Plastics-Tora Sellers

                Just like most other advice I receive, the best advice I’ve gotten recently was also unsolicited. During the course of a week-long confrontation I had with my mother, we had gotten to the point where we didn’t even acknowledge each other’s presence. In the end, my father stepped in to resolve the conflict. He came to my room in hopes of reaching an understanding with me. He assured me two things: he wasn’t taking either side, and that neither side would convince the other anything. So his solution was for me to be the bigger man (he reminded me that he wasn’t taking either side). He told me that the “winner” in an argument doesn’t actually matter. The only thing that matters is that the situation is resolved. After this, regardless of who claims victory, both parties have heard the grievances of the other, and even the “winner” will consider the other’s feeling more than they did before.  Trusting my father’s word, I apologized and ended the argument with my mother. And just like my father predicted, I felt like my mother began to see my point of view more clearly, and she’s been treating me the way I’d like to be treated ever since.