4D Human Being Podcast

Conflict is Inevitable: How to Stop Running and Start Resolving

• 4D Human Being • Season 4 • Episode 42

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Conflict is a part of all our lives! And it can be incredibly time-consuming, distracting and difficult for so many of us. Raising anxiety and blocking constructive, collaborative and joyful relationships both at work and at home. In this episode of the 4D podcast  Philippa and Penelope look at a whole new way to think about conflict, starting with reframing conflict and changing the word ‘conflict’ itself. Plus tools and tips how to step into difference and disagreement in a whole new way… Reducing anxiety and increasing confidence, communication and co-creativity with all your colleagues.

Speaker 1:

Hello, my name is Philippa Waller, my name is Penelope Waller and we are two of the directors at 4D Human being. And welcome to the 4D Human being podcast. What's it all about, pen? It's all about your personal and professional relationships. It's about your communication skills, how you lead, how you work and build teams, how you are looking after yourself and your well-being, and how you are much more at choice. What do we mean by that? Well, sometimes we can get a little caught in patterns in life and we can all be a little bit on our automatic pilot. So 40 human being is all about helping us get back to choice and being a four-dimensional human being, and your fourth dimension, of course, is intention. So, whether it's about your impact, your leadership style, your team dynamics, whether it's about your well-being, whether it's about your communication or your presentation skills anything that involves human beings interacting with other human beings 40 Human being are here to help. We're going to take a deep dive and look at some tools, insights, theories that are going to help you go from a 3D human doing to a 4D human being, so that you can happen to the world rather than the world simply happening to you, recording well, hello, and on this beautiful sunny day, beautiful sunny spring day of these recently.

Speaker 1:

Yes, how are you doing? I'm very good. Actually, I'm a little bit throaty, not ill, just a little bit. You've had a lot on. I have had a lot on travel, a lot of travel, a lot of travel. Shopping, yes, a lot of Easter activities, yeah, so I feel fine, although just, yes, slightly croaky voice, which Love Easter. I enjoy a croaky voice. Well, mariella Fostrop, yes, is sort of top in one of the most appealing voices and she's got that throaty croak. No, apparently, it's a very appealing sound. This could be my window of opportunity, I don't know for what. So easter, yes, love easter, opportunity to get together, see your friends. No, crazy commercial builder, quite a lot of chocolate, not gonna lie, yeah, but just love it.

Speaker 1:

And also, we, we had the weather. We had the weather. Oh, it was so lovely, very lucky. We had weather and lots of children had lots of. I had my daughter's friends staying over and it was a. It was a lot of fun.

Speaker 1:

We enjoyed the minecraft movie, didn't we feel surprising? I thought, well, as I've said to a few people, as we sat down in the cinema it was such an intense education and as the lights went down, I turned to your youngest and said I quite literally have no idea what's about to happen, what's about to come. She was laughing, she, you know, sort of you know what a ridiculous person who doesn't know Minecraft, actually, and I thought I'll just meditate for the next 90 minutes. This will be a good opportunity to use the world being noisy but be able to switch off. Actually, I was engaged, very engaging, it was engaged it. But, yeah, switch off. Yes, actually I was engaged, very engaging, it was engaged, it was a good setup, wasn't it? It was a good setup. It was engaging enough. I don't know how, but it was. And also the message at the end, which was very sticky have the courage to go back out into the real world because you can also create out there. And I was like, yes, well, do I? Loved at the end of it, much easier to destroy than create, but we must be creators. I was like go Jack back. I thought Steve, as his name was it. I thought there was some really, really solid messages there, loved it.

Speaker 1:

And the other thing I would say about that is off the back of can't believe I'm gonna say this chicken jockey madness for anyone who doesn't know that is a reference to a slightly just like a moment in the film. For those of you who know, this will be an embarrassing explanation, but like a moment in the film, like a character or, yeah, I'm gonna say character. I've got no other work to do with trolls or baby trolls, I don't know. There's a moment where literally there is a chicken jockey. But there were so many memes going around of people going to see the minecraft movie all ages like quite grown up tears and when that gets mentioned, the moment in the film where chicken jockey happens, don't ask, and everybody throws popcorn up in the air and in one cinema actually had a live chicken. Now, again, what I loved about that they did get thrown out. They did. I thought it was fun.

Speaker 1:

What I found so reassuring is, with all of the tech, with all of the you know amazing stuff that we've got, with gaming, with you know, everything that we have, those shared experiences are still important and also really sticky. That's what people were getting excited about being together in a cinema, all waiting for the moment where they could all jump up out of their seats together, yes, and throw popcorn together. And there is so much creativity out there in the world. I mean, not only is Minecraft such a creative game, I mean literally the whole purpose of it is building and creating, yeah, but the fact that you know, people took chickens into cinemas and there is so much fun and creativity, that's what I mean. It's really sort of life-affirming. Yeah, we love it. Yeah, very good.

Speaker 1:

So, back to work, back to work, and we are going to be talking. I sort of want to say finally, because I think we've avoided this topic, which is sort of I mean, not on purpose, but it's kind of interesting because it's such a big topic. Interesting because it's such a big topic. So many of us avoid conflicts and are conflict averse, and so we're going to talk about managing conflict. I mean even that word conflict, yeah, so we're going to talk, we're going to do two podcasts. That really isn't very much. No, in fact, we keep talking about our 4d on demand series that we're going to create for, yeah, feedback, so they're managing. So there will be every day. We, when we talk about it, there are more and more things we want to put in that series. Yeah, it's just like a behemoth that keeps growing, like an octopus with more.

Speaker 1:

It really cuts to the fundamental core, doesn't it of us as human beings, in terms of you know, fundamentally, what causes a lot of problems in the world for us? Yes, exactly, which is disagreement? Yeah, so what do we mean by conflict really? We mean any conversations that feel difficult, conversations that we don't just go oh, I can't wait to go and have that call, or, you know, this is going to be brilliant, we're all going to be so happy. Any conversation really could be anything from a little bit of a disagreement to full out. I can't stand that person, I don't even want to be in the same room as them. And why is it important? Well, I would say a couple of things on that. One is if you know that you've got the tools to deal with difficult conversations, your whole life is simply improved. Life is simply improved.

Speaker 1:

The dial of well-being on your life just goes up because it's such a constant otherwise of either you're going to the polarity of people pleasing and sacrificing your own beliefs, or being in conflict all the time, being angry or avoidant, or avoidance. It's daily, daily day, and the other thing on that which is so huge and we don't think about it Dogs are now. Oh, he's sort of fighting with himself. He loves your fluffy rug. I've got a fluffy rug and he's now having. I might, just, I might just put the video on him for a second. We can see him. He loves that rug. Yeah, there we go.

Speaker 1:

Very, boy, that's not a conflict, that's sometimes. Sometimes that's not conflict, of course, it's just. It looks like conflict. Well, that's the whole. Other thing is when we don't need to step in, we don't need to step in.

Speaker 1:

But so the other thing I want to say on it is something that we talk about a lot in therapy, which is rupture and repair. And if you're very conflict averse, there's a chance that you have not had modeled to you when you were growing up rupture and repair. And what we mean by that is that you have learned somewhere along the line that you can fall out or disagree. Maybe you could upset your parent or they could upset you and you could come back together and what? And say sorry and repair the relationship. And if you've learned that, you have a much more solid foundation and trust in relationships, and if you haven't, it's really tough. The risk is too high. The risk is too high because what you've learned is they don't repair. You have to either please or you stay in conflict. But, of course, when we learn rupture and repair, when we know that we can repair, we don't just get back to where we started. We gain more trust because if you're in a relationship and you and I can definitely talk to this where you know that you've come through difficult moments, you've got more trust in that relationship because it's got more it could hold, more exactly and and recognizing as well when someone is trying to repair and accepting as well.

Speaker 1:

I mean, there there is definitely a skill set involved and we can learn these skills. You know, not all of us learn them. As children, we might have learned some of them, but not all of them. You know, depending on our upbringing, depending on the experiences we had at school with friends, we will possibly have learned some of these skills, not all of them. You can learn them, yeah, you can. These are possible and we're going to talk to some of those things today.

Speaker 1:

I would say one thing as well that I think is really important the word itself, as we know, can be quite challenging. It's like networking, isn't it? Words that can be quite pokey, yeah, and we use different words in the training that we do. You know, candor, conflict, healthy conflict, challenge these kind of words. Fundamentally, I think it's very interesting that we find that word so challenging.

Speaker 1:

Conflict, and I think something we should definitely talk about, whether on this podcast or the next one, is recognizing when there is actually conflict that you need to step into, rather than perhaps there being some drama around something that you don't need to step into. So we'll also we'll also talk about that, but the word itself is very interesting, yeah, and I, and I love the, I love the phrase. You don't have to turn up to every argument you're invited to. Exactly so today we're going to talk about conflict is inevitable, and the next podcast we're going to talk about conflict is an opportunity and more in that space of like the friction that is really creative if we allow it some space and let it breathe a bit. So let's think about conflict. So I I want to offer listeners fill in the blank.

Speaker 1:

If you ask yourself a question of when I think of conflict, when I hear the word conflict, I dot, dot, dot. Yeah, what does it mean to you? When I hear the word conflict, or if I know there's conflict on the horizon, I, yeah, run away, avoid, defend, get my argument ready, get battle ready, appease, buy, buy gifts, compliment, apologise, apologise, bitch, gossip, talk to everybody else but that person there's any number of things. So the first thing is to recognise what are your patterns around conflict and from that, can you You've got Barry boy, I love you. Can you recognise? Watch your cubbies after your tea. Where have have some tea, there we go. He loves tea, loves to this dog. Can you my daughter's tell me that the odds are lactose intolerance I'm not sure it's a good thing, but he no. This has got lactose-free milk and he's fine. There we go. Love a gun, I don't love it.

Speaker 1:

Um, can you recognize where those patterns came from? Because, importantly, what that can do right from the start is shift you from a sense of either I've got to be, I've got to win, or I'm rubbish I should be better at conflict to simply objectively Ah, that's why I have responses like that. Yeah, conflict, that makes sense. That's what I learned. It's like I went to a certain conflict school I, this is what I learned and that's why I respond now.

Speaker 1:

And being able to do that can just shift us into actually it's not about fault, it's not about blame, it's not about incompetence or ineptitude or fear. It's about what we've learned and those things that we've learned very often and we say this a lot in psychology and psychotherapy those patterns that we've learned have served us very well. So you know, as an example, they've helped us survive, they've helped us survive. So you know, as an example, they've helped us survive, they've helped us survive. So you know, perhaps, as an example, if you are a conflict avoider, it might be that in your younger life, at school or at home, it was safer for you to avoid conflict, for whatever reason. So those patterns are there for a very, very good reason. Why do we think that it's important to understand those and perhaps change some of them if they're not working for you? Well, I guess I would.

Speaker 1:

I would go back to one of the fundamental things that we often say in this work, which is there's kind of three ways to live your life. You know the world is happening, you don't like it, so someone's got an opinion that you find abhorrent, or somebody does something that that you don't like, or whatever it might be. Your three choices are you fight back. Your second choice is you kind of feel crushed, victimized, you stay quiet, you just accept. Or the third one is that you change something in yourself, you have a conversation, you change your own behavior.

Speaker 1:

Now, lots of us do spend time in those first two patterns of behavior and, like I said before, those patterns are there for a very good reason. They have helped us, helped us survive, stay safe, and they ultimately cause psychological pain for us. Yeah, they're keeping us stuck at this point. They're keeping us stuck Because our options are not any broader than that. Exactly, they're only as narrow, as we've learned. Exactly, and this is an opportunity to expand your range, because we're not saying never go for the fight, because sometimes you've got to stand up and fight your beliefs. But you want more options, you want choice, choice, choice, which is always what we talk about.

Speaker 1:

And ultimately, you know lots of the people we speak to, lots of the people we coach. You know, and lots of you out there listening will know this You'll reach a point in your life where things will feel a bit intolerable and maybe a relationship will break down or you won't want to work with that person anymore, or whatever it might be. And for us, exactly as you said, phil, it's just some of those patterns will no longer work for us, and that's where we have the choice of we can either be in one of those two initial pain points, or we can make a change and have more choice absolutely, and I want to build on that to initial pain points. Or we can make a change and have more choice absolutely, and I want to build on that to those pain points where we find ourselves saying things like why is everyone so horrible? Yes, I would never do that, I would have that.

Speaker 1:

Why is everyone so difficult? I always end up working with difficult people or working for, or you know, my bosses are always so difficult, or no one ever listens. And if you find yourself in these really broad statements, actually this is about pattern, because if we turn the mirror back to ourselves, what it's telling us is I find any level of challenge difficult and therefore I have to make everybody else difficult. Now, again, I want to go back to my first point. This is only what we've learned be really compassionate to yourself. Self-compassion is the key to so much of the development requirements of us human beings at the moment, from getting out of victimhood to getting out of anger and resentment. If we can be self-compassionate and go, ok, this is how I tend to respond. It's been useful enough, it's got me this far.

Speaker 1:

But it cannot be true that all men of a certain age are difficult, or all women are difficult to work with, or all young people are difficult, or whatever. You know, whatever these broad statements are, when we're in the always and never, we know, we know that it can't be true exactly. So I'd be sitting here looking at my lovely twin and thinking, of course, one of the things that we can just shift with the idea of conflict is two things. One, is there an undefying assumption somewhere that everyone should be the same? Yeah, totally, that we should all think the same, have the same ideas, have the same process in mind, have the same way forward, same way of working together, same attitude. And if they're not the same as us and as we expect, then there's a problem.

Speaker 1:

Well, two main phrases come to mind for me with this. And not to say I haven't said these a thousand times, but particularly in personal relationships thousand times, but particularly in personal relationships. If you've ever said why can't you just dot, dot, dot, why can't you? I mean you've been there. Or if you've ever said I would never dot, dot, those two phrases are like the big sort of alert red flags that you are in a space where you are finding it very difficult to accept that somebody else is not behaving in the way you would want them to behave or the way that you yourself behave. So we then cascade into you should, and that's very tricky, and if someone says that to us, I mean it's infuriating. Exactly, I would never.

Speaker 1:

And actually that is the beginning of the work, of course, because while most of us, when we think about managing conflict, we want to jump to right what do I need to say? What do I need to do? Let's get to the actual conversation. Actually, we need to start with ourselves. We need to hold the mirror up and go okay, when have I ever behaved like this? Or what's my part? Not in the solution yet, but what is my part in the conflict, in the difference? Yeah, we've spoken about this, haven't we?

Speaker 1:

With relationships and as much as this can feel very difficult to accept, and I'm going to say it anyway we are co-creating our relationships. So, if you have a difficult relationship with somebody but you notice that either they go on to have a very different relationship with somebody else, or perhaps in the workplace you notice that they have different relationships with colleagues. We have to accept that we have co-created that relationship with them. So you know, if I think about myself as an example, I know that my boundaries can be a little bit poorer. So I know, for example, that I'm more likely to overstretch my boundaries in order to help people to be happy or help them do what they need to do, like, for example, this morning I was in a rush, I had quite a lot of work to do, but no, I took 20 minutes to help my, help my daughter, with a piece of homework that she she probably could have done her own, but I'm more likely to do that and try and be helpful. Now, that, in a way, is very nice and I'm trying to be nice to people. That's great. But then I have to accept that if I've co-created a relationship with somebody where they step over my boundaries, I have a part in that. Because of how I step in and perhaps a relationship they have with somebody else, those boundaries are much clearer. So it can be really difficult, particularly when we think we're being nice, yeah, to hold that mirror up and go. Well, there is something I'm doing in co-creating her that's so beautifully put.

Speaker 1:

There's a phrase that I think is really important with conflict, because it can feel, really it can feel clear that the other person is the difficult one. Yeah, because you're trying to appease. Yeah, so that you're absolutely right. Then the question is, what am I tolerating here? Because someone said to me a few years ago, which I really loved you get what you tolerate, and that give, give, give, exactly as you say. And it's tough because you know, it's so tempting to say, yeah, but I'm the nice one trying to give, but it is your contributor, it's a contributor to the relationship and and if you we go back to that lovely equation that we love you've got to do a hundred percent of yourself and 50 of the relationship. And if somebody is push, push, push, push, push, push, that 50 of boundary is your, is important, it's yours.

Speaker 1:

Now that might feel unfair. Why can't they just, why don't they respect my boundaries? That's when we're caught in those patterns yes, of life's not fair. They should. We can't do anything. We've got to start with totally. And and of course, the flip side of that is, you know, once we've held the mirror up to ourselves and recognize some, you know some patterns about ourself. Of course, we also have to understand that even if we find the other person annoying, challenging, unreasonable, whatever it might be, of course they too have their patterns and are behaving rationally, based on what they have learned about relationships and what they need and what keeps them safe. Now we may find some of that behavior unacceptable. We have to bear in mind when we, when we're creating assumptions about situations. Both parties are very likely operating rationally and behaving in a way that they have learned works quite well for their own purpose, exactly right.

Speaker 1:

And actually I'm going to be, I'm going to be, I'm going to really challenge and I stand with everybody who finds this challenging that if we think about personal development, it's at a very young age really baby age to toddler, infant age where we expect the world to bend to us. Yes, and once we start going to school, we start just into that. 3, 4, 5, that's when we start to learn all there's, all these other people, there's different ways of being. That's why we have rules to try to all work together. But so we're moving out of the egocentric, we're moving out and we're moving out the egocentric. So actually, the first thing is to catch ourselves and and to just acknowledge I'm. I want the world to bend to me because it's a young, it's a young response and it's that's not to say it's not a human. We're all human. Wouldn't it be nice if you know the world was just, you know, full of marvelous things that just suit you?

Speaker 1:

Last, but it's not the one other thing that I want to mention before we look at how can we step into those conversations, is also the second kind of fundamental piece around expecting everybody to like us so that, yeah, the liking, or wanting everyone, or wanting everyone to like us and actually, but that that can definitely get us into sticky territory when we're if we're an appeaser, if we're a people pleaser, because we'll end up bending over backwards because we want people to like us, taking the personal sometimes out of conversations, particularly with work colleagues. Yes, of course it's nicer when there's liking in there and it's also very useful, and we want to be thinking about the issue, sometimes not the personal relationship. Yes, we want the relationship to be constructive and we want it to be collaborative, but, what's more important, but taking it personally, if they don't like me and agree with me, I can't work with them. That isn't true. Actually, sometimes we need that friction in relationships to have a really good creativity. So just check again whether or not liking is at the top of your list and that means that anything below that just isn't getting the attention, because if you don't like them or they don't like you, it's unworkable. Yeah, because actually that doesn't have to be true. Yeah, necessarily.

Speaker 1:

Well, it's really interesting, phil and I know we're sort of we're sort of jumping around a bit here, but this is, this is why we have so many conversations about this, because there's so much we can talk about which is, you know, perhaps, perhaps in life we have this ideal of being in equilibrium in terms of our emotional state, and that that's that's where we feel good and nice and that's there's probably a truth to that, and that lots of us have learned that we've got to, as quickly as possible, move through and get out of this equilibrium and if we can learn to sort of sit in it, just absolutely a little bit, absolutely. I mean, it's not always pleasant, but gosh, it's a game, it's a game changer. I mean, we call you. We've talked about the window of tolerance before. Yeah, there's your window of tolerance, small, which means you either shut down or go up and out of the window of tolerance into hyper activation. Hyper activation, sorry so. Hyper activation is into that anxiety or anger I mean there's being very brief about this and hypo is when you drop out and you flatline and and we've all got different sized windows and the more we can grow that window and learn to tolerate conflict, then the the better equipped we are. Yeah, there's something. There's something that's a bit more interesting about life.

Speaker 1:

I was telling you that I was watching the very old version of pride and prejudice the other day. It's 30 years old now with colin. First, don't tell me that that's horrific. It did look. It did look a little bit dated, but I actually loved it anyway. The reason I mention it is because I definitely if I you know, if I think about what I said earlier on this podcast I'm definitely somebody who would probably try to resolve conflict quite quickly.

Speaker 1:

But of course, back in the day, when all we had was letter writing and you know if people even went into sort of two counties away, you weren't going to see them for months, of course they really did have to sit with and tolerate, you know, between letters. Yeah, so when Lizzie and Darcy. Yeah, so when lizzie and darcy. So when he first asked her to marry him and she said no and it was quite a confrontational conversation, of course that just hung with them for months actually, it's true, and and you get on with life. It was so interesting I was watching it, I thought it was. It was quite sort of tantalizing, quite intriguing that there was this kind of conflict between, of course, in reality now we'd be texting trying to resolve it, but I quite like the fact that it kind of just hung. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, that's very interesting, but I I do think that we are less able to sit with those difficult feelings now and look. So, going back to what you said, almost like we shouldn't feel them. Yeah, and actually there's something in this about when conflict arises, really normalizing that you know, at a really fundamental level, you've got atoms pinging off each other. We, we're the same. It's energy, isn't it, that's hitting each other and it's not always comfortable. Yeah, like that's normal.

Speaker 1:

Okay, let's go to the 4d model and start with, let's say, you've got something going on, a difficult conversation that you know you need to have, or a difficult relationship. First thing that I would say well, first, two things Turn to yourself and help yourself get your nervous system regulated. So one of the things we talk a lot about is story follows, state that when you're activated, when your nervous system is activated, it's going to be very difficult to get to the second point in your foundational approach to difficult conversations, which is to get emotion out of the driver's seat, get them in the back seat and get intention driving. And that is tough when your nervous system is activated. So all the time that you are churning over, ruminating, churning over those thoughts, I'm going to give them a piece of my mind. Why have they done this, coming up with all the arguments, all the reasons. The more you're activating yourself, the more emotion is driving the bus and the more that the idea of having that conversation is coming from. Yeah, a place of anger, resentment, anger, resentment, anxiety. So already we're starting from a place of this is. This is going to be an argument right, right, I Right, I'm going in, I've got my weapons, I'm ready.

Speaker 1:

So the very first thing to do is Do the breathing, get yourself regulated, take charge of the conflict that's inside of you. First, yeah, and now ask yourself what do you really want from this If you've got a project that you're working on with somebody else and they've got an idea that's different from yours. Now you can go in and you can fight about that idea. But what really do you want underneath that? Do you want this product that you're developing to be the best possible product for, you know, dentists all over the world to make their lives easier? Yeah. Do you want to increase your market share? Do you want this process to be much more streamlined and efficient, like what is really wanting here? Because there's so many paths to get there that you're stuck on the next brick that you want to put down on the path and you've lost sight of the path and the goal. So really get back to purpose, take a breath and now we can open up to okay, well, let's, yeah, let's see what options and and that that might take some time.

Speaker 1:

You know, as we often say, in the work that we do, we can be very focused on the thing that needs to be resolved or the thing that needs to be agreed on, exactly. As you said, we're not just looking at the next brick, we're looking at the hundred bricks in front of us. You want to get there because we can see very clearly where we need to go and, exactly as you've said, sometimes we just need to move the emotional self out of the driver's seat. Now. That can be easy if we can quickly get back to intention. But sometimes it's not easy and it might take some time and it might mean that it's not one conversation, it's five conversations. Right, might mean it's not today, it's next week.

Speaker 1:

So sometimes taking time out, labeling the emotions, just acknowledging how you're both feeling, might be the way to go and driving seat, but we plow on anywhere. Yeah, and actually just to acknowledge that and say and say whether it's to yourself or whether you feel you can have the conversation with someone, say I'm, I'm finding this really difficult. It's taking up quite a lot of my brain space. At a moment I wonder if we can take a take a breather, take a pause, or whether we can just acknowledge that this has got to a place. That's not easy. Yeah, let's not have the conversation today. I'm wondering if you're feeling the same. Yes, I am okay. Great, let's pick this up now. That seems very done something for the relationship already. Just release that tension valve. It's like letting air out of a tire, isn't it just like? Okay, they feel the same. They're not sitting there, you know, drinking margaritas, going, I don't care, I'm having a great time they're feeling it as well.

Speaker 1:

It's so interesting when I have conversations with clients around this and again it probably relates back to what we've learned um when we're younger that often we don't consider or think that we are in entitled to ask for the time or the space or the acknowledgement of how we feel. You know, I think sometimes we feel like, well, it's, it's not within my ask or it's it's not reasonable to ask for that. And, of course, it's perfectly reasonable for you to take care of yourself and your needs. Yes, absolutely, just exactly, and acknowledge that and also you do, you also you are. If you take this approach and you start with acknowledging this is what I'm feeling and we'll move on to some other stages. It's like the difference between sort of oh, I'm going to do it myself and actually taking the time to coach somebody because you are building for the future. If you do this on this one conversation, you've now shown each other in that difficult relationship we can do this and we know how to do it, rather than we're going to have a fight every time.

Speaker 1:

And the second thing I would say on that. There's something very important exactly about acknowledging some of the feelings and maybe finding out if someone else is struggling, and that's all. The second thing might be to go into a conversation simply to listen, because all of that ruminating, getting our weapons ready to go in with the solution, we're missing a really important stage, which is what most of us need when we're feeling upset or anxious, is to be heard. If our idea is not on the table or we're trying to get it on the table and that's what's annoying you, then it might be that that person just needs some space to be heard to say this is why I think this is really important, this is what I think is really good about this, and it might be that once they've been heard, they feel on a level playing field. Yeah, they feel less victim to it Totally.

Speaker 1:

And again, I would go back to it doesn't all have to happen in one conversation. So the first conversation might be that I don't know if you can hear my dog crying there. I mean, he's literally trying to get into my seat. Um, gonna lead over, look at him, um. And then, you know, the first conversation might literally be I'm just I'm. I mean, I'm here, I've got half an hour, I'm gonna listen to you and you know, one phrase that can really be a game changer is help me understand. Yes, or describe to me what's going on for you.

Speaker 1:

You could literally say one thing at the beginning of a conversation hear them out and you might be very even though in your head you're thinking but I don't agree with what you're saying, and I've already got the solution. Yes, agree with what you'll say and I've already got the solution. If you can just not go there and let them be heard, my goodness, their emotional state at the next conversation is going to be completely different 100 so, 100 so. And they can also feel a bit unfair because you're sitting there listening and you're thinking, but they're not listening to how I feel. But again, if we can change something in our own pattern, we can really change the game in terms of what, what that conversation will ultimately be like.

Speaker 1:

Yes, and in that conversation, catch yourself wanting to jump in and disagree, take a breath and ask for more. Yeah, tell me a bit more about that. Can you expand on that? I'm really hearing that reflect back to them. So what you're saying is yeah, you're gonna give everybody such a win. Well, it's so much easier. It's so much easier. You haven't, because you haven't got to come up with the answer. So ask listen, yeah, yeah, you've now put a lot of um glue into the relationship, because now that person feels heard.

Speaker 1:

Now they might have been expecting an argument. What they've had is, oh, tell me more. Okay, yes, I really hear that. Yeah, tell me more, pick up your lovely dog. I've got to bring the dog in and that's not what they're expecting. So already you've taken some of the heat out of their yeah sales to mix my metaphors. Which is going to Hot sales, hot sales. Metaphors which, which? Which is getting hot sales, hot sales, hot sales. That's gonna be. That's gonna be in the podcast description, isn't it? So I want to now add to this. So let's say, let's say we've heard. Okay, great, at any point during this, this might be your next stage.

Speaker 1:

You might now set the intention between you. So let's really have the conversation about what we do and don't agree with. Let's say you've done it the other way around. You've asked to be heard yourself. You've both you've both listened to each other set the intention.

Speaker 1:

So there's a very different intention to my intention here is to beat down your ideas and make sure I win this argument and let you know that I'm right. Let you know I'm right and that you never, ever, disagree with me again. That's my intention. Or my intention is that we get to a really good solution that's going to work for everybody here, or that we get to a place where we really feel like we can work together again, or my intention here really is to take care of the team within this project. That's what I'm really feeling here, because it might not even be about the idea, it might be about something else. So, set your intention, and that is going to be one, at least one layer below. I want my idea to win, or whatever it is. Yeah. So set your intention because, again, once you've got that between you, that's already a very different conversation too. We're in a boxing ring and we're about to beat each other up. I hope you're not yawning at our podcast there.

Speaker 1:

Well, the other thing I would say about that setting the intention is occasionally, it might be that if you take those five minutes to really think about, as you say, the true intention that sits beneath, occasionally you may come to the conclusion, actually, that you don't actually need to have a conversation. You know, very often I ask clients you know it is is that person's behavior or choices or opinions, are they stopping you from doing the work that you need to do in the way that you want to do it? And sometimes the answer will be no. Yeah, actually, I can get this need yet without us necessarily bringing out that I can serve the underlying intention actually without going into a difficult, conflicted conversation. And that would suggest to me that there's probably something else at play. There's some drama going on that's been created that isn't actually sitting at the core of what you're doing. Now, not to say that that's always the case, sometimes we'll come to that core intention and we'll still need to have a challenging conversation, but sometimes you may recognise that actually the argument or the conversation that you were planning to have has got really nothing to do with the underlying job at hand. Yeah, exactly, just because you find their way of working irritating, maybe you can still get to where you need to get to, or certainly 90 percent, whatever.

Speaker 1:

And the other thing I'd say on that is we so often assume that they know, yes, what the problem is. So you know, sometimes you just need to say, actually tell them the effect of what's happening on yourself or on them or on other people and colleagues, so you know when, objectively, rather than you're really not. Yeah, you know, to let you know. When you send emails at 10 o'clock at night to the rest of the team, they really feel under pressure because they have a high respect for you. They feel under pressure to respond at that time. It I mean, I cannot tell you how many times I've had this conversation and I really get it as somebody who can, whose brain can be busy at very odd hours of the day, that you want to get that idea out there.

Speaker 1:

So you send an email and your intention is good. Your intention is simply to get that into. I've got an idea, I've got an idea and I just want to get that out of my head and into the system. No expectation that someone's got to action that at 10 o'clock at night. But that's not. The impact is different, different. That's not necessarily how people feel. So again, it might be that you state the effect of someone's behavior, the impact of someone's behavior, and they might actually say, oh, my goodness, okay, I'll put them in save drafts, yeah, and I'll back.

Speaker 1:

There's a really simple solution to that. Exactly, that's right and and there's a, there's a maturity piece on that that it's all very well talking about intention, but we also need to take responsibility for our impact. Yeah, totally. But if someone says you were in it, because if you're on the receiving end of what we've just said, if you're on the receiving end of someone saying the impact of when you do that is this, and you say what? That's not my intention, not what I meant, it's not my I meant at all. I just I meant it, but that's not my intention, not what I meant, it's not what I meant at all. I just meant it, but that's not the point. The mature level of this is to both acknowledge the intention and to take responsibility for your own impact. So that's another piece.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, okay, I want to give some tips. I mean there's so much that we could say about this and there's a huge topic. I mean We've got to try and contain the beast. Yeah, contain the beast. Just make it really really practical, yeah. So there's a number of things that we've already said. I want to add a couple of few tips in here. One of them is language, which I'm going to pass to you yeah, so language. So there's loads of things that we could say on language when we think about challenging conversations and conflict. So so many things we could. We could say.

Speaker 1:

One thing I would say that we talk about time and time again, both in feedback and challenging conversations, is what we call the, the integral map or the multi perspective map. Sounds very grand. It sounds very grand. I know it is very grand. Well, it's not.

Speaker 1:

It's not anything that people don't know, it's just it's the pronouns, effectively, that we get caught in when we're in these conversations. Because of course, we are very often in these conversations subjectively, because we have our feelings, our opinions, our experience of that person, the situation, etc. Etc. Situation, et cetera, et cetera. So we will sometimes get caught in the I and the U. So if you think about a four quadrant grid of pronouns, you've got the I, the U, the we and the it. We can get caught in. You did you should? I feel you know I'm right, you're wrong. So there we are, we've got these two kind of polar, polar positions.

Speaker 1:

Now it's not to say that sometimes those pronouns are not valid. They very much are, and we are often much better off going back to intentions, where we're often much better off moving as quickly as we can into either the we language or the it language want. So it could be you know what's the best way for us to move forward. How can we think about this differently? What do if you're in the we space? There's no finger pointing. It's quite difficult for the other person not to respond in a in the similar space, even if they do keep responding a little bit with the I and the u. Eventually, if you keep using the way they'll, they'll probably be forced to to go there too.

Speaker 1:

The other piece of course, of course, is the it. I love this, which is wonderful when you're dealing with a challenge, a problem, a situation, because, of course, if you can put the it as sort of an external, objective thing that you're both looking at, think about a triangle, and that you two are sitting on sort of two points of the triangle the it, the issue is on the third point of the triangle, so it's not sitting with either of you, it's not personal. There's a thing there that needs to be resolved and you're both looking at it. Um, so if you can sort of objectify the it and put it outside of yourselves again. That will completely change the language that you use and how you're each feeling about the situation. So lots of things we could talk about about language one. One of my favourites is the integral multi-perspective map. Get out of the I and the you, get into the we and the it, and I'm going to build on that with the second tip to end on, which is the physical, the geography of the space.

Speaker 1:

So when we think about the it that you've just mentioned, if you're online, this is tougher. I would argue that if you can have conversations in person, if they're very difficult conversations, better. Definitely get off email. I mean, we haven't said that already? My goodness, get off email, the pinging back and forth and then copying people in and copying people in or taking people off. Copy on email. If you've got two or three back and forths and you're getting into a difficult conversation, pick up the phone. Totally, I think you are only going to make it worse if you keep going back and forth. Yeah, in fact, I would offer if you risk if you are the recipient of an email, that's a bit challenging don't even reply. Don't reply. Pick up the phone. Pick up the phone. The tone of the voice, hearing another human being at the other end of the line, whether it's on video call or phone, is already. It's going to dissipate so much of your problem on email. It's so impersonal on email that it's just an argument.

Speaker 1:

So if you can meet in person and if you've got to a place where you're trying to, you know, resolve an issue, as penelope said, think about the it literally get a flip chart or a piece of paper. Sit with the other person shoulder to shoulder, not opposite each other on a table, because that's like the battlefield the medieval armies are coming in towards other. Sit next to each other, looking at the thing. Looking at the thing, be it a screen, be it a flip chart, be it a notepad, look at the thing. It's so difficult for your brain to think you are in conflict If you are sitting shoulder to shoulder and looking at something else. Your brain will just not recognise that as conflict. Think of historically. You and I are now together. In are now together on the medieval battlefield, exactly. So, if you can, yeah, I don't think we have traditional views of ourselves, had we lived in past history. So it's that buddhica, I'm sizing myself.

Speaker 1:

Okay, two more tips. Look for the safety cues. So when you're in conflict, we can often lose sight of what does work about this relationship. What do I like about them? What are they in agreement? What are they in agreement with? What ideas can be shared? Are they trying to be collaborative? Exactly, look for the safety cues. There will be some.

Speaker 1:

Um, finally, palms opening close, notice your body language, notice what happens, build their foldy arms, jaw lock, tense fists, clench shoulders. Low eye contact can often go as well. Eye contact can go. So your body is a really, really great portal into diffusing some of that conflict, um, sort of driven language and attitude, and one of the amazing things we can do is to very softly open our palms out, face up and open. When we soften our palms about waist height and open them out, your body signals are now screaming to your brain we come in peace, we're fine, totally, and the impression that you're giving to the other person.

Speaker 1:

So, as an example, if you were to say a simple phrase such as I don't know why you're saying this If you have your hands kind of out, with phrase such as I don't know why you're saying this, if you have your hands kind of out, with palms down, I don't know why you're saying this, versus if you have your palms up. I don't know why you're saying this. Yeah, that will be interpreted totally differently, yeah, and your body will feel differently and the person sitting opposite you will feel different as well. And you could do it, even though it's actually really basic. I can see we're in disagreement here with palms pushing away or palms open. I can see we're in disagreement here. There's an invitation. The voice will change as well, because your brain's getting different signals, exactly. So it's incredible Palms open and closed. That could get you out of all sorts of sticky situations. So true.

Speaker 1:

So that's our first podcast on managing conflict. I feel like we sort of stuffed the Christmas stocking there. We sort of stuffed the christmas stocking there, yeah, but we know we'd only just touched the first everything that we want to just try to give you as much as possible. But there's so much to look at and, like I say, we will be laying everything out in a fabulous series to give you loads of insights and tools and tips into managing conflict, because it is such a game changer and actually game changing is the right word because if you're in ongoing conflict with someone, they are expecting the game to continue as it is. So take some of these tips, change the game and you'll change your life.

Speaker 1:

Thank you so much for listening to this episode of the 40 human being podcast. We hope you enjoyed the show. Do take on board some of the insights, tools and tips, because every time that you try something new to get back to choice, you are making a vote for the you that you want to become and I love that phrase, pen, I do too and please do share this episode with somebody that you know would really benefit from the lessons and learnings we've been chatting about today. And, of course, if you're interested in more from 40 human being, do get in touch. We run workshops, trainings online, in person, conference events and keynotes. We've got the 4d on demand platform for your whole organization and we do have a free essentials membership where anybody can sign up for absolutely free to access some of our insights, tools and tips. So do get in touch with us if you'd like to hear more. We cannot wait to hear from you and to carry on the conversation.