"I didn't mean to hurt you."

No matter how close you are with your partner, you are bound to have conflicts. Sometimes, they end in hurting feelings that can’t be resolved. If those arguments keep repeating then the relationship will eventually come to a point from where there’s no going back. As long as the partners know how to resolve issues peacefully, they don’t stop learning about each other’s struggles and respect their recovering processes. But when they do everything they can to resolve and still find themselves unable to get past them, they may be unaware that they are amplifying the most common enemy of conflict resolution. It is the all-too-human tendency to excuse one’s own behaviour and blame the other for the hurt he or she is feeling. It shows up as “asking to be excused for what you’ve done because you didn’t mean to hurt them.”

“I was just angry. I didn’t mean what I said.”

“Just because I said those things doesn’t mean you can’t be a little forgiving.”

“I wouldn’t be that way if you weren’t that way to me first.”

“You’re over-exaggerating. I never said anything that bad.”

Whether we want to face that truth or not, most of us know exactly how much we are going to hurt our partner before we say anything. It’s just that there have been so many interactions where they’ve told us exactly how they feel after those arguments. We just don’t want to remember those things because, if we did, we’d have to behave accordingly next time around. If we can just pretend that we actually didn’t understand what was about to happen this point around, we never have to admit that we just didn’t care enough about our partner at that moment to stop our own behaviour.

When we are only into our own thing and ignoring our partners, they become the invisible enemy and no longer deserve automatic consideration or compassion. It is only when the argument is over and we come to our senses that we may realize what we’ve done. Maybe we truly didn’t mean to hurt our partner, but we certainly put that awareness aside when we wanted to say what we exactly wanted to say.

If we’re willing to admit that we chose to put our own needs above those of our partner in the heat of the moment, we can at least be honest about it. That accountability gives your partner the right to be angry, instead of being expected to forgive you because you “didn’t mean to hurt them.” It really doesn’t matter if you didn’t mean to; you DID hurt them. You’re in charge of the pain you’ve caused whether or not you supposed to or not. The outcome for your partner is the same. It would be wonderful if both partners would be honest about their own self-serving behaviour in their lack of accountability. It would even be better if they could remember how important their partner’s feelings were before they chose to fight. Unfortunately, that’s not what usually happens. Perhaps out of guilt or embarrassment, most partners who have chosen self over the other are more likely to compensate by feeling righteous about what they’ve done. That need to cover their inability to admit their self-serving behaviour then leads them to excuse it and, instead, blame their partner for starting it. All it takes is a little consideration and acknowledging the fact that it's still the person we chose to love.