You and him will disagree. You'll have strong feelings about different subjects. You'll misread each other. Anyone who tells you they never argue is either lying or very avoidant.
Here's what it actually looks like for us:
We still get loud sometimes.
No one's shouting the other down, but we're still passionate. We still have emotions — they just don't run the show.
We stay on topic.
The thing that happened six months ago doesn't matter. We don't spiral into every hurt we've each experienced.
We table things.
Cooler heads prevail, and sometimes we're at an impasse. We table it and set an intention to come back to it. When that happens, I choose not to sit in my hurt feelings and disrupt a perfectly good evening. We created a container for the conversation, and we go back to it.
We don't always agree.
This absolutely happens. In these moments, we go back to our shared values and goals as a couple — instead of being offended with each other in the moment.
We don't punish each other for days with passive-aggressive behavior.
If one of us is ignoring the other (or feels ignored), we address it. What grounds us is the fact that we — allegedly — love each other, so we choose not to treat each other like shit. Usually we're more hurt by not talking to this person, who's actually one of our favorite people on the planet.
I'm going to show you exactly how to navigate disagreements, misreads, arguments, and conflict with your husband — so they don't turn into the same old song and dance that's been keeping you from actually enjoying your marriage.
And that doesn't mean:
Be nice. Accommodate. Give in. Avoid.
(Crying is totally okay, though.)