Pillows Not Fists....Just My Opinion

Fighting fair seems to be the mantra of relationship "experts" throughout the country.

1. Try not to rehash old details from "forgiven/forgotten" arguments

2. Don't hit below the belt (figuratively & literally)

3. Don't be passive-aggressive and fight about irrelevant subject matters, instead of facing "the real issues"

Blah Blah Blah....fighting is not a "fair" practice. Hell, rarely are "relationships" and "fair" in the same sentence. So how does one "fight fair"? You don't. Stop being focused on fairness and focus on winning. Seems crazy? It's not.

Winning a fight is a relative concept. I do not equate winning to bullying, when I say "win" I mean accomplishing your end goal.

For instance, if your fight starts because your boyfriend isn't spending enough time with you, don't waste your energy playing mind games with him....figure out what YOUR ultimate goal is....

1. Do you want him to spend more time with you?

2. Do you feel like communication is the issue?

3. Do you just need more attention overall?

4. Do you dislike feeling like an afterthought?

5. Are you looking for a reason to leave him anyway and he's not making it easy enough?

Whatever the goal is, structure your fight not to be heard, but to win.

Dani....that seems conniving.....no....it seems real. Why waste time in an argument if you're not going to win? You'll just end up fighting about something else, until victory is yours.

Over the weekend Sweets and I had the most intense (and yet shortest) fight I'd ever experienced. I will not purport that we are even slightly more mature/enlightened than the average couple. We just honestly didn't have time for the full out argument, "salty" feelings, untrue statements of forgiveness, obligatory gabfest with the respective friends about how much we can't really stand when the other person does _________, etc.

I could tell something was wrong and we started to get into the usual routine of one person asking questions, while the other person lies with "salty" answers.

Looking at the time, I realized the way this would end. We would not accomplish anything immediately, go through the day with an unresolved issue, ruin one day of vacation, eventually solve the issue, and then regret (one week later) that we hadn't resolved it sooner.

Let the fight begin.....(Ding, Ding)....in this corner with unspoken, yet obvious anger is Sweets.....in the other corner with confusion and aggravation is Dani.....

Pause...I don't even know what the fight is about...but I want to win it. For me the "win" in that instance was to be over it. For him a "win" was to get to the bottom of what he had overheard me saying.

So I pulled an uncharacteristically Dani move and without a drop of coy or decorum attacked Sweets until I got an answer to what was amiss. Now, having taken a big girl pill and questioned him head on, I had to be completely willing to handle the rest of the argument the same way. So when he asked me to clarify what I had said in passing, I did. There was definitely room for me to fly off the handle abt why he was asking me questions and go around in circles, but....I wanted to win.

So we talked....in an open/honest/unvarnished format. Before I knew it the fight was over.

Is focusing on "winning" a "fair" way to deal with relationship quarrels, probably not, but then again I suppose you'd need to ask someone who is in one. Our fight is over. Guess who won? We both did.