The other day, I recounted a discussion between my son, Dan, and myself on the subject of relationships. The subject was relationships in which fighting is a constant component vs. relationships where fighting is a rare part of the day to day.
I found the conversation a thought provoker. Dan’s POV was that people who fight a lot and who stay together must genuinely love each other and must both deeply believe that the relationship is strong enough for everyone to be able to fully air their opinions with out the risk of implosion.
My view is that I don’t understand such relationships and I, personally, prefer a calmer situation with low-key discussions and people giving each other lots of leeway and the benefit of the doubt.
He said that people who don’t care enought to argue may actually just be luke-warm about each other and thus the passiveness of their relationship’s interactions.
I still don’t know what to make of these ideas but I did want to say and acknowledge that it provoked a lot of comments both pro and con from my readers here.
Cheers,
dennis
I didn’t see any comments offered to your earlier post. But yes, very thought provoking. I think a healthy amount of bickering or arguing is okay in a relationship. If it becomes the norm though or if it consumes a relationship, then I think that could be problematic and worth looking into. Relationships offer us the opportunity to grow as individuals and usually that opportunity comes when challenges are presented to us from the other person. Keep pondering!
I have to agree with you about some disagreement being okay, but I feel that it is much too stressful to live with constant arguing. Differences of opinion make a relationship interesting as long as we can agree to disagree sometimes and don’t always have to be right. Learning from other points of view can be enlightening and rewarding.