Why Conflict Isn’t a Reason to Quit

I am a stubborn person. My wife, Melissa, is a stubborn person. We both might contest this depending on our disposition at the time, but by doing so we would only prove the point.

And the Lord said, “the two stubborn people shall be made One.”

If He wasn’t God, I would question His integrity.

I’d question Him, because I was cooking dinner the other night when for the umpteenth time, in the midst of a series of difficult culinary techniques (chopping, sautéing…my motor skills are not the best), Melissa insisted on trying to clean up the kitchen.

This was a problem for me.

I operate in the kitchen as a not-so-benevolent dictator. So I went all Gordon Ramsey: “Get out of my kitchen!” This is what they call in military warfare a “disproportionate response.”

Photo Credit: Mikaela Hamilton

All of our relationships are littered with trivial, temporal conflicts like these that mark them. Our lives are filled with tension points that test the durability of our faithfulness to a person, a goal, a dream.

How are we to approach these conflicts?

How are we to evaluate them?

There is one way that prioritizes our limits. It suggests that we should have in mind a threshold, an acceptable level of infractions—in severity and occasion—that when crossed, prudence demands that we cut and run. It is a view that is short-sighted and immediate: “what have you done for me lately?”

This way makes commitment circumstantial, and our present comfort an idol.

There is another way that did not come easy to me until I was forced to make the commitment in advance. This way focuses not on our limits or our self-protection, but on love, on the idea that commitment bears fruit we could not have anticipated at its inception.

This is the way of a significant life.

It provides a barrier against the rationalization that can too easily defeat yesterday’s promises with today’s predicaments. It allows us to have confidence in the decisions we make today, because we know those decisions will have meaning and relevance tomorrow.

Of course, if we are to take on this life, it requires some changes:

Guard your “yes” carefully. The best way to protect our commitments is to not make them lightly. (tweet this link)

This is a problem for those of us who hate closing a door or disappointing people, but it is necessary. It has helped me to remember that each “no” that I give to someone is a “yes” to my priorities, my relationships, and the commitments I have already made.

Maintain wise counsel. We need people who look out for us. If our eyes are not always on the exit ramp, we need people who love us enough to let us know when they should be, and to give them enough insight into our lives that they can offer good advice.

When we choose to live a significant life, conflicts and obstacles transform from reasons to quit to reminders of why we made the commitment in the first place. They turn into monuments, milestones, on the way to the fulfillment of the promise we made. They urge us on toward a hard-fought victory.

Melissa and I are still stubborn people.

But with each momentary conflict, our love grows stronger, more durable. We are stubbornly in love. And slowly, but surely, whenever Gordon Ramsey decides to show up, we’re both learning to just tell him to calm the heck down.

And we move on: toward that goal we both have in mind.

Why Conflict Isn’t a Reason to Quit is a post from: Storyline Blog