When I looked at the title for this blog post, I thought long and hard about what I should write about. I mean there are a variety of interpersonal conflicts I’ve had with various groups of people. During this thought process, I realised that the most pertinent interpersonal conflicts I have experienced usually involve people I am close to and care about. It does seem ironic in a way as these are the ones who understand you best and therefore communicating with them should be relatively easier. However, as I have come to learn over these two weeks, there is much more to communication than the above.
Thinking back on all the arguments I’ve had with my best friend, P, I remembered one which we had back in junior college during the preparation for our CCA’s annual production. P was in-charge of the song item which I was also involved in. It was the evening before the actual event and I was still unable to get one of the songs right. This caused a lot of uneasiness in me which I expressed to P a few times but she was confident that I could pull it off. However, I was unable to sing the song right with repeated attempts. I began to get agitated. This caused P to become exasperated as she tried to explain to me that it would be highly inconvenient to make any changes to the sequence this late. Her attempts to reason out the issue with me proved to be futile as I was in no emotional state to listen. Eventually, I walked away after a vehement argument with her. It was only after taking some time to calm down that I realised that I could have handled the situation in a less volatile manner. For example, I needn’t have gotten so frantic about the getting the song right. The emotions an individual displays determine the response from the person he/she is interacting with. So, me getting anxious about the song might have upset P and caused her to respond in a negative manner. In contrast, if I had been more composed, the situation could have been solved in a much more harmonious manner. I suppose everyone’s emotions were running high that day due to the intensity of practices and peaking stress levels. This might have been a contributing factor to this conflict as well. I came to realize that making decisions or trying to solve situations during emotionally charged moments would be pointless.
However, to this day, I still wonder if we could have avoided the conflict entirely or if it was bound to happen. While I am aware that certain conflicts can be avoided with the monitoring of one’s tone or trying to put one’s self in another’s shoes, I feel that some conflicts may not be that easily avoided. I’d like to ask if all conflicts can be completely averted during circumstances like the one I’ve mentioned above. What do you think?
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Dear Mufeedha,
ReplyDeleteI do agree with you that there is more to communication than knowing the other person well. What happens often is that the particular situation makes us say and do things we usually wouldn't. In this case, I think both of you reacted quite naturally to the situation. Like you mentioned, everyone must have been under quite a lot of stress and not in the frame of mind to listen to others. You could have possibly tried to approach your friend and explain to her, a little more calmly, why you were feeling nervous. Instead of saying that you couldn't perform at all, you could've asked for help to help you get the song right. Its always difficult to sort out problems when everyone's tempers are running high.I suppose we can only try to calm down before we try to sort out the issue.
Dear Mufeedha,
ReplyDeletePersonally I don’t think conflicts can be completely avoided especially in stressful situations like the day before an event. When emotions and stress levels are running so high, conflicts are unavoidable. However, the degree of the conflict can be made less severe. In a best case scenario you would probably have short arguments and disagreements which end in someone accepting the other’s viewpoint.
I felt that perhaps you could have walked away from the beginning as soon as you felt panic arise within you. You could have taken a short break just to mull over the options you have. If you would have done that, I think you would’ve realised that you could not possibly learn a whole new song in 1 day and thus you did not have a choice but to stick to the current song. While this was not the ideal situation for you, it could not be helped. I guess then you probably would not have scared your friend by asking her to change the song on the last day. This would probably have averted the large-scale conflict that you experienced. I think all of us remember venting our frustration regarding a certain issue on someone who probably did not deserve it. This is especially so in times of high stress or when something is not going our way.
But during times of high stress people tend to forgive and forget so no long term damage eh?;p
Just some of my thoughts:))
Cheers,
Jigna
Thanks for sharing this personal story, Mufeedha.
ReplyDeleteYou have shared a very real conflict scenario, highlighting some of the factors that could have contributed to the conflict. Nice job!
You also discussed what you could have done better in order to minimize the chances of such a conflict happening again, in other words, you have offered possible solution(s) to the scenario above. While it is commendable that you reflected on the conflict and discussed what you could have done better, the task of this blog post has been overlooked, i.e. "to ask a question... answered in the form of a possible solution by the members of your blogging group" - what do you think?