Rules For Conflict Part III

Third and final post to wrap up rules for effective conflict resolution:

Everyone Takes Personal Responsibility - easily my single greatest pet peeve in counseling, when people refuse to look at their own responsibility but rather blame their spouse, and justify themselves.  God gives us our job descriptions as husbands and wives not our spouses, so when we fail to be what God has called us to be we have no one to blame but ourselves.  Too often couples want to go back and forth justifying their poor choices by comparing the other's transgressions, or excusing their own refusal to meet their spouses needs by listing what needs they haven't received.  That's like saying, "Yeah I failed Math but another kid in my class didn't do his homework so I decided not to.  And you think my grade is bad, my 60 is way better than their 45" - you both failed.  Everyone is responsible for their own decisions, good or bad, and justification and blame just assure that one will ever become who they are called to be.  We often compare our own excellent job of biting our tongue fifty times to our spouse's five mean statements and don't realize they bit their tongue eighty times.  When we compare our internal achievements to our spouse's external failures we always win and we feel justified in treating them like crap, when we compare our hearts to the hearts God has designed us for we allow ourselves to be molded into His image.  With this perspective there is no room for defensiveness, as anything our spouse brings to us can be seen as an opportunity to grow rather than an attack that needs to be countered with something they do even worse.

Become aware of the core wounds and accompanying fears of your spouse and avoid them.  If they came from a family that always made them feel they were wrong then they may fight a little harder than necessary to make sure they don't always lose in the marriage.  If they had an overprotective mother that smothered them they might fight a little harder to have their autonomy and not feel controlled by you.  If they had a critical father that always compared them to someone else who they could never live up to you may want to avoid telling them they aren't as good of a wife as friend's wife.  If your spouse has an ex-husband who verbally and emotionally abused her it may be that you can never raise your voice at all without signaling to her that you are attacking her.  Whatever the wound and wherever it came from you have the opportunity to help heal it or to keep ripping it open and pouring salt in it, and that is a tremendous power.  Usually during conflict there is the topic that the fight is about and then there are the real underlying issues that aren't being spoken.  You can grumble about how you have to clean up someone else's mess or you can recognize you have your own core fears that get triggered as well and need extra grace in certain areas.



Create a culture of appreciation and acceptance rather than contempt - One of the keys inside and outside of conflict to make sure you are able to resolve conflict well is create a culture of acceptance, appreciation, and love rather than judgement, criticism, and blame.  Research shows you need at least five times as many positive interactions for every negative one just to balance things out.  Deep at the base of your brain is a part called the amygdala that is the emotional center that basically sees people in black and white, good and bad ways, people are either your allies, on your team and there to make your life better or people are enemies, attacking you and need to be protected from.  Its like a giant scale that tips one way or the other and it takes five experiences of acceptance, respect, and positivity to balance out each one incident of anger, frustration, judgement, or negativity.  Whichever side the scale is on, that is how everything will be interpreted, neutral comments like "Oh those look like new jeans", get automatically interpreted either as a compliment - "Oh thanks, I'm excited about them" - or a criticism - "They aren't new, I've had them for two weeks, and before you complain about money they were on sale and I had nothing else that fits."  If you want your spouse to hear what you say as you intend it rather than with automatic defensiveness you can help by working hard to show tons more appreciation, respect, acknowledgement, and praise, rather than always being critical.


Stay Engaged - the last rule for effective conflict is no matter what, try your best to always stay engaged, or to reconnect as quick as possible afterwards.  Often in the middle of conflict one partner will go into an icy cool stance where they respond like a robot without emotions.  It's called stonewalling and it is usually a defense mechanism to keep themselves from becoming overwhelmed and flooded with emotions, and often as a way of protecting the relationship.  The idea is that if I were to open up and express how I feel I will say something I regret and then lose this important relationship, but what the other person sees is somebody who doesn't care about the relationship or them.  Both partners have racing heart rates and blood pressures, but only one looks like they give a crap.  This is where it becomes important to learn how to reschedule or just sooth the other person or yourself in the moment, to talk yourself back into being present and engaged.  Sometimes this carries over into an overall approach to the relationship where the partner is no longer angry, just numb.  The way our emotions work is that we either feel them all or none of them and if someone feels to painful for too long they often have a firewall that comes crashing down that cuts off all emotions.  To feel love means to also feel all the pain so they both get thrown out.  This is where you need to stop playing around and get in to see a counselor, because your marriage is flat lining.  Most couples wait 6-7 years after they notice major problems before they go for help which is like waiting a few weeks to see if you are having a heart attack - tons of damage has already been done.

Rules For Conflict Part II

Here is part two continued of rules for a fair and productive fight:

Perception is reality - this means that it is possible to validate your spouse's subjective experience and perspective without agreeing with them or saying they are objectively right. Wherever they are coming from is their true view of things and arguing with them will not change this. We have this mistaken notion that if we just tell someone our subjective reality it will trump theirs and they will adopt our way of viewing things, which really doesn't happen. "You know I was really upset about feeling fat because I couldn't fit in my jeans but then when you informed me I was beautiful and didn't need to worry about it, it just all clicked and now I feel totally secure!" "I was really hurt and upset with you but then you told me that was immature so I just decided to get over it and not hurt anymore, you are SO right!" "When your mom said I was a selfish incompetent excuse for a wife I was really upset but then you said that was just how she was and to not take it personal so now I'm fine and considering having lunch with her tomorrow." It really never quite works out that way but we argue as if they are just deluded in seeing things from their obviously wrong perspective. The key is learning to accept influence and being able to put yourself in their shoes so you can see and express the validity of their perspective while still seeing things differently.

Emotional Repair - the key to great conflict resolution is realizing you are both imperfect and need to be forgiven often, and therefore extending grace to the other as well. This means after conflict and eventually even during conflict you can practice emotional repair where you take responsibility for your actions rather than blaming or justifying.  Emotional repair is basically restating that we are both on the same team, I did these specific hurtful things, and I really want to be able to have a dialogue without more injury.  This should be done as quick as possible and as thorough as possible.  It is like moving into a beautiful new house when you get married and each fight you break something or put a hole in the wall, emotional repair patches and fixes rather than just continuing to trash the house until there is nothing to look forward to coming home to.

Stay on Topic - this means to dialogue through one issue until everyone feels heard, validated, and empathized with rather than jumping from gripe to gripe, adding more and more without resolving any.  This means no bringing up crap from the past as a way of discrediting the defense's whole case and painting the picture of them as whatever poor character trait - most common complaint is selfishness.  No going on and on with endless stories from the past where you are convinced you are Aesop and by the end of your fable your spouse will feel convicted and the reality is you just end up bickering about story details and missing the main point completely.  No interrupting the other person, it's a sign you aren't listening and don't care, but on the flip side keep tirades to a minimum so interruption is not necessary.  Some people try to filibuster in marriage figuring if they can hold the floor long enough they somehow win, and reality is you end up getting interrupted or at least tuned out.

Avoid Negative Generalities - Never say never or always in the middle of conflict unless your goal is to get your spouse defensive and looking for exceptions, "You claim I NEVER help clean up yet 15 years ago I picked up my socks, therefore you are dead wrong."  It is fine to share a complaint, it isn't OK to criticize.  We often broadly and generally paint the picture of our spouse as unfeeling, frigid, selfish, lazy, or whatever by lumping together all of their mistakes and making a generalization, yet we don't do that for positive things about them.  We make it sound like we view them as a giant horrible loser that every once in a blue moon screws up and gets things right, when we usually really see them as a great loving person who from time to time makes mistakes or drops the ball.  Therefor name calling, character assassination, and generic criticism are off limits as completely ineffective.

Next Post - part three and the conclusion to rules for a fair fight!

Throwing Fuel on the Fire

My beautiful wife was kind enough not to call my blog boring, but did suggest I make it shorter and not drone on and on - so here is my attempt at a shorter post.  I'll discuss deescalating and keeping conflict less intense within the context of marriage, but I really believe these three principles are critical in parenting, dating, friendships, etc. as well.  They are Soft Start-ups, Checking, and Accepting Influence and they can make the difference between huge blow-ups and reasonable disagreements.

A Harsh Start-up is anything that initiates a conversation in a way that incites defensiveness in the other person because it starts off as an attack.  Research says women tend to make this mistake more than guys in marriage but also that they initiate the vast majority of communication anyway so it really is just they are the ones that start so more often it is harsh.  If you get that the first 10 seconds of the conversation really sets the tone for the whole conversation then you realize you can kill the whole talk in your opening sentence.  Start off with generic criticism of their character, exasperation, and a harsh tone and they are unlikely to hear anything after it.  Start with a reassurance of how you really feel about them, then give a complaint and it can be heard, start harsh and you will only get defensiveness.

Second is Checking, where you simply choose to not overreact until you are sure you heard what they were trying to communicate.  It is sort of a time-out where you say "It sounded just then like you were saying I purposefully left my socks in the middle of the floor just to anger you, was that what you were trying to say to me?"  Rather than assuming you know what they are really trying to say, give them your interpretation and let them give their real message so that you don't waste emotional energy blowing up at something they didn't actually mean to communicate.

The third is Accepting Influence, where regardless of what is presented to you, being willing to hear it and validate it.  Research shows women are naturally good at this but that men struggle much more - leading to the complaint that we are bad listeners - truth is we hear it, we just swat it away quickly before accepting it.  Maybe it is the fragile egos that take a contrary opinion as disrespect and a threat to our truth, or a fear that if we accept this and go with it then we become weak, controlled, and subservient, but we tend to do it less.  When we throw up a wall it just signals to our spouse that they need to find a way through or around it by jackhammering, sniping, or whatever approach we think will assist in message delivery.  When you respond to anything the other person says with acceptance it disarms them and leads to more conversation.  Rather than blocking and punching it is more like Aikido where you diffuse the other person's energy with redirection, and you become the strongest person in the room because you are teachable and able to grow.  "I can see how you view it that way.  That is totally valid.  I'll definitely try to be more aware of that in the future as I definitely did not mean to hurt you like I did."  Agreeing and validating aren't the same - even if you disagree you can still see it from their perspective and take whatever can be learned to heart so you are better able to communicate how you really feel in the future.

Start with a soft start-up, respond by accepting influence and if it ever threatens to escalate then check it before you wreck it.  The majority of conflict can avoid destructiveness with just these three steps.