Getting Along

A collaborative article written by members of our on-line community.

Relationships with those closest to us can be the most stressful.  You'd think that years of exposure to the others' idiosyncrasies would make it easier to deal with them.  It turns out the opposite is often true - they just irritate us more and more.  But there are ways of softening the impact of these interpersonal irritants.  We do have some insights into dealing with the tensions which develop in relationships. 

We’re devoting this page to compiling your best ideas for getting along.  I’ll start off with one of my own.

What do you mean by that?

For years I struggled with setting off to events on time.  Inevitably, we’d hit the road 10 to 15 minutes after I had asked others to be ready.  (By the way, it seems we could get away on time for events that others were pushing.)  I’ll spare you the details, but I discovered the key was in the way we all understood: “Let’s leave at eight o’clock.”  To me that means we are all ready, gathered everything we want to take,  have shut down the house, done the double checking, are sitting in the car and out of the driveway.  To other family members, “Let’s leave at eight o’clock.” means we’ll start to get ready, gathering up everything we want to take, remembering and assigning all the things that need to be checked and checked again.  Eventually, we’ll get our coats and shoes on, go out to the garage and into the car and if we’re on the road by 8:15 we’ve done really well.  Understanding this difference in what a designated departure time means has brought a lot of peace with it.

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Showing comments 1 to 4 of 10 | Next | Last

Katty
Posts: 10

GJyDJdWMIMirxpE
Reply #10 on : Thu January 12, 2012, 04:34:11

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Free info like this is an apple from the tree of knowlegde. Sinful?

Ron
Posts: 10

Drop the labels
Reply #9 on : Tue April 28, 2009, 13:27:28

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You can sometimes miss connecting with the people around you when you apply labels to them, even if you only do it in your own head. When you think of a person in terms of a character trait instead of as a whole complex human, you give yourself permission to treat them as if they could be completely summed up "a driven type A" "a social climber" "unambitious" "a procrastinator" "hyper" or anything else less than all they are. Once labelled like this in your head, they tend to stay that way even if they are working hard to bring balance into their lives. I guess the key point is to see each person as he or she is today - unique, interesting, complex and worthy of your attention and assistance.

Anonymous
Posts: 10

Re: Getting Along
Reply #8 on : Mon April 06, 2009, 15:30:39

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I really agree with the last comment. It has taken many years and a softening of my hard heart to admit that I really do reap what I sow.
Why do we take those who are closest to us, the ones we love the most so for granted?
Why do we assume it is alright to treat them badly just because we are feeling that way?
Why do we say those horrible things we can never take back?
Isn't true love patient, kind and good...

Anonymous
Posts: 10

Mistaking a problem for the problem
Reply #7 on : Mon April 06, 2009, 15:04:15

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Sometimes a problem will come up in a relationship, particularly between spouses who have some history together. Maybe one is rude to the other or disrespectful or not as thoughtful as would be appreciated. Though that's "a" problem, it's not necessarily "the" problem. Instead of the offended spouse going on the attack, trying to get an apology for what's happened and a promise that it'll never happen again, it's worth looking at why that problem arose. Ask yourself how the relationship got to the point that one could treat the other so. Often as not, people unconsciously treat others as they have been treated (that's why the abused often become abusers). If a family member treats you with a lack of respect or consideration, could it be that they perceive a lack of respect and consideration from you and that they are unconsciously reflecting your own attitude regarding the relationship back to you?

Showing comments 1 to 4 of 10 | Next | Last