Pic adapted from Istockphoto.
The day the conflict happened between the couple…
Activity: Over the phone
Girl: Let’s go to Chinatown later. I want to develop photos over there. Remember to bring the thumb drive. The photos are in it. Anyway, I’m hungry, I haven’t had lunch.
Guy: Ok! Let’s go have lunch at Chinatown later as well.
Activity: Meeting on the bus
Girl: Good, this time round you are not late. You have the thumb drive with you right?
Guy: OH SHIT! I forgot about it. Why didn’t you remind me again?
Girl: I already told you, didn’t I?
Guy: I was rushing out since you said you were hungry. So how? Do I go back to my place to take the thumb drive?
Girl: Hmm. How? We are already on the bus.
Activity: Continuing on the journey to Chinatown without any idea what to do over there other than having lunch
Activity: Eating in Chinatown
Girl: Do you want anything for yourself?
Guy: Nope, I’ve eaten.
Activity: Guy trying to be funny by placing his used tissue paper near the noodle sauce, causing Girl to finally flare up.
Girl: What are you doing?!?! I’m still eating, you know?!?! You are so f***ing irritating.
Activity: The cold war starts
Activity: Girl has finished eating and wants to leave
Girl: EH, let’s go.
Activity: Guy stayed still
Girl: Why you don’t want to leave? Became a statue?
Guy: Because you said I’m f***ing irritating, so I’m staying still.
Girl: What do you want?!
Guy: Why are you, a girl, using such foul language?!
Activity: Both, feeling angry and annoyed, left the eating place.
Why was there so much anger and displeasure between the two? Was it because the guy forgot about the thumb drive and yet he continued to cause annoyance to the girl? Or was it because the girl was feeling sore about the thumb drive and the unhappiness continued to accumulate until it was finally released in the terms of foul language?
To me, it is a conflict due to roles and responsibility in a close relationship. And precisely because of the close relationship, it is tough to manage the feelings well. We tend to treat people, whom we are close to, in a manner that we will not treat others. At times, there will be less courtesy and more arguments as we know that the people who are closer to us can tolerate our misdeeds better. Hence our behaviours are allowed to go awry and we lose control of our feelings. However, I believe that having conflict is not the biggest problem. The biggest problem is to face the conflict, find a solution to it and eventually learn and grow from it.
6 comments:
Ha! This is exactly what happens to me and my boyfriend. He expects me to be his 'secretary', reminder calls and all included. (-.-)
Personally, I think it is due to the way the guy reacted when the girl asked if he has the thumbdrive with him that started the displeasure between the two. Despite the fact that the girl already told him the main objective of going to Chinatown, i.e, to develop photos and hence the importance of bringing the thumbdrive, all the guy heard was the girl wanted to have lunch. Yet he accused the girl of not reminding him to bring the thumbdrive along.
Somehow, the guy just did not realise he had already started the timer for the bomb. Poor thing. Muahahaha.. Or maybe, he did realise his mistake and he truly thought he could succeed in making the girl laugh when he was 'trying to be funny by placing his used tissue paper near the noodle sauce'. In any case, it certainly backfired and aggravated the girl instead. Then, the ill-feelings snowballed because the guy has an issue with the girl responding with foul language. (Some guys seem to want their girls to be demure and free of vulgarities)
It is most likely that the conflict can be avoided by 'smoothing out the incident of the thumbdrive'. However, if the situation has already escalated into a 'full-scale war', I think it is important for both parties to step back and calm down before any hurtful words start surfacing to worsen the problem.
I feel that in any relationship, the ability to talk things over is often the most difficult to have. This may most likely be attributed to the lower tolerance level we have for love ones like you mentioned. I see the truth in this because my boyfriend once asked me, "Why are you so intolerant of my mistakes? But I'm sure if it were your friends, you would just let it go."
I believe anything can be solved if there is mutual respect and if both parties show willingness to thrash things out! (^.^)
Hmm,
As far as i could see the situation. The guy is the one at fault here. And the girl should learn to control her emotion.
The guy should have given a proper apology instead of the "accusation". Since i can't hear the tone, and them being a couple, i am imagining that the accusation part of story its more in a joking guilty manner.
This happens often in close relationships, we tend to neglect apologies,thank yous, greetings etc. While when you are with people that you are not that close with you tend to use them more.
This though can indicate closeness in relationships, could sometimes backfire when you do not know the mood of the other party.
For example, i tend to call names jokingly on my friends such as calling him monkey (ehe... you know who you are :P) or maybe abit severe such as stupid monkey etc. But all in all meant is as a joke and not in and offensive manner. However the other party was in a bad mood or had a bad day, calling names etc would trigger the "bomb" in this case when other days you guys would just laugh it off.
As such EQ is important in reading the mood of the other. Especially reading facial expressions the all important non-verbal information ^_^.
There was a time when i learned that the hard way.
I was walking down the stairs and met one of my friends at the bottom of the stairs, being in a playful mood, i went down and give him a slap on the back(pretty hard since his quite a big guy) while saying: Hi there big ape!
And to my demise, he was in a bad mood and thus replied with a rough jerk of the shoulder and a scary glare along with a sharp: FuXX Off !
Thus reading the other's is important in this case.
As for the case of my friend, i apologized to him after he cooled down a little and then found out that he had a bad day caused by his other group members.
The scenario you describe sounds like what often happens between me and my girlfriend. I think the problem should be nipped in the bud at the initial stage instead of letting it roll over subsequently.
I think I understand how the guy felt when the girl said "Good, this time round you are not late. You have the thumb drive with you right". The guy must have felt that it was his fault and turned defensive so that is why he replied with "Why didn’t you remind me again?".
I actually have a few strategies to deal with this kind of problem. Firstly, one should try his best not to turn defensive when being accused. If one turns defensive, chances are that communications will break down and I guess both parties will start to quarrel with each other. I will try not to turn defensive by thinking that the other party is not finding fault with me but with the problem instead.
It will be the best if one trys not to pinpoint the fault at someone else. After all, live and let live :D If one really has to do so, it will be good to talk about himself first before approaching the fault itself.
My experience so far has tell me that never use the word 'you' when dealing with issues such as this. In my humble opinion, I think it is one of the simplest and most effective thing to do. When one uses the word 'you', the other party will feel as if he is being accused and will turn defensive subsequently.
Well, the crux of it all is to prevent the other party and yourself from turning defensive. The moment a party turns defensive, it is as if a invisible wall has been erected between both parties and chances are this wall will be hard to breach :)
As the saying goes, opposite attracts and thus it is not odd that in this case the girl is often 'in charge' while the guy trots along obediently. Given the trivial nature of forgetting the thumbdrive, it seems that the guy is a repeated offender of momentary amnesia and had previously succeeded is sneaking his way out of trouble by coaxing a smile out of her. In my opinion, both parties could do better with their EQ skills. The guys should have sensed that the incident is a little too big to blow off with a smile and mixed in a word of apology to reset the emotions. Likewise, the girl could have acknowledge the guy’s good intentions to make her laugh or simply just indicated the mood of the moment rather than giving him the cold shoulder and let the frustration build up to boiling point. Girls, let the guy off. He is trying his best - meeting her for lunch despite not being hungry, making her laugh when she is unhappy, giving her space when she ask for it, and most importantly loving her for everything good she represents (demure as Joyce mentioned).
Thanks, Angeline. This is a very dramatic scenario. (Ouch!)
Would it be possible to pose your solution question from one of the participants view? Also, what is the main question that you want answered?
At least you got ample feedback from your classmates!
Possible solution question from the main characters: Why do I feel so much anger and displeasure?
Main question:Will a better management of feelings take control of the situation to prevent any outbreak?
Afterall, prevention is better than cure. :p
Thanks all for the feedback! I guessed everyone got into this kind of situation before. :p
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