You deserve to get as much as you give in any relationship.

Why would you want to date someone who doesn't return your love?

Sexual relations should obviously be consensual. If they aren't it is called rape. And if either party in a relationship wants to call it quits, they have that right. Only abusive partners would respond violently or threaten the other to make them stay.

And business interactions should involve an equal trade. Otherwise, we call it fraud, theft, or charity.

We recognize the need for freedom in a healthy love life. But why don't we translate this same ideal over to all human interactions?

And we recognize the need for mutual benefit in business transactions. But it feels cold applying this same standard of trade for romantic relationships.

Maximum individual freedom will always lead to better interactions, in whatever type of relationship.

I have a habit of reading a couple books at once. Usually, they will be on different subject matters, and I'll choose which one to pick up based on my mood. Right now I am working my way through a list of books recommended by fellow attendees and instructors at an entrepreneurship retreat I attended this summer.

Alongside each other, I ended up reading How I Found Freedom in an Unfree World, by Harry Browne, and Attached: The New Science of Adult Attachment and How it Can Help You Find–and Keep–Love, by Amir Levine and Rachel S.F. Heller.

I assumed the two books would have little in common. One was about individual freedom and the other about healthy relationships. But as I alternated between the books, I found striking parallels in their recommendations for the best ways to interact with people.

Exercising your freedom to do what is in your own best interest is the key to healthy relationships in business and love, friendship and finances.