Someone asked me this question: “How do I deal with people close to me whom I love have an opposite opinion?”
When Opinions Oppose
Because of the political climate around the Presidential elections, we may encounter more chances to disagree with others or feel strong emotions towards each other due to our differences in opinions and viewpoints. And the pain from these emotions can be stronger if it is with someone close to us.
Actually having different or opposite opinions may not be bad.
Our habit is to belong to communities, groups, and organizations, or be involved in relationships that share our same point of view because we feel understood, supported, and loving towards each other in those situations.
The problem comes when we encounter different opinions and those differences escalate and affect our relationships in a negative way.
Here are the things that I can recommend that you ask yourself:
- Is it really important to keep insisting on your opinions?
- Am I caught in the energy of my emotions and my ego?
- Am I hurt by him/her because I feel he/she is trying to prove I am wrong?
- Do I feel misunderstood? Do I have charged emotions because I have a strong desire to be understood by him/her?
- Do I want to be more valuable by trying to be more right than the other person or to make the other person wrong so I can feel better?
- Can I be open to hearing what the other person is saying?
I think the last one is very important because when we insist on our own opinions with charged emotions, we cannot hear anything the other person is saying.
But if we are not attached to be right or to prove we are better or do not insist to be understood by others, we can welcome the new ideas from other people who have opposite opinions and we can expand our horizons so we can make better decisions in the future.
