Conflict

I continue to learn each day about relationships and how they work. Here are a few things that have come to mind as I sit here late at night, right before I head off for a good nights sleep.

1. When there is a conflict or a tense situation, it is always good to reflect on our personal actions to see if we could have handled the situation better. Most of the time when we take time to do this, we will find one or several things we could have done to handle the situation better and will come to realize what we have done wrong to the person we are having the conflict with. Once we have identified our wrong in the situation we go to the person and apologize for the part we played in the conflict. (Boy that is hard to do)

2. When someone apologizes to you it is not time to preach them a sermon… it is time to just say I forgive you. Yes, there may be things to talk about in order to work through the situation… we just need to be willing to make sure we have that conversation in the right way. There is nothing worse than for someone to apologize and then get a tongue lashing in return.

3. People are not idiots… they generally have a reason for what has happened. It might not be the way you would have gone about it… but at least they did something.

4. Sometimes the same thing that irritates you, is irritating them. Sometime people come across as being on the opposite side of the issue when in fact they are on the same side you are on. They are just saying it differently

Remember relationships are important to Jesus, to make the effort to hold them together always has better results than when we do things to break them apart.