1. Be careful about what you say. You don’t have to insult people to make your point.
2. Don’t talk until it’s your turn. If you talk all the time, you don’t listen at any point. Let the other person speak.
3. Always keep in mind the point of the conversation. The goal is not to win, but to figure out what went wrong, learn from it, and get better.
4. Listen to what is said, but also listen for what is really meant.
5. Events from the past can be used to show a trend, but before you do that, you should look at the problem at hand as a separate problem.
6. Fighting is both a way to teach and learn. Let yourself teach and learn good things, not bad ones.
7. Make sure that even if you can’t solve the problem, you can walk away knowing you did your best.
8. Leave before things get rough.
9. Use conversational tools to help you get your message across:
Wait for the other person to speak.
Bring the point back to make it stick better.
Know when to stop talking and put it off until later.
Move quickly to happy endings.
10. Don’t let fights go on for too long; try to settle them as soon as possible. Lastly, don’t wait until fights start to take place. We would all misunderstand each other sometimes. Plan ahead of time how you’ll handle problems if they come up. This helps you find reasonable ways to solve the problem when you’re both calm instead of when you’re both angry.
