A CREDO FOR OUR RELATIONSHIPS

You and I are in a relationship which I value and want to keep. Yet each of us is a separate person with unique needs and the right to meet those needs.

When you are having problems meeting your needs, I will try to listen with genuine acceptance, in order to facilitate your finding your own solutions instead of depending on mine. I will also try to respect your right to choose your own beliefs and develope your own values, different though they may be from mine.

However, when your behavior inteferes with what I must do to get my own needs met, I will tell you openly and honestly how your behavior affects me, trusting that you respect my needs and feelings enough to try to change the behavior that is unacceptable to me. Also, when some behavior of mine is unacceptable to you, I hope you will tell me openly and honestly so I can change my behavior.

At those times when we find that either of us cannot change to meet the other's needs,let us acknowledge that we have a conflict and commit ourselves to resolve each conflict without either of us resorting to the use of power or authority to win at the expense of the other's losing. I respect you needs, but I must also respect my own. So let us strive always to search for a solution that will be acceptable to both of us. Your needs will be met, and so will mine--neither will lose, both will win.

In this way, you can continue to develope as a person through satisfying your needs, and so can I. Thus, ours can be a healthy relationship in which both of us can strive to become what we are capable of being. And we can continue to relate to each other with mutual respect, love, and peace.

This works out in the real world, where differences and feelings exist that tend to drive a wedge between healthy relationships. In our christian relationships we should all be striving for the same things, but there are times when attitudes even cause differences in the church. Things cannot always be like what we think they should be, but the end solution is following the examples that Christ set forth.