RESOLVING CONFLICT

“My girlfriend and I have been dating for six months and we’ve never had a disagreement about anything. We both feel we’re perfect for each other. A few of our friends feel it’s impossible that we agree on everything, but we don’t see anything wrong with it. What do you think?”

What you say may be true, but it’s more likely you and your girlfriend have not developed a good system for problem solving yet.

You see, people are individuals, not carbon copies of one another. Therefore, no matter how much alike you are in your ideas or opinions, there will eventually be areas of conflict where you don’t see eye to eye. Though that may not have happened yet, as you deepen your relationship together, it will.

So, you need to develop some sort of system that can help carry you through the stages of conflict when they arise. If you do that, it will help both of you to be honest in those harder conversations and will cause your relationship with your girlfriend to become stronger.

In reality, conflict is inevitable in any meaningful relationship. Learning to resolve conflicts without dissolving the relationship is a very important skill. And if you can learn that skill now before harder conversations or bigger conflicts arise, they will be much easier to talk through and deal with.