Where to start looking
We keep having the same argument
You could both perform the other person's lines by now.
It starts over something small and neither of you thinks it is about the small thing.
Afterwards you make up without resolving anything.
A recurring argument is usually a stand in
Arguments that repeat are rarely about the dishes or the diary. They are the only available shape for something that has no other way of being raised. That is why resolving the surface subject never holds.
Both people are usually right about something
In most repeating arguments each person is accurately reporting their own experience and inaccurately reporting the other's motive. That is enough to keep it going indefinitely.
The pattern is shared even when the fault is not
Whatever started it, the loop is now something you both maintain. That is not a way of assigning blame equally. It is what makes the loop possible to interrupt.
What this usually connects to
- What each of you is actually asking for underneath the complaint.
- What happens in the hour before it starts.
A question worth sitting with
- What would you have to believe about them for their side to make sense?
The session gets underneath the surface subject to what the argument is standing in for.
What are we actually arguing aboutIt is a conversation, not a questionnaire. You can stop at any point, and finishing it does not mean anything has to change.
If the question turns out to be a different one