Living Outside of Conflict

What to do when people poke at your own immaturity

Patagonia Sea Lion Fight. Source: Shutterstock

Thanks to everyone who has preordered my upcoming book, True to You! Remember that once you preorder, you can download the companion workbook here. Working on getting some book events on the calendar, so more on that soon. DC folks, you can join us for the launch party at East City Bookshop on July 9th (virtual is also an option, but then you won’t get a cupcake or learn weird things about me from my friends). - K

People spend a lot of time in therapy talking about how other people poke at them. A rude comment from their father, a fight with the girlfriend, or an unreasonable boss can eat up a lot of time.

I’m curious about how people make the shift from thinking about the content of arguments to the process of how anxiety gets managed in a relationship.  

Individual thinking: Bob is a mega-jerk.

Process thinking: Oh hey, Bob is trying to involve me in how he manages his reactivity by making a mean comment. If I respond similarly, he will have someone to be mad at, and that will make him feel less reactive. What do I want to do here?

Though it seems counterintuitive, we forget how steadying it is when other people behave poorly. When other people join us down in the dirt, we have someone else to focus on and blame.  

People ask, “Why should I behave if they aren’t? Why do I have to be the bigger person.”

This is a great example of how “why” questions aren’t particularly helpful. What do I do? And How effective is it? are more useful ones.

Conflict happens when two people (or groups) think the other needs to change for things to get better. And it is one relationship pattern through which a system attains some stability.

A person who is thinking process sees how going along with the conflict isn’t winning. It’s actually going along with the other. They are able to say to themselves,

And then do a new thing.

Example: A mother tells her daughter, “You never bring the kids to see me. Don’t you care about me at all?” Feeling her mother’s reactivity, the daughter could try to convince her mother that she’s wrong, pointing out all the times they’ve visited in the past year. She could insult her mother, or tell her how unreasonable she’s being. She could go to her spouse or therapist and complain about her mother.

But what are the alternatives that exist outside of predictable patterns? Responses that aren’t about convincing, winning, feeling superior, or matching the level of immaturity? What does it take to do a new thing, one that doesn’t involve anyone else in regulating yourself?

Maybe it looks like ignoring the comment. Or saying, “That reminds me, Mom, that I need to give you our summer schedule.” Or maybe even asking a question about how the previous generation managed time spent with grandkids.

Of course there are times when people have to stand up for themselves. When it’s useful to say, “I’m not going to continue this conversation if you’re talking to me this way.” But sometimes standing up for yourself is just being a self, rather than being another point in the system where the anxiety can be passed.

It is a fascinating experience to see how not going along with the familiar patterns seems to take the wind out of people’s sails. The pattern gets interrupted, and the person has to manage their reactivity in a different way.

Does they mean that people will calm down and be nicer to you? Not necessarily. But when a person is thinking about process, their own sensitivity to the provocation changes over time. They see it as an opportunity to play ball, to jolt people out of what’s predictable. To work on their own maturity and increase the flexibility of the entire system, so that it doesn’t have to rely on those familiar but costly ways of managing the tension.

It gives me great joy when somebody starts to have fun with a new way of operating. When they can say to their spouse, “That’s so interesting that you think about it that way Brian. Here’s how I see the challenge.” And then Brian looks at you like your spaceship just crashed into the living room, because you aren’t calling him names or trying to win the argument.

So here are my questions for you this week:

• Where did you think you were standing up for yourself, when you were really giving the other person exactly what they needed to feel calmer?

• Where do you want to inject some weirdness, some maturity, into the very predictable conflicts you have in your relationships?

By weirdness, I mean something that communicates your own thinking and your own capacity to STAY OUTSIDE of the ways a relationship system manages itself.

Staying inside the relationship but outside the patterns is no easy task. It’s almost impossible in the moment to interrupt what’s automatic. That’s why it’s useful to know the system so well that you can predict how people involve you in how they manage anxiety. And to have a plan for holding onto yourself. What’s yours?

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