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How to Make up With Your Partner After a Fight  
HOW TO 

Tags: Fighting, Dating, Relationships, love, marriage, counseling

Swallowing a little bit of your pride is important to making up with your partner after a fight. Here is how to make up with your partner after a fight.

1.	Look underneath the argument. There's a saying, "You're never fighting for the reason you think". It may look like you're fighting about money, sex, or someone who's moving in on your guy, but there's usually some feeling underneath that hasn't been expressed fully.
2.	Communicate what's most true for you in one sentence. Letting your partner know "I feel scared when I see you talking to other guys." or "I feel angry I don't have the money to pay for this right now" allows you to get to the core issue and often helps them to understand where you're at without arguing about it.
3.	Take Response-Ability. Did you snap at your partner? Are you trying to control the outcome? Is it easier to get what you want by manipulating the situation rather than asking for it? We all do these things to one degree or another. If you can find a way to own up to your part in the argument, without trying to blame or wrong yourself or your partner for it, it may just open up a whole new dialog.
4.	Let go of being "RIGHT". Wanting to be right in an argument is the surest way to keep it going. People will argue about who's right and who's wrong for years if they don't decide to do something else with their energy. It's a no-win situation and keeps you from truly connecting with your partner.
5.	Learn from the argument. Is this argument much like others that you've had in the past? If you keep repeating the same arguments, it's because there's some learning that hasn't taken place yet, or some way in which you keep these issues going without realizing it. What might this issue that you've been arguing about have to teach you? Usually there is a lesson about boundaries, owning power, creative expression, and taking action that can be learned from arguments. If you face what you've been fighting about, you can often uncover the golden nugget of learning for yourself.
6.	Let your partner learn in her own way, at her own pace. You can only control yourself, and your own pace of learning. If your partner isn't getting it, you can't force them to see what this issue might be about for them. You can only see what it's about for you. There's information in any argument for both of you, but you can only take care of yourself.
7.	Appreciate your partner. Successful relationships have a five to one ratio of appreciations to criticisms. After an argument is a great time to re-balance your relationship by noticing and expressing lots of things that you really like about your partner and yourself.
8.	Make new agreements. If your argument has been a nasty one, you may want to make an agreement with your partner about how you choose to be in relationship with one another. For example "I agree not to call you nasty names." Or "I'd like for us to agree that we talk about what's going on with out yelling at each other."

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