Resolving Issues Between People

[Gregory Matthews]

In the human world in which we live, problems will always arise between people.  That is just life and the way that it is.  It is unrealistic to expect that one will be able to have positive relations with everyone else.  The Bible may ask   us to love our enemies, but it does not tell us to like everyone, believe it or not.     We are not required to like everyone.  That is simply unrealistic.

If we want to   develop positive relationships, we must, at times be up front in bringing appropriately to their attention issues that are problematic to a positive relationship.  When we fail to do that, we are simply saying that we do not value developing a positive relationship.  NOTE:  That does not mean that we build every minor issue into a major one.  Some issues are so minor that we do not need to make a major issue of them.

I will give an example that may be of interest as it is current.

Recently I received a message from someone in this forum.  I will simply describe it as crude and let it go at that.  I was dumbfounded.  But, I dismissed it as coming from a person who was having a bad day.    I even contacted someone else who knew the person who sent me the message and asked them if that individual was at a very stressful time in his life. 

So, I let it go.  But, deep down I felt that my relationship with that person had been strained.

Yesterday, while sitting in church, my phone goes off and I receive a text message from that individual and it was exactly the same text that I have described as crude.    So, I calmly brought it to the attention of the individual who had sent it to me.  We talked about it in a discussion that involved all of the other Administrators of this forum.

It was determined, yesterday, that in probably a unique set of circumstances, a computer glitch sent me a message, twice, that it identified as coming from a person who did not send such a message to me.  The glitch has been identified and it is believed to have been fixed. 

In retrospect, I find it funny that a computer sent me a message on its own.  It almost represents thinking by a computer.    I can laugh at it now.  I feel much better now about the person whom the computer named as sending me the message.

But, my point is:  Things are good now because the person and I got together and we discussed it in a manner that was designed to foster a positive relationship.  If I had not brought it up, the issue would probably have fostered and grown larger.

People who want to build positive relationships talk about them.

 

[Stan]

Great post, thanks!  I have shared it on Facebook.

 

[Gregory Matthews]

Feel free, Stan.  I am always willing for my words of wisdom to be shared.  

Please excuse me.  My wife tells me that I have a sense of humor that can be easily misunderstood.

 

[Stan]

LOL no i understand that humour..

[debbym]

yes i agree it can be valuable to step back and communicate aboyut how we are communicating and what it seems is being communicated.

 

i call it respect... "re" again, and "spect" to look... to look again.  if we always just go by first look we will miss so much, and think we got it, when we simply do not.

 

when i have felt misread... it seemed to take more courage to ask others to look again.