Wisdom from Dr. Henry Cloud.
“The most important benefit of a good confrontation is that it preserves love in a relationship. This may seem counterintuitive to you. You may think, “This doesn’t make sense. When I confront someone, they will either get mad or leave the relationship.” This can and does happen. But confrontation was not designed to make someone angry or chase him or her away. In fact, it was designed to do the opposite.
The Latin term for confrontation means “to turn your face toward, to look at frontally.” It merely indicates that you are turning toward the relationship and the person. You are face-to-face, so to speak. In confrontation, people simply face the relationship and deal with an aspect of the connection that needs to be addressed. The intent is to make the relationship better, to deepen the intimacy, and to create more love and respect between two people.
That is why, to be an effective confronter, you need to understand that confrontation works best when it serves love. Boundary conversations are motivated and driven by love. They promote the purposes of love. They enhance a relationship, not end it.
How can confrontation preserve love? Basically by protecting the relationship from elements that would harm it. Love needs protection. It is like tending a garden. If you want your plants to survive and thrive, you need to do more than water and feed them. You also need to protect them from bad weather, insects, and disease.
In the same way, things like disconnection, defensiveness, control, immaturity, and selfishness have the power to infect an entire relationship and contaminate it. Unchecked, they can harm or even end a connection.”
When either party fails to come honestly and with goodwill to confront and resolve a matter that is sowing division, separation is likely, especially if either party no longer will accept and respect the boundaries of the other.