If you were to ask me “What are you most proud of?” I would answer “My relationships.” Here are some of my favorite resources on the topic.
I don’t endorse all the things here but this is a good assortment to get an idea of what’s out there. (These are mostly from the male-side of things.)
Relationship Health and Communication Skills
John Gottman’s books on relationships
The classic best resource for having healthy relationships. The marriage ones are fine for the not married/people in less committed relationships as well.
Here’s a short article describing bids: https://www.gottman.com/blog/turn-toward-instead-of-away/
And one describing the Four Horsemen: https://www.gottman.com/blog/the-four-horsemen-recognizing-criticism-contempt-defensiveness-and-stonewalling/
Those are the 80/20 most important concepts in my opinion. Still, his books are definitely must reads! I would start with The Seven Principles for Making Marriage Work and the Relationship Cure.
How To Win Friends and Influence People by Dale Carnegie
You may have already read this. It’s the classic.
Radical Honesty by Brad Blanton
Great intro article by AJ Jacobs on Radical Honesty (who is interesting in his own way for all the experiments he does): https://www.esquire.com/news-politics/a26792/honesty0707/
I want to add Sam Harris’ Lying here as well. I don’t fully practice radical honesty but it’s something I think about.
Tim Ferriss Experiment episode on dating:
This is good to watch just to see the different methods of “hacking” dating.
Evolutionary Arguments/Dark Triad stuff
The Game by Neil Strauss
The original primer and bible of pickup artists. Pickup artists and game is very controversial but it’s worth at least knowing what’s out there even if you think some of it is immoral.
Red Pill stuff: https://web.archive.org/web/20170302213843/https://www.reddit.com/r/TheRedPill/comments/2q582c/a_comprehensive_guide_to_the_red_pill/
I feel like you should also at least be familiar with the red pill stuff even if a lot of it is distasteful/exaggerated/or most encountered with demographics of people you should avoid anyway. Still, reading it will let you know what people mean if you come across this type of stuff:
More seduction/PUA: https://www.reddit.com/r/seduction/top/?t=all
The Red Pill (2016) documentary by Cassie Jaye
A feminist filmmaker dives into the men’s rights movement and does a very rare thing: has her mind changed. Helps give a more balanced perspective on gender issues.
Sexuality
Sex at Dawn by Christopher Ryan
Some controversial claims and there have been some empirical criticisms but still very much worth reading.
The Red Queen by Matt Ridley
I never got around to reading it but it’s always recommended for an evolutionary understanding of sexuality.
Ethical Non-Monogamy/Alternative Relationships
Polyamory isn’t for everyone and high-level relationships take exceptional people. I agree that monagamish (as popularized by Dan Savage) is probably the best form of relationship for most people. Certainly being realistic and aware of evolutionary history with mating and relationships is vital.
Poly: https://www.reddit.com/r/polyamory/wiki/faq
https://www.morethantwo.com/polyamory.html
Poly Writing from the Rationality Community
http://slatestarcodex.com/2013/04/06/polyamory-is-boring/
http://lesswrong.com/lw/79x/polyhacking/
http://slatestarcodex.com/2017/05/17/polyamory-is-not-polygyny/
This interview with Professors Geoffrey Miller and Diana Fleischman is one of the most cogent on polyamory and relationships I’ve seen. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rRC6JYSbgsE
Aella: https://aella.substack.com/p/what-i-learned-from-my-date-me-experiment
(I didn’t read all this but wanted to link to something she wrote about being poly/dating without linking random tweets.)
Putanumonit’s blog: https://putanumonit.com/category/love/
Dynamics
Can polyamorous hierarchies be ethical? Part 1: The tower and the village
Relationship Anarchy: http://log.andie.se/
The ideas here aren’t really useful to me but they’re worth knowing about.
The Ethical Slut by Dossie Eaton
Classic book on non-monogamy
Stranger in a Strange Land
Great book by the badass sci-fi author Robert Heinlein which is worth reading on its own and it has interesting stuff on relationships in it.