After a while your energy is gone, and you start to crack at the seems, because you've left yourself no energy to maintain the darker parts of you. Or worse yet, you forget how to have fun.

A healthy relationship is where everyone involved balances and helps each other stay human. They're there to foster the good, and to keep the bad in check.

Where you can talk about what ails you, and cheer when your day has been the best in a while.

Where you can both do chores, and come together and play without feeling like one of you hasn't done their share.

Where you know what buttons to push, and what amends to make when you've pushed them all.

A healthy relationship is where you can be yourself.

And further down the line, if you want to better yourself beyond who you know you are, a good relationship will help give you the strength to carry through with it.