If you are tangled up in a confusing relationship, one effective strategy to gain a solid footing (and eventually a voice) is to write things down. It doesn’t matter if you are a good writer or not. Your purpose isn’t to win a Pulitzer prize. Here are three important things you can record on paper (or on your computer) that will be tremendously helpful to you over time.

We want to believe we live in an advanced civilization—one that has risen above the base prejudice of our unenlightened ancestors. Human beings have a bent to marginalize other people. We want to be the best Sneetches on the beaches, after all.