Disagreements
Disagreements, arguments, disputes.
Two people don’t agree about something, there are strong emotions behind both views, and the situation begins to escalate. The disagreement is affecting the relationship and needs to be resolved.
How do we handle these situations?
When disagreements arise, it’s tempting to escalate the disagreement into a full on airing of grievances. We start bringing to the table all the other times we’ve disagreed with the person, felt wronged or mistreated by them. Maybe we’ve discussed these grievances with them before or maybe we’ve suppressed them and now they’re going to hear about it! Regardless, these grievances don’t actually have anything to do with the current disagreement and only act as fuel to an already growing fire. In the end what could have been a small, quickly extinguished fire turns into an uncontrollable blaze; bringing with it more long term damages.
The only solution I’ve found to limiting these airing of grievances is to constantly remind myself that when disagreements arise this temptation is forever present and I must fight it with everything I have. Keep your focus on the disagreement right in front of you; do your part in helping to determine what is causing it and how it can be resolved. Forget about the other grievances. They aren’t relevant. In this moment they never happened. And while you work on resolving the current disagreement go for a walk, run, write the grievances in journal. Do whatever is necessary to get them out of your head.
But don’t suppress them forever. If they need to be addressed, let things cool off and then come up with a plan to discuss them with the person in a deescalated environment. You’ll be better prepared to have this conversation and hopefully they will be better prepared to hear it.
How do you handle these situations?
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