Many of us are avoidant. Let me explain what I mean by avoidant in this instance. I mean lots of us are good at avoiding situations we perceive will definitely trigger, or even those that possibly risk triggering, uncomfortable emotions.
There’s no surprise here as that’s what emotions were created for: in very simple terms they encourage us to seek out more of something or trigger us to push, or move away, from something. This is a brilliant basic system for survival – were we living as cave-people – but we’re not! Sometimes, as much as it might not feel that way, it’s beneficial to work against our emotional urges to seek out something that we know is going to be tricky, as lots of things we automatically avoid are better dealt with proactively and directly.
Tricky conversations are one such example of something many avoid. By tricky, I mostly mean conflict. One person appears to want one thing, and the other wants something else. Ignoring the issue doesn’t make it go away of course. In fact it can make it linger, create a build up of resentment, mean the original issue remains totally unaddressed, sometimes mean unresolved feelings resurface to sabotage totally unrelated situations and impact negatively on relationships.
Avoiding conflict is very common. However, a well-managed conflict resolution not only solves the original problem, it builds trust, openness, improved understanding and better communication in the relationship. Learning how to ‘argue’ well can strengthen relationship bonds ultimately.
There are many books that tell us how to manage conflict but for me, managing conflict is mostly about staying very aware of what is going on for yourself emotionally, so that you prevent any triggered emotions from sabotaging productive communication. Many of us can approach conflict so full of an anticipation that it’s going to be incredibly uncomfortable, we’re already triggered. We might be poised with a guarded defensiveness or even be very ready to be aggressive and ‘attack’. Neither of those approaches will help and are certainly not going to enhance our listening or problem solving capabilities!
For me ‘good arguing’ is also about stepping away from trying to ‘win’. Winning makes your wants prioritised over the others’ wants. Instead, it’s about looking at, understanding and addressing, the underlying needs of everyone, and for those to be aired, the whole thing needs approaching from a more beneficial angle.
Approaching conflict also requires bravery – if we haven’t learned we can actually cope with it – and the opposite of avoidance. So my ground rules for a tricky conversation, bearing all of this in mind, are:
