Conflict

Conflict can be good. When you encounter conflict, if you have a humble heart and you want to learn from it and build a better relationship from solving it, then you can begin to see how conflict can actually benefit you and your relationship. By being humble, you realize that not everyone is perfect, including yourself. This step enables you to better understand where the other person is coming from and therefor you are less likely to become offended by something they say or do. Next, conflict can help because when you solve the conflict, or are in the process of solving it, you learn more about the other person than you originally did before, which can help you two to become closer.

Along with conflicts can come stress. According to the Marriage & Family textbook that we are using in my class, the top five most severe stress starting events in a family are:

1. Death of a Child

2. Death of a spouse or parent

3. Separation or divorce of a spouse or parent

4. Physical or Sexual abuse between family members

5. Family member becomes physically disabled or chronically ill

(6. I feel like financial problems can definitely be added to this list as well.)

All these stressor events can cause crisis in the family but any stress and crisis can be overcome if the family uses appropriate coping mechanisms. Coping is the family’s reaction to crisis which can be either good or bad, it all depends on the attitude the family has. Attitude is the difference between making a crisis better or worse.