Good relationships take work and patience. Many times behaviors that seem natural to one can irritate the other. Understanding where the conflicts lie and making adjustments, can enhance the lives of both parties.

As a Rational, you seek eternal truths, feel comfortable with abstractions and like solving complex problems. You use your visionary skills to create something new.

If your partner is a Guardian, they like events and people to be predictable and planned. You are likely to annoy them if you:

• Discount their stories of lessons learned from past mistakes
• Ignore or criticize their routines and procedures
• Often do things on your own without checking in with them first
• Don't appreciate their efforts for keeping family ties through simple celebrations

If your partner is an Artisan, you may find them fun and exciting and see that they add more zest to your life. Since you tend to move toward long-term goals, sometimes you may see their activities as frivolous. You are likely to annoy them if you:

• Get so focused on a project that you can't stop to have fun with them
• Talk only about your ideas for the future and not act on anything today
• Try to make them over to think like you
• Belittle their need for freedom and movement

If your partner is an Idealist, you'll share the love of envisioning the future, but you'll be more interested in ideas and theories and they will be more interested in what is happening with people. You are likely to annoy them if you:

• Ignore their visions of how to make life better for the people around you
• Complain that they lack objectivity and are too influenced by others
• Ignore their warnings about potential people-problems
• Ignore their needs for renewing their romantic attachment to you

If your partner is also a Rational, you can still easily annoy each other. You are likely to have different interests and visions of the future. You'll likely nitpick about the meaning of words and be critical about each other's exactitude in thinking. If you do not become too critical of each other, both of you are likely to find these intellectual exchanges stimulating.

Amanda is a Rational whose partner is a Guardian. She appreciates that Kevin keeps everything on an even keel. Her job as a research chemist requires 60-70 hour work weeks. She does, however, resent that he is so picky about keeping the house picked up. Kevin gets angry when she can't plan ahead for the time they can have dinner together. After learning about personality differences, each realized that they needed to respect each other's needs more. Now Amanda does her best to inform Kevin when she'll be able to make dinner. He's less likely to view her as rude when the dinner plans don't work out. They also agreed that the house can be more messy some days but that they will both pitch in to clean things up on the weekend.

Stephen is a Rational whose partner is an Artisan. Shannon works in sales and has always loved athletics, especially golf and tennis with Stephen. Now Stephen's work hours have been expanding, leaving him with less energy for sports on the weekend. Shannon thinks that Stephen is becoming boring. He says he needs time alone to think. They realized that they needed to make some adjustments. Shannon has joined a women's bowling league, and Stephen makes sure he can play either golf or tennis one day of the weekend with her. He has found that physical exercise actually improves his thinking, and she gets action in her life. They are both feeling less stressed.

Maria is a Rational whose partner is an Idealist. Jason amazed her with his writing of love notes and gifts of special meaning. She, in turn, gave special gifts to him. But now she wonders if he is too clingy. She loves good verbal fights while he can take her arguments as personal attacks. After Maria and Jason re-read Please Understand Me, Jason told Maria that he had been afraid she wasn't in love with him any more since she forgot his birthday. Now Maria better understands Jason's desire for regular reminders of the deep connection between them. Maria has been careful about giving him regular strokes. Since he feels more confident in their love, their discussions have been more lively and help clear the air. Of course, they are careful to not be mean to each other.

Richard is a Rational whose partner is a Rational. They each have their separate interests and have interesting careers. Joelle is a psychobiologist and Richard is an engineer. At first they were fascinated about the other's topic of interest, but they found that when either of them tried to become too much of an "expert" in the other's field, they started looking for each other's areas of incompetence. This behavior was driving them apart. Now they are less critical and take turns being teacher and student. They only offer suggestions when they see the other as being open to input.

When both partners take the time to learn more about each other's normal behaviors and both parties make some adjustments, the partnership is much more successful.