After surviving another election with supposedly intelligent adults being mean, nasty, and rude to each other, I’m thinking of how the rest of us can have conflicting points of view without putdowns, character defamation, talking over and louder, and permanent damage to relationships. Most of the candidate commercials, uninvited into my living room between my few TV programs, demonstrated how NOT to fight.

All relationships have disagreements. Arguments are normal and healthy. Learning the skill of fighting fair is vital to all of us. If we fight in ways that dump our frustrations with the intention of hurting, we are wrong. Our only goal should be to resolve the present issue; nothing more, nothing less.

I was once the mediation (not meditation) coordinator in a large school system. Mediation was a great process because it taught kids how to resolve conflict, so both parties won and lost some. We taught them to compromise, to fight fair.

The process is the same whether people are three years or one hundred and three and whether there are two people or a group of people:

Turn off all technology. Sit facing each other.

One person begins and gets 10 minutes to tell his/her side of the story.

Everyone else listens – no person interrupts or gives body language or facial expressions relaying approval or disapproval.

Everyone looks into the eyes of the person who is speaking.

When the first person finishes speaking, the second person begins.

After the last person finishes speaking, each person, in turn, has the chance to define the problem: “I think the problem is…….”

All agree on the defined problem.

Each person commits to what they can do to solve/resolve the problem.

Each person does what they promised to do after mediation ends.

In short: speak, listen, identify the problem, commit to solutions, and then do what you said you would.

The great thing about this process is that each person speaks and owns the problem and the solution. Much conflict is resolved inspeaking because each person feels heard and can safely release emotions and information. During the problem identification and solution commitment phase, there is a shift to the brain and logic. At the end of the process, each person is calmer and has clear direction on what they can do to solve the problem.

If friends, couples, and families would make this process routine, it could enhance mental health plus the quality of relationships.

Instead, people store up frustrations and unload them all at once because their emotions are near explosion. In politics, someone wins, and the other loses. It doesn’t need to work that way in real life. With skills, each person can win a little and lose a little and come out knowing they identified and did their part in resolving the real issue. Conflict is a given in life, so learn not to be the bully or the victim, and grow rich
connections.

Healthy love, friendship, and families happen not by magic but with respectful communication and personal responsibility.

Until the next time: Live while you live.

Jennifer Goble, Ph.D., LPC, is the author of “My Clients…My Teachers,” and the blogger and writer of Rural Women Stories: www.ruralwomenstories.com.

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