In one of my recent couple’s coaching sessions, Rachel and Judy came to me because they had been having more frequent and more serious arguments. Please note: Rachel and Judy are fictitious and composite characters for the purposes of confidentiality.
 
They had an idea of where it might be coming from but they felt stuck and miserable, and unable to stop the cycle on their own.
 
Rachel and Judy recently had their third child in less than three years, putting their loving and respectful relationship to the test. They both had to go back to work pretty soon after the birth of the child and are dealing with postpartum issues for Judy, and a lack of sleep for both of them. Needless to say, both are feeling overwhelmed, tensions are high and tempers running short.
 
Their most recent recurring conflicts had to do with the fact that Judy felt Rachel was not keeping her agreements. One such example happened just days before the session: Rachel had committed to pick up the kids from school and daycare, and at the last minute had sent Judy a text that she was held up at work and couldn’t go. Another time, she had agreed to get up in the middle of the night to take care of the baby and Judy woke up to the baby’s wailing with Rachel sleeping peacefully next to her. These broken agreements made Judy so irritated that when she tried to discuss these issues with Rachel, she would freeze and be unable to express her real feelings and clearly articulate her expectations and requests. She would be in such a reactive mode that she would blurt out sentences, like “I can never trust you to fulfill your engagements”, or “I can’t count on you to keep your promises.” Of course, these accusations put Rachel on the defensive and she was put in a position of justifying and explaining herself, making her feel inferior and treated like a child. The arguments kept ending in loud yelling, deeply hurt feelings and not much resolution.
 
Loving relationships often start out with a “bank” account full of love, goodwill and good intentions. Arguments deplete this account. If couples don’t pay attention to replenish it, the balance on the account ends up being pretty low. A low love bank account can lead to pretty dire endings, like separation or divorce. But at the very least, it will make both parties in a couple pretty miserable. Therefore, it behooves couples who seriously mean to stay together for the duration, to regularly replenish this love bank account or, even better, not deplete it in the first place. For that to happen, couples need to learn how to fight. In other words, couples need to learn how to resolve conflicts in a way that does not damage their relationships.
 
Of note is the fact that known experts in the field of relationships like John Gottman or Harville Hendrix agree on the fact that couples will almost by definition have conflicts. One could say it’s the nature of the beast. This is due to the fact that couples mostly argue on the same three to five topics until the end of their relationships or lives – whichever comes first. Those topics are usually the few things in each partner that drive the other partner crazy. They are the three to five things that we all secretly and fervently wish we could change about our partner. The problem, of course, is that we all know we cannot change anyone. The fact that our partners don’t fix those three to five things that drive us crazy on their own and out of love for us is unfathomable to us. Why can’t they just slightly alter who they are by tweaking these few things to become more of who we want them to be?! Thus, the recurring fights which often lead to the demise of couples.
 
In addition, very few of us have actually learned how to fight fair and have productive arguments. Unfortunately, that skill is not taught in school. Therefore most of us are pretty clumsy and resort to one of what John Gottman calls the “Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse” of relationships: four patterns of communication that he says lead to the downfall of relationships. These four patterns are criticism, defensiveness, contempt and stonewalling.

Sounds familiar? You’re not alone.

And thus, the importance of learning how to deal with conflict in a constructive way, so that our relationships don’t end prematurely when the love bank account is drained empty and all that’s left is resentment and regrets.

USEFUL PRE-REQUISITE TO PRODUCTIVE CONFLICT RESOLUTION

 
Some of you might remember our May newsletter in which we described how to “know thyself.” In the blog, we discussed how to know oneself on three planes: temperament, physical, and authentic selves. One dimension of knowing oneself we did not discuss was our conflictual selves: what’s our “go to” place of fighting? Yes—there is such a thing. We all have a default setting we revert to when we find ourselves in a conflict situation. You might already know what yours is. If you want to be sure or confirm your instinct, or if you don’t know, there is a fantastic way to find out what that setting is. Take the TKI--Thomas Kilmann Conflict Style Inventory. The TKI is a tool that was developed precisely to measure an individual's response to conflict situations. You can find out more about this and take the assessment here. I am also happy to help you take the assessment and offer you a debrief session if you’d like.
Thomas Kilmann explains that the five general default settings we all have in conflict situations are based along the two axes of Cooperativeness and Assertiveness, and are the following:

• Avoiding
• Accommodating
• Compromising
• Competing
• Collaborating

Being aware of your conflict style, and knowing that there are other conflict styles which might be more productive than your default one, is helpful in that you will be better positioned to work through difficult situations with others toward productive outcomes. 

THE THREE STEPS OF POSITIVE CONFLICT RESOLUTION

There are three steps that lead to productive conflict resolution and effective solutions:

1. Calming down
2. Effective communication
3. Problem solving

In today’s newsletter, we will review steps 1 and 2. To spare you a really long read, Step 3 will be the topic of our August newsletter.

1. CALM DOWN

Never has anybody ever in the history of the whole wild world calmed down by being told to calm down. No: calming down is an inside job. And it is a mandatory first step to conflict resolution.
 
When Judy, who has recently given birth to a child and has to go back to work in a pretty frazzled and tired state, gets a text from Rachel that she has to leave work abruptly to pick up the kids when it was not her turn, she gets ambushed and triggered. She gets into “fight mode”, which makes her lose her ability to think clearly. She starts awfulizing in her head as she drives to pick up the kids, remembering how many times Rachel stood her up in college. One can see how when Rachel walks in the door, she would not be welcomed with loving words by Judy. And one can also see why Judy is not capable of having a rational conversation with Rachel when she gets home.
 
Therefore, Judy‘s first task is to help herself calm down before encountering Rachel again so that she may have a productive conversation with her that actually leads to solutions in the future.
 
How does she do that? The answer: Whichever way Judy knows how to calm herself down. That’s going to be different for every person. In Judy’s case, she knows that listening to her favorite piece of music on the radio as she drives to pick up the kids will help distract her from thinking and will lower her blood pressure. Another thing she occasionally likes to do is repeating this mantra to herself: “Rachel and I love each other and together we will figure this out.”

By the way, this is true for either party in a conflict: if Judy has not calmed herself down before Rachel walks in (because she is unaware of her state or has chosen to stay angry), then Rachel will receive Judy’s wrath when she walks in the door.

If someone has a strong and sudden emotional reaction towards us, it ambushes us and therefore triggers us to become defensive and fight back. It takes a lot of wherewithal to have enough awareness in the moment about what is happening (we are being attacked and we are getting triggered to fight) to then decide to not react in the moment (fight back), but instead to step back/retreat and choose to go calm ourselves down. These are the same calming down techniques as pictured above: do whatever works best for you!

2. COMMUNICATE EFFECTIVELY

A.k.a.:
 
How to talk so your spouse will listen and listen so your spouse will talk.
 
(Phrase borrowed shamelessly from Adele Faber and Elaine Mazlish in their book How to Talk so Kids will Listen and Listen so Kids will Talk.)
 
Once Judy has worked on calming herself down, she now has the ability to think more clearly about how to handle this situation. She can calmly think through what she is going to say to Judy and how.
 
One of the techniques Judy is familiar with through our work in coaching, is a communication method called Non-Violent Communication, or NVC. This method was created in the 1960s by clinical psychologist Marshall Rosenberg based on person-centered therapy concepts. You can find more about NVC on their website, where you will find that it’s actually more than just a communication method: “Nonviolent Communication is a way of being in the world that has the purpose to serve life and to create connection in such a way that everyone’s needs can be met through natural care.” NVC is about having empathy for self and others and respect everyone’s needs. One of the most important points of NVC is that in order to communicate effectively without creating violence, which is without provoking reactivity in the listener, we need to speak while owning our reality, our emotions, our wants and needs, and not blame the other for not giving those to us. This can be achieved using “I” phrases (instead of “you” phrases).
 
If Rachel comes home and Judy says “Rachel, you were supposed to pick up the kids at 5pm. You can’t send me a text at 4:45 asking me to go get them. Especially not after I just got back to work after weeks of being out. I can’t help but remember when we used to have dates in college and you would cancel them at the very last minute without any explanations. I hate that I can’t trust you!”
 
How would you react to those sentences? Do they possibly sound to you like accusations? The trick here is to transform the sentence in order to say the same message using an “I” phrase, so that Rachel can hear what Judy is saying without getting defensive.
 
In this case, Judy might have said: “When we have an agreement about who is going to pick up the children, and I am counting on this agreement and organizing my schedule accordingly, and then the plan changes at the last minute, I feel put upon and let down. As a result, I am frustrated and upset, and even somewhat disappointed and sad. Could we set some time aside maybe this weekend to discuss what happened and find solutions for next time?”
 
Since Judy didn’t start the conversation by saying “you” to Rachel and instead states what happened neutrally and expresses how it made her feel, Rachel can actually hear what Judy has to say and realize with empathy how Judy felt in this situation. This will enable them to proceed to have a productive conversation, which can actually lead to solving problems.

3. PROBLEM SOLVING

Make sure to check out next month’s newsletter in August to find out about the last step in conflict resolution! For now, I’m sure you’ll agree there’s already plenty to work on and practice in the current newsletter!

To support you in implementing these concepts, here’s a little coaching practice as a challenge for you (I can do this because I am The Challenge Coach!). Ponder the following questions and write down the answers in a journal, so that you can concretize today’s read and put it into action:

• What is your natural conflict style? Do you know? If not you could take the TKI and call me for a debrief. Or you could examine your last 5 conflicts and see if you notice a pattern. Or you could ask your spouse or best friend: what do they think your conflict style is?
• Is your conflict style conducive to productive resolutions? If not, which one would you like to move to? How might you get there? What kind of practice might you need?
• What are your favorite techniques to calm yourself down? Are they available to you in the heat of a triggered moment? If not, can you find some that would be?
• What is your natural “horseman of the apocalypse of conflict?”. Identifying this will help you become aware when it shows up the next time you’re in a fight, thus enabling you to more quickly get to the step of removing yourself from the situation and calm down before proceeding.
• Start practicing non-violent communication: next time you have something difficult to communicate to someone, start by writing down the sentences on paper before actually saying them to the person: “When [this thing happened], I felt [feeling words] because my need for [needs/values words] weren’t met. I am wondering if you would …[request].”

I'm curious to hear how your practice goes. Don’t hesitate to share! As always, if you need “a little help from a friend” to work through these steps, you know where to find me.

May you find the courage to practice the first steps of conflict resolution!

Conflict is inevitable: it’s the nature of being different emotional human beings with different perspectives and a strong survival instinct. But remember: war is optional. There absolutely are peaceful ways of getting to cooperatively solved problems!!

Peacefully Yours,

TRANSFORM YOUR CONFLICT RESOLUTION SKILLS
SPECIAL OFFER

Join us for an enriching half-day conflict resolution workshop on Tuesday, October 8th, from 9 AM to 12 PM.

Who it's for:

Everyone who might be currently experiencing conflicts, or who would like to pre-empt future ones and learn how to become a better “life fencing partner”.

What You'll Learn:

1. Calm Down Techniques: Master strategies to manage your emotions effectively.
2. Effective Communication: Develop skills to communicate clearly and ensure your message is heard.
3. Problem-Solving: Gain tools to approach and resolve conflicts constructively.

Why Attend?

Bring your real-life problems or conflicts to the session and leave with enhanced conflict resolution skills that you can apply immediately.

Details:

• Cost: $350
• Special Early Bird Discount: Register by August 31 and get $50 off with code EARLYBIRD!

Don’t miss this opportunity to improve your conflict resolution capacity significantly. Secure your spot now and take the first step towards smoother, more effective interactions.