Oracle of Consciousness
#63 - Dealing With Conflict
Conflict is two or more opposing forces or energies.
Opposing points of view
It can range from a simple difference of opinion, an inner personal conflict, to physical irritation or aggression towards someone, right up to, violence, terrorism, and wars.
Conflict has a vast array of effort and energies behind it.
This is the separate
nature of duality
One coin, two sides = Duality
Photo by Derrick Treadwell on Unsplash
Photo by Derrick Treadwell on Unsplash
Side A
One coin
The birth of conflict resolution
Between zero and seven years of age, we learn everything we need to know about conflict resolution.
How?
By watching our parents, in some cases it could be a close family member, grandparents, or someone that is in our lives fairly consistently and does not deal with conflict in a really rational or resolving way.
It's usually our parents.
As youngsters, we watch, we feel and sense energy, we can sense there is something going on, although we may not be able to articulate it.
And we watch how mum and dad, (let's use those as the example), deal with conflict.
There are many different ways of dealing with it, ranging from the rational, to mild irritability, aggression and more violent.
Scenario #1
For this hypothetical example, let's use dad as being the powerbroker.
He always gets his way.
Whenever there's conflict, he raises his voice and if that doesn't resolve it for him, he shouts louder.
Then he can get physically aggressive, even turning to violent words, and violent forms of physical abuse.
Or he could just shut down and disappear.
That is just an example, the dad and mum roles are interchangeable.
There's no particular pattern, per gender.
Scenario #2
Mum, on the other hand, wants to keep the peace and harmony in the home, above all, she wants to protect her children from harm.
So she kowtows to the 'powerbroker'.
"Yes, dear".
"Okay, I'll do that".
"Oh yes, you are right".
And in doing so, she gives away all her power.
After a while, she becomes powerless and the 'power broker' uses this as an excuse to get his (or her) way. Again, they're interchangeable.
This is a no-win, unhealthy situation, and both sides lose.
Remember, the EGO wants to make itself right and the other person wrong.
This is the superiority and separateness of the EGO.
On our journey to becoming more conscious, it really is advisable to look at and ask:
"How do I deal with conflict"?
"Do I react" or "Do I respond"?
If I react, I need to look deeply into this by asking:
"Why is it"?
"Where did I learn this"?
If I learnt it from watching and observing my parents, how they dealt with conflict and I've assumed one of their behaviours,
"I want to be the peaceful one".
Or "I want to be the aggressive, powerful one".
Then any time we use this as a method of resolving our own conflict, we're not being ourselves.
We're not being authentic.
We're being one of our parents, or in some cases, both of them, flip flopping between them.
This is not the best path to go down.
Fortunately, all learnt behaviours can be unlearnt.
The best form of resolving conflict is through the six heart-virtues, by being grateful and appreciative.
By expressing compassion and understanding, being forgiving, humble, brave and courageous, and using those values to resolve what's going on in front of us, which will dissipate the conflict.
If both parties are using the heart virtues, we can quickly resolve these differences, melding them into understanding and love.