Sometimes, despite your best efforts, conflicts do not get resolved the way you wish.  Divorcing couples routinely say and do things they later regret. Parents and children become estranged.  Neighbors and friends may not speak to each other for years because of a perceived injustice.  Even minor misunderstandings can cause a rift.

The destructive anger may even persist when the source of the hurt is no longer present.  A parent may have died, the neighbor moved away.  The anger continues to divert emotional energy as you replay the situation over and over, perhaps seeking to remake the past with a better ending, perhaps as punishment to show your outrage at the offender’s actions.  Forgiveness creates a new reality to escape these negative feelings.

Look at the sky on a crystal clear night far from the city lights.  What do you see?  The heavens are filled with twinkling stars.  If you are in the northern hemisphere, you can see the Big Dipper.  Maybe you can see the Milky Way and thousands of dimmer stars.  As time passes, the sun rises with glorious pink, yellow, and orange hews.  What do you see?  Now your attention is drawn to the magnificent sunrise.  Gradually you see the stars no more.  While the light of sunrise illuminates our way, enabling us to better see our path, it also blinds us to a different reality.  Which is real?

I sometimes hear people encourage those in pain to “forgive and forget.”  Is this good advice?  While the advice may be well-intentioned, to forget denies that the experience happened.  If the trauma is significant, remembering the trauma may be an early step to recovery.  Victims of sexual or physical violence, for example, may suppress any memory of the experience in order to manage  the emotional pain. Remembering, and accepting that they are now safe in spite of the event, is necessary for true healing.  The past does not disappear.  As Gary Hawk says, “To get over something in the hope of creating something new in our lives requires that we remember the harm we experienced without letting that memory create momentum that leads to revenge. Memory is absolutely essential to the forgiveness process because it is central to the identity of individuals, peoples, and nations, and may reduce the susceptibility to repeated injury in the future.”[i](Rather than “forgive and forget,” we should forgive and put to rest.

Some people believe that, bullying is a harmless rite of passage that is a natural part of growing up. “Boys will be boys,” they say.  “A little adversity builds character.”  However, researchers find that 25% of bullies end up in jail by the time they are 30 years old! They also say that the victims frequently develop physical symptoms such as headaches, stomach pains, and have sleeping problems.  Some are afraid to go to school, go to the bathroom at school, and have trouble concentrating. Bullying is a big problem.  Fully 49% of students reported being bullied in the past month, while 30.8% reported that they bullied others.

I delivered my manuscript on conflict management to the editor today.  The book should be released next year!

When presenting  concerns to others, many experts  encourage you to begin your presentations with specific facts rather than opinions. Disputes are rarely about getting the facts right.  They are almost always about our interpretations and values. While this seems simple enough,  I sometimes encounter confusion.  So let’s give some illustrations.  “You arrived home at 11” is a specific fact.   “You are late again” is more general, and therefore less effective.  “When you are late I worry about you” is a fact.  We may discuss whether I should worry (an opinion), but the fact is that I do worry.  “You make me worried” is an opinion.  What caused you to be worried is based on interpretation, not fact.  It may be the challenger’s actions, or your own neuroses that made you worry.  But “I am worried” is a fact.

On the eve of the mid term elections we are reminded that, whatever our political affiliation,  our choices are between people seeking more power.  In her book, Taking the war out of our words: The art of powerful non-defensive communication, Ellison states that  high power people frequently exhibit many of the characteristics of an addiction. The desire for more power becomes an end into itself, rather than a means to achieve the goal. Her reasoning is that:  

Power struggles are highly complex.  They may be a one-time event, or ongoing soap opera. As any parent of more than one child knows, it is not always easy to determine when the power struggle began.  “Mom, she hit me” the brother complains. The sister may indeed have hit her brother, but she did so in response to her brother poking her.  Is that when the power struggle began or is he poking her because last week she tattled on him.  It is probably futile to determine when it began, and not really necessary. 

For many people, it is extremely difficult to develop sufficient self-control to remain calm as the conflict escalates in ever increasing emotion and volume .  I learned some valuable lessons when I joined the Colorado Mountain Club and took fly fishing lessons.  I learned that certain flies will work with some fish and not others, and what works may vary depending on the time of  year and what type of bugs are normally in the area.  I learned that flies that don’t work early in the day may work later the same day as the water warms up.  I also learned how to cast my line to get the lure where the fish are likely to be.  Finally, I learned how to set the hook to reel them in.  As I listened to these instructions I couldn’t help but think that fly fishing is very similar to dealing with conflict. Button pushing children and adults know what kind of barb to throw, when, and where to get you to bite.  They know how to set the hook to pull you in and how to land you.  They know that if they toss the hook late in the day when you are tired, they will get a different response than when you are rested. 

We have a tendency to believe that unexpressed feelings will do no harm if they are not expressed, and there may be considerable risk to expressing our feelings about a topic of concern.  We could have our ideas rejected, or ostracized.  Even worse, a person we care about may reject us. Therefore, we hold it in.  There may be times when this is appropriate.  However, important unexpressed feeling rarely lay dormant.  Rather they ferment and turn into something far more potent and intense than the original concern.  Unexpressed feelings may creep into other conversations with that person in unintended ways.  Resentment may creep in through tone of voice, impatience, or tense reactions.  We may lose self-esteem, and chastise ourselves for not standing up for our interests.  Even more important, hidden feeling may block positive emotions.  It is more difficult to love someone when you resent what they do.  I am not suggesting here that we spill our guts and vent all our emotions.  I am suggesting that we carefully express our feelings as they relate to the problem without being judgmental.

I once met at restaurant manager who was quite proud of his “Machiavellian” approach to management.  He felt that his employees needed a touch of fear to operate optimally.  He let them know in no uncertain terms when their work did not meet his standards, and was careful NOT to establish a relationship with his employees.  However, he confided that he was frustrated and perplexed by a waitress who had worked at the restaurant before he had taken the job as manager.  She continually did as little work as possible, and seemed to engage in a work slow-down whenever he was around.  He thought she was unmotivated and angry because she wanted his job and didn’t get it.  It did not occur to him that her behavior might be a reaction to his fear oriented tactics.  Since she could not discuss her concerns with him directly, she retaliated with the guerrilla warfare tactics of a work slow-down.