Conflict Resolution for Couples

While there are many couples that do refrain from losing their tempers during conflicts, there are many more that “let it fly”. There are natural dilemmas that exist when dealing with how you do or don’t express your anger. If you squash your anger, pretend or act like it doesn’t exist, you may have saved the day today, but it’s going to eat away at you inside and either explode somewhere down the road or find other ways to get out. If you “let it fly”, you risk saying things that you’re probably going to regret, and maybe don’t even mean, but, once said, can’t be undone. So what’s a person to do? Controlling anger requires discipline of your emotions - which doesn’t come naturally. It is definitely a skill, and, being a skill, it is learned – you aren’t born with it. Remember what we already discussed about needs. Basically, you have three core needs: security, significance and fun. You need to feel some level of security and trust in your relationship. You need to feel important and valued by your partner. And you need to be taking time to enjoy the life you have together. Needs are legitimate, and while they can’t be met fully by your partner, there is a natural obligation built into a committed relationship that if you love your partner you will value and try to meet some of his needs. If your needs go unmet for a long enough time, or they come under attack, you will feel hurt. The unspoken message that is conveyed when needs go ignored is “What I want is unimportant” which is easily interpreted as, “He doesn’t care about me”. There is an internal mental ladder that people walk themselves up when making such interpretations. People with a healthy amount of self-esteem don’t automatically start leaping from “that hurt” to “they don’t love me”. Others more rapidly climb that ladder and require more assurances because the smaller things automatically mean some very big things for them.