Never Fight Again . . . Guaranteed!: Groundbreaking Practices for a Win-Win Marriage

By David Hawkins

What do couples fight about most? Is it sex, money, children, in-laws, or time management? The answer is: “none of the above. Couples can get into power struggles over anything. It is not any specific subject, but the act of fighting, that drives us. We want what we don’t have and will fight to get it. And this drives a wedge between us and the ones we love.


In this book Dr. David Hawkins, bestselling author, psychologist, and advice columnist, outlines a plan of action to assure that you “Never Fight Again . . . Guaranteed!” Dr. Hawkins argues for a paradigm shift that will take your relationship from one built on selfishness to one of sacrificial love. Once we do that, we give up the fight, care for ourselves and those around us, and change our hearts for the better.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Abingdon Press
• Release date: Jul 15, 2014
• ISBN: 9781426787409

David Hawkins

With more than 30 years of counseling experience, David Hawkins, PhD, has a special interest in helping individuals and couples strengthen their relationships. Dr. Hawkins’ books, including When Pleasing Others Is Hurting You and Dealing with the CrazyMakers in Your Life, have more than 350,000 copies in print.

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Copyright Page

Never Fight Again…Guaranteed!

Groundbreaking Practices for a Win-Win Marriage

Copyright © 2014 by David B. Hawkins

All rights reserved.

No part of this work may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying and recording, or by any information storage or retrieval system, except as may be expressly permitted by the 1976 Copyright Act or in writing from the publisher. Requests for permission can be addressed to Permissions, The United Methodist Publishing House, P.O. Box 801, 201 Eighth Avenue South, Nashville, TN 37202-0801, or e-mailed to [e-mail].

Guarantee: We guarantee that after reading this book, working through its contents, following its steps, journaling through its questions, and working through this book with your mate you will find new ways to relate—without fighting. If you have diligently done the work that the book describes and within a year of faithful practice haven’t found a change, please contact us, with a letter explaining your steps, process, and lack of change, and we will refund the cost of the book.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Hawkins, David, 1951-

Never fight again ... guaranteed! : groundbreaking practices for a win-win marriage / Dr. David B. Hawkins.

pages cm

Includes bibliographical references.

ISBN 978-1-4267-7385-3

1. Marriage—Religious aspects—Christianity. 2. Man-woman relationships—Religious aspects—Christianity. I. Title.

BV835.H3784 2014

248.4—dc23

2014009107

Scripture quotations are taken from the Common English Bible. Copyright © 2011 by the Common English Bible. All rights reserved. Used by permission. www.CommonEnglishBible.com.

Contents

Contents

Introduction: You Can Choose Unity over War

Chapter 1: Conflict Begets Conflict

Chapter 2: Passive-Aggression, Explosions, and Other Power Plays

Chapter 3: The Hidden Dangers of Perfectionism and Compromise

Chapter 4: When Negotiation Isn’t Effective: The Art of Collaboration

Chapter 5: Clearing the Air: Letting Go of Resentments

Chapter 6: Grace and the End to Fighting

Chapter 7: The Problem Is Not Really th Problem

Chapter 8: Living Free from Angerl

Chapter 9: The Power of Accurate Empathy

Chapter 10: Guarding against the Backslide

Chapter 11: You’re Not Finished until Everybody Wins

Chapter 12: Mad about Us

Notes

Introduction: You Can Choose Unity over War

Introduction

You Can Choose Unity over War

When he came, he announced the good news of peace to you who were far away from God and to those who were near.—Ephesians 2:17

On a recent flight from Seattle to Dallas, I sat behind a couple who couldn’t agree on anything. They appeared to be in their early thirties. They bickered about who would get what seat, who would clean up after their young son, and where to eat once they landed. While I struggled not to listen, it reminded me of our sad state of affairs. Tensions run high, from the international stage to the confines of our nation and our communities, marriages and families—even to the pews of our churches.

As far as I can see, we are in serious trouble. Everybody’s fighting. People think their way is right, their opinion is the most accurate, and they have a right to share it forcefully with others. We’re a world divided, nation against nation, neighbor against neighbor, mate against mate.

Am I exaggerating this problem? I don’t think so. Listening to my pastor friends and colleagues in business reassures me I’m not overreacting. Strife is common; cooperation and peace are rare.

Conflict is an inevitable part of any relationship, I hear counselors, pastors, and experts say. You just have to learn to fight fair.

Oh, really?

Let me see if I get this: arguments cannot be helped; since they are inevitable, we have to fight with each other in a way that isn’t hurtful. We’re to bicker and quarrel, air our grievances, but still avoid harming anyone.

I believed this fair fight notion for the longest time. I was trained in the fields of social work and clinical psychology when expressing yourself was in vogue. I learned how to teach clients to use foam mallets to pummel their mates—therapeutically. I learned the value of rage therapy in an effort to release those nasty feelings constructively. I learned that suppressing emotions was dangerous to our well-being. Aggression is a natural phenomenon, and we must learn to accept and embrace it. Assertiveness training, talk therapy, and free expression of raw emotions were all part of my indoctrination. Express those feelings!

Somehow, along the long and winding therapeutic road, I could never quite get the words healthy and conflict to sit nicely together. I couldn’t get fighting for what you want and deferring to one another in love to make friends. As anger management, aggression therapy, and never taking no for an answer became more common, I heard less and less about cooperation and peace. The concept of war seemed to be favored over unity.

Backward

I have felt uneasy for years about this idea of expressing feelings no matter the consequences. During personal reflection I discovered that when I’m fighting, manipulating with assertiveness, being direct, and sharing my opinion, I’m often not practicing peace-making. I’m operating from a primitive position, seeking ways to win.

I decided that we’ve really got things backward.

Peacemaking, I discovered, involves a whole lot more than not fighting. Making peace, which is our path to never fighting again, involves more than simply restraining unwieldy emotions. Ending my battles with people is a war (pun intended) I have to first win internally before I can successfully win it externally. Unity is possible—it just takes some work.

Never Fight Again . . .Guaranteed! was for me a matter of professional and personal exploration. I found myself puzzled as to why, despite years of training and degrees, as well as being married, there were times I was unable to constrain my emotions. While I achieved some success at ending my battles with my wife externally, I still wanted to win! I needed a mind-shift—and perhaps you do too—and that is what this book is about.

Never Fight Again . . . Guaranteed! is a radically new message. While it may seem almost too good to be true, this book envisions a message of peace. This is not a book of tricky gimmicks for outmaneuvering your opponent or ways to sweeten your aggressive impulses but rather a new way of looking at others. I will take you on a journey where we take off our let it all hang out approaches and replace them with unity-seeking ones. Prepare for a profound shift of consciousness.

It’s Time for a Fresh Idea

The fact is, healthy conflict and constructive criticism are outdated ideas. Still, you may be asking how can we avoid episodes of bickering, squabbling, and edgy power struggles. Is it really possible to live out the words of Jesus: Happy are people who make peace, because they will be called God’s children (Matt. 5:9)? Could Jesus really have been talking about marriage and relationships?

Yes! In Never Fight Again . . . Guaranteed! we will discover some invaluable tools and strategies for healthy connecting. In the next twelve chapters we will:

1. Discover that conflict only creates more conflict—and what we can do to build relationships instead.

2. Unmask the dynamics of power involved in explosions, passive-aggression, and outright power plays—and how we can replace these with healthy expressions of feelings.

3. Understand the true nature of compromise. As we examine the heart and soul of compromise, which is often to get the most while offering the least, and the dangers inherent in perfectionism, we will learn how to relate from the heart, not the ego.

4. Explore the hidden dynamics involved in negotiation—and how this tactic is often riddled with manipulation and self-serving strategies. We will learn the skill of true giving, seeking solutions that are productive and healthy for both partners.

5. Uncover the wisdom in letting go of resentments. We will learn how to avoid this hidden toxin that fuels so many quarrels—and how to heal with the power of forgiveness.

6. Experience the true meaning of grace and the impact it has on our inner spirits as we take an honest inventory of the hidden parts of our personalities. We will discover the benefits of nurturing love as it relates to marriage.

7. Realize that what we thought was the problem isn’t. The source of conflict is not the issue—it’s our inability to manage conflict itself that is the problem! We’ll look at embracing our problems, recognizing them as symptoms, and viewing fights in a whole new way.

8. Live free from anger. Knowing that the battle begins with us, we learn how to identify and control the different parts of our personalities.

9. Experience true empathy for others. Discovering the fine art of accurate empathy, we’ll learn to place others’ needs above our own and to work toward others’ highest good.

10. Discover ways to avoid backsliding, which seems inevitable in relationships. We will learn strategies for recognizing when we’re on thin ice and ways to manage those difficult situations.

11. Engage the winner in our mates, staving off conflict and enlisting them in strategies of collaboration and cooperation. We’ll reinforce the importance of everybody feeling like a winner.

12. Focus our energies on protecting our relationships, not our self-centered beliefs. We must take a more aggressive stance toward our union, not our personal goals. We must become more important than I.

A Better Way: Living in Unity

We are not simply called to manage or to engage in healthy emotional expression, but to live in unity.

Consider the words of David, the king and psalmist: Look at how good and pleasing it is / when families live together as one! (Ps. 133:1). In many ways, this idea of living together without overwhelming one another is too great to imagine. Many of us struggle to relate without backbiting, quibbling, and quarreling, let alone feeling unified and enjoying life together. If we can finish a week without getting into a bitter battle with someone, we think we’ve accomplished great things. But that is not the picture drawn for us in Scripture.

How good and pleasant it is when mates live together in unity. Can you picture a world, or at least a marriage, where potential battles are managed immediately and efficiently, giving way to peace? Squabbles are resolved quickly with true partnership being the norm. The focus of the relationship is on cooperation, not when and where the next fight will occur. This is possible, attainable, and you’ll learn how in this book.

Unity begins from the grounding we have in our faith. King David, the writer of Psalm 133, knows there are natural differences between us, disparate temperaments and life experiences, and he still suggests unity is possible. Our differences are not really the problem—pride is the culprit! Pride about our particular position erects the dividing wall.

This is tragic! Clinging stubbornly to our position, allowing differences to separate us, we lose the sweet unity that is possible.

Humility binds our hearts together. Humility allows us to rejoice together in fellowship. Humility breaks down the walls of suspicion and opens the way for real fellowship. Unity, peace, and fellowship: they are possible.

And so, I’m offering to teach you how to never fight again, guaranteed. Yes, I know this is a huge promise, but I can show you how to do it.

Living in unity is possible, but it takes a change of mind. We must give up our old ways of acting, our outdated beliefs that struggle is a natural part of everyday life. Strife is not natural, is not healthy, and does not have to be part of our daily existence.

It is time for a change. Will you be part of a growing number of people seeking peace rather than war, harmony rather than debate and division, kind cooperation rather than bitter conflict? Let’s explore together how we can have marriages marked by agreement and encouragement.

Chapter One: Conflict Begets Conflict

Chapter One

Conflict Begets Conflict

The greatest conflicts are not between two people but