RESOLVING CONFLICTS;

Intimate Relationships

Irrespective of where you are relationship wise right now, this letter is for the present you and the future you. Last weekend’s letter opened our minds to the many ways of resolving conflicts within friends and I promised to continue the series today and talk about how to resolve conflicts in an intimate relationship.

Dear friend, I trust that you are doing good and well, I hope you read this while opening up your heart to new discovery, the discovery of how you can make things better with your relationships.

Intimate relationships also mean spousal relationship, but for the purpose of this letter, lets focus on dating and pre-marriage stages. However, I promise to end these series with the Marriage aspect.

Let’s go.

Many times, relationships break because of the carelessness and lack of will for both parties to hear each other without screaming at the top of their lungs, without working things out, without taking efforts to just resolve the issues. Other times I have found that one person is quiet and waiting for the other person to make the first move, while the other person is somewhere swearing that they wont also take the first move because they would look like a coward. Good news is that even if you make the first move to resolve the conflicts you are having in your relationship, you are definitely not a coward.

I have also come to understand that one of the major reasons for conflicts in relationships is the fact that the two people involved are not thinking alike. Having different thoughts, principles and ideologies about certain things is normal because you both are not coming from the same upbringing and experience. However, narrowing it down to accommodate each other’s perspective without making one person feel stupid for thinking the way they think is something you should strive for.

Dear friend, conflicts will arise in different ways, from money problems, to commitment issues, character and attitude indifference, family indifferences, Ex-girlfriend/boyfriend drama, close friend or bestie intrusion, communication and comprehension problems, ideology and principles that differ, anger management, entitlement issues and a host of other challenges. But, how to go about all these matters a lot.

Let me tell you a small story that I was permitted to share here, two people who loved each other so much broke it off because of the man’s best friend, a female who is far closer to him than the lady. She said that several times, she would come for weekends and find that the bestie had cooked and stocked up the fridge or that the bestie was always on the phone with her man, laughing and talking for long hours. She also complained that sometimes whenever she wanted to cook a meal and the lady was around, she would correct her tens of times; oh, he doesn’t like so much spice, oh he doesn’t eat fruits that way, don’t add ketchup to his potatoes and the plenty ‘I know him better, let me teach you’. The relationship lasted approximately 6 months and 2 weeks.

Now, this could have been avoided if some certain things occurred. One which is communication and the other is comprehension and the zeal to create boundaries. You can love your friends so much and be the best buddy with them but never let it come in between your relationship. This doesn’t mean that you make your friends feel unloved or you stop talking to them. NO! This is only to say that you can be friends and buddies without it affecting that lovely thing you have going with the person you love and are in a relationship with.

A lot of persons forget that a relationship also means loyalty and commitment, we often think that only marriage needs commitment and loyalty. However, this is not true, if it were, cheating won’t be such a big deal.

Here are the few things that could have changed the course of that relationship;

·        If the lady communicated this to the man, and told him that this over-intrusion was making her insecure about her place in his life

·        If the man truly listened to her and decided to fix it

·        If he also apologized for making her feel less

·        If she communicated this in a calm and loving way and not with a war tone

·        If he indeed decided to create boundaries and change

·        If he loved her enough to respect her and not make her feel less by doing the right thing

·        If he made efforts to correct his best friend

·        If he also did his part by reassuring her that such things won’t occur again

·        If he even tried!

Now, maybe this relationship could have worked if they both did any of these things and who knows, could have led to something much more beautiful.

Dear friend, I wouldn’t want your relationship to end because of these types of issues. Honestly speaking I have seen people in relationships who allow these conflicts to linger with everlasting quarrels, disagreements, fight which come in both physical, verbal and emotional manner, and later lead to toxicity.

If truth is told, a lot of people are in toxic relationships and the painful part is that this was caused by conflicts that were left roaming about, allowed to rent a room and lodge permanently.

You see people in relationships that lack mutual respect, the ones that are physically violent, the ones where one person treats the other like trash especially in the midst of friends, the ones where one person has no regard for the feelings of the other, the ones where one person drains the other financially, emotionally, and even physically.

The ones that don’t include God. They obviously know better.

I have however written a list of things to do to solve the conflicts that occur in relationships, and that is if these conflicts are resolvable. Like physical violence and emotionally manipulative violence, these are some issues I personally think that should be addressed seriously. There are a whole lot of other issues but for the purpose of just stating a few, I urge you to please leave any relationship with abuse and heal properly. I also want you to talk to anyone you know who may be suffering from such. When Jesus talked about  ‘love your neighbor as yourself’ he meant ‘do not sit idle while someone you love is in pain and hurt’ this includes domestic violence.

To resolve your conflicts, please try these steps;

·        Choose a good time when you both are calm and are in good spirits

·        Maintain a calm and respectful demeanor

·        State the issues one at a time, if there are plenty issues, try starting with the one affecting you both strongly and leave the rest for another day, besides Rome wasn’t built in a day.

·        Apply self-control, I have found that you can do this while breathing in and out

·        Give each other the chance to clear the air

·        Calm down, calm down, calm down

·        Your tone of voice has started to rise, please bring it down

·        You are talking in phrases, make sentences

·        You are too formal; this is your boo you are talking to

·        Take a bottle of water and sip from time to time especially when you want to jump into the other persons words

·        Listen with intent to understand

·        Be honest about how you feel

·        Do not communicate your feelings harshly. Start with soft words like; babe you know how much I value you and love you, sometimes I don’t express it enough, I would really love this to stop, it makes me feel unwanted, I know life is not so great right now but I want us to never stop loving each other. So, the other day, I noticed that I was excluded from your plans, I don’t know if it slipped from your mind, but my concern is that someone else knew about it, I don’t know, have I done anything or can you tell me what’s up? If you speak to someone who ‘loves you’ this way and not ‘So you decided to exclude me from your plans, only for me to find out from someone else, I am only saying this because we are dating, I won’t take this from anyone, how would you feel if I did the same to you, it’s very annoying, I am so pissed right now’ I don’t think the conversation would end well.

·        Again, control your emotions especially the negative ones pushing you to lash out or say rude and unfair things

·        Avoid the blame game

·        Do not bring up past wrongs that the other person has apologized for

·        You may be also wrong, do not assume you can never be at fault

·        Find a middle ground to narrow what you both are feeling

·        Compromise and Sacrifice; there are certain things that the other person does that you can overlook or ignore especially when they are trivial and not something that affects your peace. Sacrifice is also about two parties; one person cannot carry all the burden. Help your lover, the load is too much.

·        Apologize from your heart genuinely

·        Correct wrong impressions, Clarify softly

·        Re-assure the other person about where you place them

·        If its only about the issue at hand, the tension may be so much. Try spicing it up with asking how the other person is doing in between, if they have eaten or even bring up something like a fun good memory that occurred in the past between you both. Find a way to incorporate it. It will ease things down.

·        Try Therapy; it helps

·        Do not kill your man or woman with words in front of your friends, there should be no reason why he or she is their subject of gossip or discussion. The person you need to talk to is your man or woman, because these people are not in the relationship thing with you.

·        Please tell God about your problems, he can surely help.

Dear friend, no relationship is easy but these steps can help. Most importantly God can help. I wonder why anyone will do relationship without God; he makes it so easy. You can work things out between yourself, you can make each other better people, you can stop some habits to accommodate the other person, you can learn and unlearn. You can listen without hearing something else.

Again, not all relationships are meant to last or move further, and its not because you both are bad people, but because you are not just meant for each other or because God wants someone else for you both. Most times we argue with God or don’t even listen to him or know when he is speaking to us in terms of our relationships.

I hope that this has helped you today and I wish you apply it now or in the future because like it or not, conflicts always arise but the question is would you be willing to take these steps and refuse the urge to shout, blow things out of proportion and talk to God?

I have attached an awesome podcast version for you to listen to. Kindly keep the energy going by hitting the like button, sharing and commenting on what you think.

And get ready for the last part of these series; RESOLVING CONFLICTS IN MARRIAGE. I will be bringing the excerpts and words from few married people too.

Till next time

Warm Regards
Amanda Sibi.