Recently I found myself in an unexpected heated discussion. It had been awhile since I had seen this gentleman, and without a greeting or even a simple “Hello” he entered into a discussion with an attacking tone as if I had previously threatened all that was precious to him.
Not only did this conversation take me by surprise, but I also found myself growing in frustration and anger as the discussion went on. The “It’s not fair” light seemed to be flashing obnoxiously in my brain as I tried to find my way to exit the conversation.
Today I met with the gentlemen and we were able to clear everything up, but I left our meeting still taken back and trying to sort out what I can learn from all this. Here are my thoughts:
- If you are upset with someone, give him or her a chance to share his or her side of the story before you blow up. I found it a bit unfair to just get into the middle of a tornado without any storm cloud warning. Before just exploding out of frustration, be sure to listen and find clarity before stating your case.
- If someone begins to attack you and you don’t know what you’ve done – keep your cool – and ask him or her to let you in on the details that led to this point. I quickly realized that I had no idea where I had gotten off track with the man that approached me. In fact, as he continued to talk I realized that someone else was feeding him the information that had upset him. I should have stopped him early on as asked him to explain to me where his ill feelings began – that would have helped up get to the root issue much faster.
- Make plans to resolve it quickly. Do everything you can to resolve it in the moment, but if you can’t then schedule a later time to get together. The man I was speaking with did say he needed to walk away and not speak with me anymore (because he was so mad). I tried my best to say, ‘that is fine, but please help me get this resolved as soon as you are able.’ It should be our goal to never let unresolved conflict last more than a day.
- Learn your lessons well. If you did make a mistake, then own it and say you are sorry. Also, we must learn the lessons we need to learn in any conflict situation. Be on guard against your pride. Don’t think you are above learning a lesson in any situation – there is always room for our own personal improvement.
How do you deal with unexpected conflict?
