Relationship and Marriage Advice | The Gottman Relationship Blog ...

1) Becoming a ?Dream Detective,? and allowing yourself to contemplate dreams you may have buried or ignored within the gridlocked issue. This will help you to understand the ways in which you feel that these wishes are not being addressed in your relationship.

2) Explaining your position to your partner without criticism or blame. If it helps, write out such an explanation beforehand, focusing on what the two of you need or want out of the area of disagreement. Come to an understanding of the dreams the two of you have within the conflict, and dig deeper than the superficial issue to discover your feelings and hopes below the problem at hand. Suspend judgment. Relax. Give each other time, and do not attempt to solve the problem immediately. Ask questions.

3) Soothing each other. Gridlock is, by definition, stressful. If you feel like you are becoming flooded with emotion, or incapable of productive conversation, take a break either alone or with your partner. There?s no rush.

4) Accepting that some problems are unsolvable. Unfortunately, it is practically impossible to entirely resolve such a gridlocked conflict. As per Dr. Gottman?s humorous observation, ?your purpose is not to solve the conflict - it will probably never go away completely? instead the goal is to ?declaw? the issue, to try to remove the hurt so the problem stops being a source of great pain.? Here are a few steps that you can take to arrive at a temporary peace settlement in these treacherous lands:

• Define the minimal core areas that you cannot yield on.?
• Define your areas of flexibility.?
• Devise a temporary compromise that honors both of your dreams.?

We hope that by going through these exercises with your partner, ?the two of you will be able to make some progress communicating about a perpetual issue in your relationship. Look forward to next week as we continue the Managing Conflict series with a discussion of Dr. Gottman's Six Skills for Conflict Management.

Have a great weekend,
E. Lisitsa

Source: http://www.gottmanblog.com/2012/07/weekend-homework-assignment-overcoming.html

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