The Price of Peace
Everybody wants peace, but no one is willing to stop fighting. That’s usually the hallmark of marriages that are constantly in turmoil. Everybody wants their way, nobody wants to get out of the way.
Before we became engaged, my wife and I discovered something earth shattering about ourselves. As much as we despised to admit it, we were both pridefully stubborn when it came to having a point and a monologue to go along with it. It wasn’t until we learned the value of concession that we learned to manufacture peace in our home and relationship.
These days, we are much better brokers of attitudes and reactions. By nature, I am sensitve and she is curt; we are learning more and more that both sides of the equation are not purposeful, and that we can teach each other to be better spouses and people with our differing perspectives on things.
My wife has made me more assertive and self-confident. I have made her more patient and tolerant. There was a time where both of us were neither of these things, and it grated on our relationship. But we took the step of admitting our shortcomings to ourselves, and then to each other. Then we set about the long road of learning how to manage each other, without losing our own identities in the process.
This is how you negotiate peace in your relationship. You are never going to get everything that you want, or even most of it. The trick is to find contentment in the things that come natural, and the things you can negotiate amicably. There is no joy in being right or wrong all of the time, or in harboring resentment because you conceded a point or an issue you felt strongly about. There is always a way piece of mind to be found in every dispute, and there is always peace on the other side of war; no matter how big or small.
But it begins with you being the bigger person first.
