Most recurring arguments are not solvable
The assumption underneath the frustration is that a disagreement which keeps coming back has not been solved properly yet. For most of them, that is not the situation.
These are not failures of problem solving. They are the places where two people genuinely differ, and no amount of discussion is going to make one of you want what the other wants.
Trying to solve unsolvable problems is counterproductive, and no couple will ever completely eliminate them. However, discussing them is constructive and provides a positive opportunity for understanding and growth.
Marni Feuerman, The Gottman Institute
The surface and the need
The surface is whatever the argument is nominally about. Dishes. Money. Who forgot what. The need underneath is what each of you is reaching for: to feel considered, to feel like a priority, to feel safe.
A recurring argument is usually one where the surface changes and the need stays unmet. You solve the dishes and then find yourselves arguing about something else, because the dishes were never the point.
“The argument that keeps coming back is almost never about what it looks like. It is about something that has not been said clearly yet.”
The shape it usually takes
There is one pattern that shows up more than any other, and it is worth recognising because it gets read as a character flaw in whichever person you happen to be.
The same two people often swap roles depending on who raised the subject, which is the clearest sign that it is a dynamic between you rather than something either of you is.
Finding the real thing
Once it has cooled, ask a different question. Not what are we going to do about this, but what did I actually need from you in that moment.
The answer is usually simpler than expected. To be acknowledged. To be a partner rather than a problem to be managed. To know the other person is still there when it is hard.
An exercise worth doing
Answer separately. In our recurring argument, what I most need to feel from you is ___. What I most need you to know is ___. Then compare. The overlap is usually larger than either of you expects.
What good looks like here
The goal with a perpetual disagreement is not to end it. It is to get to the point where raising it does not cost either of you anything.
Being in dialogue, the preferred status, is when the couple has learned to accept their differences on that topic even though minor arguments arise occasionally.
Marni Feuerman, The Gottman Institute
When you accept your partner, you also accept their influence when discussing problems.
Maureen Werrbach, The Gottman Institute
Three dimensions in your Attune results bear on this directly: how each of you meets friction, what each of you needs before it feels finished, and how openly each of you says what is actually going on. Read those three together and the shape of your own loop usually becomes obvious.