“Raise your words, not your voice. It is rain that grows flowers, not thunder.” -Rumi
I’ve been watching the news lately and getting more and more disappointed with how people try to get their demands met. Whether it is someone disputing a charge at a store, or working towards a major social issue, what the news captures on film is always the same–people (often groups), yelling as loudly as they can, and usually reducing their vocabulary to a few words, or worse, curses, rather than well thought out points. People yelling over each other, getting louder and louder. Can any message really get across in all that noise?
What happened to civilized debate? What happened to conversation? Reason? Where do the thinkers go when a fight gets going? What’s with all the yelling going on?
Ok, I understand that sometimes, you need to vent. To get it all out. Fine. Scientific American even published a study a few years ago stating that a bit of yelling was healthy. I agree that it is not a good idea to hold in your frustrations and anger as that could lead to health issues. Go yell in the woods, or in your bathroom, just not at each other. Or better, find a different method of communicating your needs in a way that leads to positive action towards that goal.
When a problem really needs to get solved, and multiple people are involved with different opinions on the topic, can we just stop all the shouting and cursing already? It may just be my personal experience, but it never seems to get anywhere.
Before you start to think that I’m some prudish woman who doesn’t ever curse, hardly. I’ve been known to go on a few tirades. And while I am rather soft-spoken most of the time, there are times when I yell out of frustration, or to get someone’s attention.
Now I can be a fairly opinionated person and I tend to surround myself with friends who are equally strong in their convictions. When a bunch of us get together, normal conversation can spark passion for a topic that isn’t shared by others in the group–and that’s often where the “fun” begins, and voices get louder. So over the years I’ve found a few successful methods for resolving fights and keeping friendships intact, with a lot less yelling:
- Take a breath and mentally visualize having this fight inside a library or a hushed art museum, or the hallway of your child’s school, or anywhere you know you should not be yelling. Then try to lower your voice to one you would respectfully use in that place. This often helps bring down the volume of your opponent as well. Try not to let your voice get louder.
- Agree to walk away from a fight until you “cool off” and can discuss the issue more rationally. If this is with a friend/spouse/lover, it could be “I love you but I see we disagree on this. I want to fully understand your opinion, but I cannot focus on it while I am in this emotional state. Can we sit down later/tonight/tomorrow to discuss more and move on to something else right now?”
- Agree to disagree. There are times when two people are just not going to see eye to eye on something, no matter how much thought, kindness or empathy goes into the discussion. If you care enough about the person, you can see past the issue that you disagree on and just agree to disagree.
- Bring in a moderator. Sometimes, when you just can’t get to an agreement, but you really don’t have the option of agreeing to disagree either because a decision is time sensitive or life changing, it can help to bring in a third person who understands the pros and cons of a situation and can help get the two of you to see eye to eye on a plan to move forward.
- Consider a third option. When an argument gets heated, sometimes it is hard to see past what you are arguing about. In simplest terms, just because one of you loves chocolate ice cream and the other can’t stand it, doesn’t mean that there aren’t dozens of other flavors to try. Take a step back and look at all the options. It may stop that argument in its tracks!
Often, you will remember that you had a “big fight” with someone a week ago, but can’t remember what is was about. Sometimes in the heat of a conflict, we also need to ask ourselves “will this decision even matter by tomorrow/next week/next year?” Often just answering that is all you need to stop the fight.
Wishing you all many peaceful, meaningful, and low-volume conversations ahead!
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