Is Your Conflict BlueprintTM Working For You???

By Ruth Sirman, CanMediate International

As I was growing up there were many times when I found myself thinking “If I was a mom, I would never do (or say) THAT to my children..”. And then one day when I actually had children of my own and things were not going well, I opened my mouth and out came all those things that I had naively sworn I would never say. It was not one of my more ‘stellar’ moments and when I realized what had happened, I was devastated. How could I have inflicted on my wonderful innocent children the same hurtful words that had been said to me? And to be honest, it happened not once but many times throughout my parenting years.

Well, life goes on and my children appear to have survived those days – and I did too. However it started me wondering why rational and intelligent adults can find themselves saying and doing things that are not particularly wise, logical or helpful. As a professional mediator, I often work with people struggling to deal with the difficult and stressful situations in which they find themselves – at home, at work or in their personal lives. People will describe their reactions during the conflict and then say things like “Once I thought about it, I realized that I could have done things differently and it would have changed everything”, or “I always avoid conflict – and then I kick myself later for not standing up for myself”, or “I know fighting doesn’t solve anything but when my buttons get pushed, I just react”. So why do we get caught up in these habitual reactions that often do not work rather than doing what we know would be more constructively helpful?

Humans are creatures of ‘habit’ - actions or thoughts that are ingrained in our behaviour patterns through repetition. The more often we think it or do it, the more deeply embedded it becomes in our personal operating procedures. So take my beliefs about conflict and add my habitual behaviour patterns in conflict situations and that creates my default Conflict BlueprintTM that drives my instinctive (and often involuntary) responses to conflict when it erupts.

So where did this Conflict BlueprintTM come from? The short answer is that it has been carefully developed over the course of our life time. As we move through our lives we learn from each conflict situation we encounter. Each entry is carefully filed away in our brain and contributes to our Blueprint – either positively or negatively (or both!). Children are influenced primarily by the key adults in their lives – and each adult has a Conflict BlueprintTM that they will selflessly (and often unconsciously) share with the children in their care. Children are fast learners and don’t necessarily pick up on the habits and attributes adults would prefer them to choose!

However, our Blueprint has only as much power as we choose to give it and if we don’t like it, we can change it! So if I have habitually avoided conflict, always given in to the other person or aggressively defended my point of view and I now realize that this is not getting me the results I want – I have the power to make changes to that blueprint. Awareness of its existence and the ability to critically analyze it and decide what to keep and what to change is the first step. This means accepting that I choose my actions and behaviour – in all situations. This can be a tough pill to swallow, because it’s so much easier to blame someone else than to accept responsibility myself. The second step is to honestly (and objectively) assess what beliefs and habits are operating. This means being totally honest about what I do – not what I’d like to believe I do. Step three is to create new and more constructive habits and beliefs and put them into action. This is tough to do and requires determination and focus plus a willingness to invest the necessary energy to change long-standing habitual patterns. A supportive counselor or mentor can help create a realistic action plan and provide support and accountability!

In our current world, the ability to resolve conflict effectively is becoming increasingly recognized as a valuable attribute. If your Conflict BlueprintTM is supporting you in your efforts to resolve conflicts constructively, then it is actually supporting your success. If not, then change is possible and it may be helpful to remember that the definition of insanity is to do the same thing again and again – and expect different results!!

Ruth Sirman is a professional mediator and trainer who teaches the same skills she has used since 1996 to help groups resolve conflicts in government, corporations, communities, churches and schools. For more information, check out her website at www.canmediate.com.