How Mutual Solutions Help You to Solve Disagreements and Avoid Arguments
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Are you having disagreements that turn into arguments in your relationships? Are your different ideas about how to do things causing separation and distance between you and your partner, friend, relative?
This can be changed!
Disagreements come in different degrees. They range from the practical to the emotional, and can feel like a sheer 100 ft. cliff in your way. You can’t possibly imagine what a resolution could be.
But here’s the thing. There will always be one, barring the rare cases where you break up or that this is a recurring argument that never gets resolved. There is a solution out there somewhere, even though you can’t imagine it in the face of that daunting 100 ft. cliff, and your current position probably isn’t it, so quit trying to defend it and go exploring instead.
Here’s where the fun comes in. You can find a path toward mutual solutions: a place where both of you are happy, satisfied and even enriched beyond your original version of the solution.
To do this, two factors are necessary: belief and intention. You need to believe that there is a place where the two of you can come together on an issue without either one of you feeling you are giving something up or deferring just to have peace. This is nothing like what is often referred to as compromise; that involves one or both parties giving something up to find a place that works for both of you. Compromise is quite different from finding a mutual solution.
A mutual solution is one in which, through a process of communication, the two of you find a new way, one that combines the feelings and needs of each of you in a form that enables both of you to feel satisfied and fulfilled with the solution. A mutual solution will contain more than either parties’ original ideas. It is something neither of you could have come up with on your own; it is something that can only exist as a result of the two of you creating a new answer together.
You can find a path toward a mutual solution where both of you are happy and satisfied #quote Share on XNot only is it important to believe that such a solution is possible, but both parties must be committed to finding it. Intention and belief are powerful tools for finding a mutual solution.
When you and your partner trust in the existence of a satisfying outcome, it makes it so much easier for the two of you to find it between you. Treat it as a cooperative game, not a competitive one. This process works because there are far more possibilities than you originally can imagine, and one of them is going to appeal to both of you; it’s just a question of finding it. You each bring different viewpoints and skills. So be creative, be a partnership, and have fun.
One way or another, you are going to reach some kind of a solution to your disagreements and estrangements on decisions. Why not put the effort into finding out what a mutual solution is, instead of what it isn’t!
Since this is very much a central theme of ours, we have written extensively on it; here are three of our past blogs that cover different aspects of the topic:
How to Work Through Disagreements to Reach a Mutual Solution
How to Reach Mutual Solutions in Your Relationship
How to Find Mutual Solutions With Your Partner
Photo credit: Phil Mayes
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Yes! Believe in the yet unknown answers! That does require a leap of faith. And that does take both parties to agree that there is a solution that can be created together.I know this to be true. Thank you for the affirmation here . I am struggling as the answer I often get is : Let’s just agree to disagree and then we go on with a sense of conflict; proceding in a you go your way , I’ll go mine! This is good work if you can get it! I will hold course! Thank you.
Thank you Iris. You speak of an issue that so many face – if when we try to find mutual solutions, people feel directly threatened, how can we make the communication go forward? My only answer is we need to keep at it. Stay firm in your own knowledge that mutual solutions are possible and know that it is still true that both parties must be committed to finding that. So, the next move becomes, how do we help bring the other person toward wanting, intending and believing in such a solution.
Thank you for articulating the wisdom of a mutual solution so beautifully!
Elisabeth