“Conflict is inevitable, the source of all growth, and an absolute necessity if one is to be alive.”
- Jean Baker Miller
I am the firstborn of three boys. What that means is I was the guinea pig for my parents. They didn’t know their identity as parents yet, so they were just trying to figure out.
I myself have only been a parent for 5 years and I know what this feels like. You’re fresh off a life where you could do whatever you want with your partner. If you wanted to go away for a weekend, you could do so on a drop of a dime. Date nights were more spontaneous. As a relatively new parent, I know what it feels like to be grieving that previous life you had, plus making room for a new role you are stepping into as parent.
On top of that, we grew up really poor and surviving was the main thing on my parents’ minds. They were just trying to make sure we were fed.
So you can imagine what type of conflict resolution model was given to me as a child. Growing up, I perceived it as a lot of fights and bickering. A lot of anger.
But now that I’ve grown, I find myself grateful for what my parents taught me about conflict.
The lesson is threefold:
* Lead into conflict
* Own your thoughts and feelings
* Reconcile through a love language
Lead Into Conflict
We grew up with unique ways of how to relate with tension. Some of us grew up in a household where the emotional thermostat was always at a cool 68 degrees. If it got higher than 75 degrees, you’d never know it. It was either never addressed or those types of emotional conversations happened behind closed doors.
For me, it was the opposite. My parents had conflict out in the open. If it was behind closed doors, you can still hear it on the other side. Early on, I was taught that leaning into conflict was the norm. And I knew very quickly what it looked like.
It was messy. It was emotional. It felt intense at times.
As an adult, although it’s not my natural default to lean into conflict, my nervous system was familiar with it. I’m one of those who is naturally able to hold this tension. But this isn’t the case for everyone.
In my work as an executive and leadership coach, I teach the Radical Candor framework to companies as a way to share feedback. It requires both caring for the other personally, as well as being able to directly and lovingly challenge the other.
The folks that have the hardest time with this exercise are the ones who grew up with their emotional thermostat at 68 degrees. So if you’re in this camp, I empathize with you. Leaning into conflict is new. It’s not a neural pathway that’s immediately available to you. While the only way to build it is by leaning into conflict opportunities, know that the neural pathways can be built! This is the main idea behind neuroplasticity. We are wired to create new ways of thinking and behaving!
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Owning your thinking and feeling
This is the part where my parents modeled the “what not to do” in conflict resolution. They let things escalate. They projected their feelings and thinking on one another. At times, they didn’t fight fair. To their credit, they got much better by the time kiddo #3 was in the mix. There wasn’t much education about conflict resolution during that time, especially in a third world country, so I give them so much credit for learning on the fly.
They learned to give space between stimuli and response. They learned to be with their own emotions before re-engaging.
If you are offended by someone’s behavior, and you recognize that it’s a conflict that needs to be resolved, it’s important for you to own your feelings. That means acknowledging to yourself that you were hurt and/or offended. It means allowing yourself to feel and ultimately, freeing the other from acknowledging their part in it.
If you decide to, you can choose to make them aware of the impact of their behavior. But whether they acknowledge your feelings is their choice. This is essentially what forgiveness is. It’s letting someone off the hook, even if they don’t know it. Especially if they don’t know it.
Reconcile through a love language
The single biggest reason why I am able to lean into conflict is because of this: my parents ALWAYS made up. They ALWAYS reconciled.
It doesn’t matter how intense the fight was (and there were times when the yelling matches were intense), my parents ALWAYS made up.
I took this for granted back then. But how I love this about them now.
I didn’t know it then, but when I saw them making up, it offered me a complete model of what conflict can look like. The full picture of conflict into resolution became embedded in my nervous system and it serves me powerfully as an adult. It gave me a complete look of what’s on the other side.
I found them laughing. I found them having a deeper understanding of one another. I found them sharing a deeper love.
My parents discovered their unique process towards reconciliation. It was through humor and touch. They reconciled through words of affirmation too.
If you’re going to lean into conflict, you need to decide ahead of time that you will be committed to reconciliation. That no matter how hard it gets, you will do your part to come back together with the other. Of course, have boundaries. Certainly, trust your wisdom when reconciliation is no longer possible. The important thing is you commit to playing your part.
It will take understanding their point of view. It will take hearing them first. It will require you being vulnerable. And trusting that you will be okay, no matter their response.
Then, when you are prepared to reconcile, offer an olive branch through one of the five love languages. Caveat: if you’re in a work setting, it’s probably wise to hold off on the Touch love language. But be ready to use the other four: 1) Words of Affirmation 2) Acts of Service 3) Quality time 4) Receiving gifts.
Again, if you grew up in a household where this wasn’t modeled for you, consider your journey as an opportunity to break that cycle. You don’t need to perpetuate what was handed down. You can take the best of what you’ve learned and then leave the rest.
Finally, the last thing I want to say is this:
If you are stepping into leadership, know that the responsibility you bear by default is to lead into conflict. You must model this. Leadership can include the spectrum of stepping into a more committed relationship all the way to an executive role at a company. Whatever it is, your growth will require for you to step into learning how to handle conflict. The only way through is by diving in.
My friends…
Normalize conflict in your life. Normalize acknowledging hurt feelings. This is the path to a deeper experience of our humanity.
Lead and lean into conflict.It can be quite liberating.
PS: To my parents, Mami and Papa, thank you for letting your kids see you work through your messy-ness. We’re all better off because of you. I love you!
Fiercely loving you,
Jomar
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