Advice Paper

Throughout life people have argument, disagreements or even fights over many different topics. They may be disputes over trivial events like what to eat or very heated political discussions like abortion but what seems to be the center of all of these issues is a lack of compromise. Since we were kids we have been taught that compromise is an important part of life, and when we don’t compromise there is issues but this may not be the case. According to author Lisa McLeod

“Refusal to compromise is widely considered to be the root cause of political polarization, business battles, and divorce wars. But refusal to compromise isn't actually the cause of these problems. It's merely a symptom. The real problem, the root problem, is unwillingness to tolerate uncertainty.”(McLeod, 2013) In her article entitled “Why Compromise Never Works (And What to Do Instead)” McLeod discusses the uncertainty of decision-making. McLeod points out that there are two components, “Over-attachment to the literal [and] inability to articulate the conceptual”. She describes that “Over-attachment to the literal causes people to dumb down their agenda”, while the inability to articulate the conceptual “keeps people from understanding where the other side is coming from.” (McLeod, 2013) McLeod gives the example of a husband and wife deciding whether their son should go to a private school. The wife says they should take from their retirement to pay for it while the husband thinks a state school is fine. McLeod points out that they are arguing over the literal when they need to look at the conceptual. Instead if the husband explains, "What I really want is for our son to get a great education, and for us to enjoy our retirement” they are now looing at the conceptual and what their hopes dreams and desires are. Because this article dealt with the ideas of conflicting desires it seemed as though RDT would be the right theory to apply. Three of the major ideas behind RDT I that relational life is in constant motion and that people try and reconcile their conflicting desires and most importantly that partners in a relationship have conflicting desires throughout the relationship. RDT also deals with the fact that relationships are complicated which is important to McLeod’s article. Because relationships are complicated when trying to compromise with a partner it is often much more difficult than just looking at the current situation and instead is concerned with many of the factors in the relationship. Another critical part to RDT is the approaches used, monologic, dualistic, and dialectic. When it comes to a relationship with a significant other the best approach to look at is dialectic because it deals with the complexities that occur in a relationship. While desire is an important part of RDT so is the contradictions between those desires, especially between couples. When looking at the basic relational dialectics, autonomy and connection, openness and protection, finally novelty and predictability. Autonomy and connection has to deal with the simultaneous desires to maintain independence and to fulfill the need for affiliation and inclusion. This can be an essential part in the compromising process. When looking to compromise with a significant other there is often the challenge of