Do you have any columns on what it takes to have a happy, healthy, functional relationship in the entertainment industry? Just curious.

Wow. What a great idea for a column. Hey, readers! Wanna help me out? Next month marks ten years since Keith and I got our relationship started, so I only now for the first time feel like maybe I could say anything useful about long-term relationships (my longest, prior to this one, was about 18 months, and most were clocking in at under a year before I would become fully impossible to tolerate, by anyone). But maybe there are many of you out there who have healthy, happy, thriving relationships, and you’d be willing to share some thoughts on what makes it all WORK.

When Keith and I got married, we invited a half-dozen couples, each of whom represented “successful relationships in this industry” to us, and a few single friends as well, of course. We wanted to be inspired by those who had found a way to make their Hollywood romances work, and we picked well, as only one of those couples is “no more” at this point (and even though they broke up, those two have stayed good friends).

So, the first thing I’m going to recommend is that you take a look around you. Who are the folks in good relationships? Keeping in mind that it all looks different from “the inside” of the relationship, what’s the starting point for some of the healthier couplings around you? Honesty? Communication? High self-esteem, low ego? Lack of jealousy? Super-hot sex life? What is the one cool thing you see, from the outside, in relationships you would call “working” around you?

Start there. Meanwhile, I’m inviting any of the awesome readers out there who have ideas about how to answer the question of having a good relationship in this biz to just shoot me an email so we can bring together an awesome column on this topic. I’ll need to know who you are, as you write in, but you can request to stay anonymous in the finished piece, if you’d like. Just say so, in your email. Thanks in advance for the help!

Bonnie Gillespie is living her dreams by helping others figure out how to live theirs. Wanna work with Bon? Start here. Thanks!

Originally published by Actors Access at http://more.showfax.com/columns/avoice/archives/001314.html. Please support the many wonderful resources provided by the Breakdown Services family. This posting is the author’s personal archive.