Do you ever find you and your partner arguing over the tiniest things? Something so small that a day later you don’t even remember what you fought about? Well today I’m going to talk about why this happens and how to stop doing it. So you can stop arguing over the smallest things and get on living your life! Now Arguing about small things, we have all been there.
We are all there right now! And I would argue that arguments over small things are actually harder to deal with than arguments over big things. Say for example your spouse cheats on you with their coworker. There is no doubt who is at fault who needs to apologize, etc. But when it’s a small argument, its there is a difference in reality.
To you, it’s a big deal but to your spouse it’s nothing. So it’s hard to get on the same page. And you end up fighting about whether or not it’s a big deal. So much of this has to do with communication, unspoken wants and needs and misguided assumptions. And I’m going to help you wade through some of this today. So let’s get started with some Do’s and Don’ts to stop arguing about the smallest things:
For the person who is angry/annoyed: Do: be mindful about when you are starting to get annoyed.
Take a breath. When you are annoyed, I know the first thing you want to do is let it out. My advice is to slow down a little and think about what outcome you want. Don’t settle for short term gains–yelling and getting angry are short term forms of relief. However, you will end up arguing with your partner potentially for hours or days. So think about your goal.
Do: figure out why this small thing bothers you so much.
What does this small thing symbolize? For example, I see a lot of wives who ask their husbands to run small errands while coming home from work and the husband forgets. The wife, in return, gets very angry. Why does this happen?
Come to realize that the wife knew her husband was very on top of things at work but when it came to home, the husband was more relaxed. She felt that he cared less about home than work and felt less important. Less valued and ignored.
So when she could communicate why it hurt her so much, the husband was more open to hearing her. When she could say “it hurts when I see you put so much energy into finishing tasks at work but you forget just a small thing for us,
I feel forgotten and unimportant.” VS “you always forget. You are so irresponsible and I don’t even know why I bother asking.” Maybe you don’t want to go that deep for whatever reason, you can communicate using the lighter version:
