Sharing Your Heart in an Argument with Your Spouse

Communicating with your spouse can be tricky. However, by sharing your heart without forgetting your message, you’ll get farther, faster.

While many couples dread arguments, we know that only through conflict can relationships grow stronger. Of course, you know this because you’ve fought with your sister or brother or mom and dad and you have seen the bonds that fighting and making up can create.

Many married couples will say anything to avoid a fight, but if you don’t have open and honest communication with the person that is supposed to be your best friend, why are you even married? Your goal should be to get to the point that you can say anything that isn’t a direct insult to the person that you love and know that you can work out whatever issue it is that you have.

Of course, you have to keep some things in mind before you begin the potentially heated discussion:

1. Remember your overall goal

Without a goal, you are not being fair to your spouse. If you are just starting a fight in order to fight, then I’d suggest you check your heart and make sure you aren’t harboring resentment against your spouse. If you are then you may win the argument but you WILL lose the battle. You’ll have to put away all of your old resentments in order to make any headway in the marriage.

And, by remembering a concrete goal it’s easier to stick to the point at hand. You won’t get sidetracked about what your spouse’s mom has supposedly done to you or what your mother said the night you introduced your bride-to-be (groom-to-be).

2. No attacks

Only a person with a weak argument will resort to name calling or to dredging up old news. If what you have to say has merit, you don’t need to remind him that he was once a drunk. Likewise, any old boyfriends/girlfriends are off-limits (obviously). Certainly DO NOT call out, in an insulting way, each other’s children if you have children from a previous marriage. Please don’t stoop so low as to personally attack the person who is supposed to be the most dear to you in the world.

3. Don’t be afraid to cry