This may sound funny, and it is definitely not the kind of life advice one is supposed to preach. But here it is anyway: a very large share of your happiness depends on your ability to let it slide.
In other words: one of the most important capacities you can develop in a relationship, in parenting, or even in a career, is the ability NOT to see.
To ignore.
To move on.
And if you're reading this on a feed somewhere (of course you are), look at the mad paradox: everyone who posts here wants your attention. Every post asks — practically begs — for your gaze. And I'm claiming that a great deal depends on your ability to withhold that gaze; and at the advanced level, on your conscious decision about what to ignore.
Too theoretical? Fine. Examples.
Start with parents and children. Most experienced parents have the wisdom not to make a production out of every drama their little one enters. Getting ready for a weekend trip while the toddler shrieks that he can't find his favorite pants/doll/toy? Never mind. It will pass. He's flat on the floor in a full "don't want to, don't want to" performance? A good parent doesn't get worked up. She peels him gently off the floor and into the car. Ten minutes into the drive he's busy with something else. She knew he would be.
She also knows the cardinal error: fueling a trivial outburst by screaming back at it. A waste of effort. A waste of nerves. So she ignores it.
But it isn't just good parents who understand the evolutionary advantages of ignoring. In the bedroom and on the field of love, the ability to let things slide is enormous. Your partner is full of irritating habits. Your partner occasionally produces remarks that... heaven help us. Lucky, then, that you've developed the ability to look sideways. Lucky that you hold a clear internal hierarchy and know these are not the things worth breaking the dishes over.
It isn't worth it.
Ignoring — "smoothing it over" — requires you to accept a central truth of living: not everything is equally important. It just isn't.
I can hear your objection from here. You're afraid you're erasing yourselves. You worry the other person will take advantage if you let their annoying moment pass without response.
Honestly? They might. So what?
Because the ability to ignore does not indicate low self-worth. The opposite is true: only people with a strong, stable self-image can run the ignore playbook properly — that is, without stewing.
If your self-worth depends entirely on the other person's reaction to you, you are flimsy, not strong. If you cannot let go of any marginal issue, any unimportant remark — that isn't toughness. That's a self-image full of holes.
Walking the road of your life, don't get stuck on every pothole at every curve.
Don't lose contact with the purpose you came together for.
Move forward.
And understand that sometimes, you need to ignore.