A misunderstanding becomes less painful when someone is willing to clarify it without keeping score.

Most tangles between people are small at the start and grow through the repair. One person explains, the other explains back, and somewhere in there the conversation stops being about what happened and starts being about who was more wrong. Clarifying without a ledger is harder than it sounds, because it means giving up the chance to be shown to be right.

The next time something is misread, lead with what you meant rather than with what they should have understood. If they explain their side, let it stand without adding a correction. Almost every misunderstanding can be closed in two sentences when neither person is counting.