hi deadheart,
Understanding that yesterday has already passed and tommorrow has yet to come. I believe that life is living for the 'here and now'. In fact, after adopting this belief, i no longer keep lovely messages in emails or sms from my love ones, neither do i guard gifts of sentimental values so dearly. This is because the past memories, no matter how good, has already passed. Life changes, good things won't last forever, neither would bad. The thing i can do to be better than the past good memories is to create them NOW. Similarly, what seems to be bad in the future has not come and it may not be so if we create a better NOW.
It requires a lot of efforts to create a better now and i'm still learning day by day. However, it becomes easier if the beliefs and practices becomes habitual. I apply this to almost all aspect of my life but i'll zoom in to r/s for this post. i'll list some of the basic qualities here.
1) Ability to reflect.
2) Seek to understand first, than to seek to be understood. Don't assume, don't speculate (esp. negatively), always seek to find out.
3) Effective communication. Just talking it out is never enough. The book 'Men are from Mars and Women are from Venus' offers good perspectives and techniques to effective communication.
4) Knowing the meaning of your life. Determining what you want in life. Be focus. From what i observed, people who have not defined their meaning of life are often lead around by their life situations, hence becoming the victims of circumstances.
What i've listed may not be holistic, as this is what i can think of at this moment. It also takes experience to learn and even to know what to learn. Maybe you can add to my list if you know more.