People in conflict often remember the same event very differently.

Fights tend to escalate when frustration builds over time.

You can set a boundary without agreeing on the past.

Often, when a client sits down on the couch and wants to tell a recent story about a relationship, they go back. Sometimes way back, even decades. The current event is just another brick in a wall that the client seems to carry on their back wherever they go.

In a way, it makes sense. If you want to solve a problem, it is only reasonable to track it to its beginning, take care of the roots, and let the rest follow. But the reality of relationships is often much more complicated than that. Our memories differ, and each person in the relationship often holds a different story close to their heart and can swear it is the only real truth. At times, these stories are only somewhat different, and at other times they are completely contradictory.

The Stories We Tell About Ourselves

In research about interpersonal conflict, Baumeister and his colleagues explained that "Autobiographical narratives…........

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