The latter is understood as the ability to recognize each other's points of view and emotions, and as a process by which partners can achieve and maintain mutual understanding. Communication has attributed the sense of"communio" [2], i.e., of mutual giving and mutual construction of a couple's boundary.
Conflict in couples often arises as a result of mutually disappointed expectations and obstructive relational and communicational modes and attitudes regarding the possibility of building a healthy context of dual negotiation. Sometimes, in the face of processing rigidity, conflicts also affect the somatic level and in particular the sexual sphere.
It is important to consider that, in the context of the nuclear family, infer all the possible unresolved related to that of the families of origin. In fact, when the partners have not yet been released from their families of origin, each tends to reproduce with the other relational modes and unresolved conflicts with the parent of the opposite sex. Whitaker talks about"divorce from families of origin [2] in the sense that there is a need to divorce as a husband from his mother and as a wife from her father, and therefore be children.
In the course of couples psychotherapy, a setting is set up in which some tidying and cleaning can be done, regarding subjective boundaries - internal to the couple - and boundaries between the couple and families of origin - external. In addition, you are helped to productively channel conflict, to confront each other in an argument, and even to go down an "aggressive" route to love.
For example, it is possible to see how arguing - which one would like to eliminate - not to be abhorred, it can for example allow the activation of a confrontation. Anger, in fact, when it can be "welcomed" and when you can "say" it in an appropriate way has in itself an emancipatory potential, can help partners to build healthier boundaries.
If, on the other hand, it is only badly acted or repressed, it can only be destructive, it can lead to the rupture of the relationship and even make people sick.
The destructive valence, violent, arises from isolation, from perceiving as a "wall", from not feeling seen and not seeing the Other. Precisely the incommunicability, as in Munch's painting '"Two people alone". In the painting, a man and a woman are looking at the same horizon, but they are not looking at each other.
Anger and quarrel can therefore have a evolutionary function, constructive and also protective of the couplecan help partners to distinguish themselves, maintaining their own identity, thus allowing them to identify themselves, a prerequisite for being united.
This prophylaxis - cleaning up the boundaries - is preparatory to overcoming self-referentiality, which also allows access to adult negotiation and any systemic logic.
In fact, the difficulties of the couple are not related to the different contents but to a difficulty in negotiating them. To the difficulty of going beyond oneself and breathing the Other as it is. The psychotherapy solicits precisely the negotiating strings, trains the comparison with the Other and with another point of view.
Conflict and Cheating in a Relationship
There is a lot of truth to the old adage that “the enemy of my enemy is my friend”. But one thing that would be great example of this is a conflict between a couple. In this case, the problem is not any sort of cheating, but rather how we handle it once the cheating starts.
It can be tempting to just let things run their course and hope everything will go back to normal (that is not how we usually do things though). But if you want to avoid any sort of emotional fallout later on (or worse), you need to take steps now — before it starts. Just like with your relationships, you should have systems in place that can help you mitigate potential conflict and keep it at bay. You may think “well, I don’t have time for this!” or “it has nothing to do with me or my business!”.
You are probably right about those two statements — but they are both wrong and incorrect. Conflict is something we all deal with on a daily basis; without it, our relationships would lose their meaning and value; without it, we cannot function well (and sometimes even do very badly). A way to communicate, to take care of the relationship, is also to let the other know his own experience, pleasant or unpleasant that is, the possibility of sharing, that is to have a look both on himself and on the Other. Finally, a healthy couple can allow itself a continuous dialectic between union and separation, between belonging and individuation.
"It's a really bizarre thing, but the closer two people are, the more separate they are. If they cannot separate, they cannot even increase intimacy. If they cannot increase their individuality, they cannot even increase their togetherness. The freer you are with others, especially your wife, the freer you feel with yourself. The more you are with yourself, the more you can be with her", [3].
Research materials were used in the article:
[1] C. A. WHITAKER, Nightly Considerations of a Family Therapist, ed Astrolabe, Rome, 1990
[2] E. SCABINI, V. CIGOLI, The family member, Cortina and. Milan, 2000
[3] Ibid.
