How to Communicate in Conflict - Terri Cole

well hello and welcome to this video first i want to say hey it's real love revolution season people and you know what that means that for the full month

leading up to my the start of my 12-week signature program reel of revolution all of my content that i put out has to do with love communication healthy love

self love and how to up your communication game so let me ask you when you are in conflict do you clam up

do you run away do you escalate it do you explode because each of us has a conflict communication style and in today's video i'm going to be teaching you how to uncover your conflict

communication style and i'm also breaking down the top four most common communication in conflict issues that people experience and i'm giving you some tips

and scripts that you can use when you find yourself in that situation so before we get started if you have not a subscriber yet hit the subscribe button hit the little bell so whenever i put

out something new which is every single tuesday i roll out something new and juicy to up the quality of your life i don't want you to miss it and if you're

new with my crew hey drop a comment introduce yourself we are a friendly bunch my name is terry cole and i am the author of boundary boss which you can get at

boundarybossbook.com thank you thank you thank you for all of your participation i love this channel so much i love this crew i love to highlight what you say about the

episodes that come out so marion says under the episode of when and how to fight i really appreciate getting to listen to you and your guests thank you my emotions flare up at some of the most

unexpected times it certainly impairs effective communication in all settings thank you for the suggestions and guides it is really helping well marian thank

you for being a part of my crew now let's move into today's content let's determine your communication style

that is what we're doing first so effective communication especially during conflict can be one of the most challenging parts of any

relationship right it's crucial to understand what it is that you do when you are activated in a conflict

because you have to learn to communicate especially when you're in conflict if you want to be in healthy relationships whether they're love relationships or whether they're friendship so

let's just break it down communication itself can only be two ways effective and ineffective right communication styles themselves so what is

ineffective it means indirect right it means you're not getting to the point never clearly stating your intention there's lots of different

ways of being indirect we'll go over some of them throughout this episode but being passive aggressive is being indirect also being unclear about what it is that you're saying

being very vague that is indirect and ineffective communication sometimes it's non-verbal right there's a lot of passive

aggression that we can express with our body language and not say any words at all do you ever use the eye roll or a heavy sigh or slam a door

anybody anybody i know somebody has because i definitely have so know that there's lots of different ways that we can ineffectively communicate

because here's the thing we can't just ignore the way that we feel and as much as we'd like to avoid it if we don't know how to communicate during conflict

it still finds a way to seep into what we're doing the way we're behaving our attitude our body language so hopefully in this episode you're going to learn how to

effectively communicate while you're in conflict so ineffective is indirect now direct is the effective way to do it now we can do that

because here's the thing with direct communication it is to the point there is no doubt to the meaning

behind your words it doesn't mean that you have to do it with massive aggression it doesn't mean you're yelling it means clarity

of language you're not hiding the true meaning of what it is you want to say underneath a bunch of other crap so the people that you're talking to have no

idea what you're talking about and again assertive communication means that we have to speak up and again assertive is not aggressive

but for many of you who fear speaking up you may hear it that way when you hear assertive does it sound like you need to be caustic does it sound like you need to be mean

well you don't and also along with this episode i've created a guide you can get at terrycole.com forward slash guide which i'm giving you a whole list of the the more specifics of the direct

and indirect communication actions that you can take but i think you get the point for our purposes now so think about it are you more of a direct communicator or

are you more of an indirect communicator and it's just you and you so be honest with yourself and i'm gonna move into the four most common relationship communication issues that i have seen as

a psychotherapist so conflict number one is listening to talk not understand let me say that again listening to talk

right you can't wait to get your point across but not to understand so the obvious is to say

listen with an open heart and mind when we're really an effective listener we are creating space for our the other person to

share what it is that they really want to share listen with the intention right the mindful intention of understanding not gathering evidence

to make the other person wrong which can be really tempting especially when you're in conflict so part of what you can do if you're in a romantic relationship is create regular dates

to discuss things openly so that you normalize the problem solving um process because the more we avoid the more

stressful it is when we find ourselves in conflict and you might say i have something important i'd like to share with you can you please let me finish my thoughts before interjecting yours i promise to

do the same for you so that we both may feel fully understood right and in each one of these i'm giving you a little script obviously you're going to make that script your own

but with communication during conflict we need to be proactive especially if what you discovered was that you're more of an indirect or

an ineffective communicator maybe you're more of an avoider and i understand that but the reality is this is something you can avoid

forever because it has this negative ripple effect when we cannot communicate effectively during conflict it affects the rest of the relationship and really

how we feel about ourselves as well in a negative way all right moving on to the second communication conflict issue that i see is using the silent treatment

right to convey displeasure now i talked a little bit about this at the top where you might slam a door or roll your eyes but here's the thing the silent treatment is really

a silent but deadly form of passive aggression right this is ineffective but it's also really damaging to your relationships ignoring your partner

and or the problems at hand really have this tendency to amplify them not make them go away so much of the time a quick conversation could take care of something that then

lingers as we are giving someone the silent treatment which is also sometimes called stonewalling them if that's you doing it and hey maybe you're on the receiving

end of this either way it super sucks so take a deep breath and a moment for yourself before committing to using the silent treatment as a

coping mechanism or really as a weapon if you know you have this tendency you can take a deep breath and i gave you a script if you're the one who is a

silent treatment giver i gave you a script which i'm going to read for you right now that you can use to provide context to the other person

without actually employing the silent treatment you might say hey i'm upset right now and my first instinct is to ignore you in this entire situation but i want us to effectively problem solve

more can you please give me a few minutes you can insert your desired time frame whatever that is to cool off and think about how i feel then let's come back together and talk it out i love you

and i don't want to fight or ignore you to make a point now that may seem like it would be really hard to say but you can practice these scripts i'm giving you

you can make them your own you can make it shorter if you need to but there's something so powerful about naming the action about naming what you want to do

rather than acting it out because from a therapeutic point of view we can only talk things out or act them out this is what happens because we don't have the power to like

poof make our feelings disappear we just don't so by saying by acknowledging it you're not letting your emotions take control of you

and have you acted out and you're also clueing in your partner or the other person to what is happening for you it's so uncomfortable if you've been in

this because i'm sure all of us have been in some relationship where somebody used the silent treatment either we did it or the other person did it but it is so stressful

it takes up so much bandwidth if you are in a cold war with someone it's so painful and it makes a situation that could be handled within like 15

minutes it could go on for days i had a client who said that she didn't talk to her partner for two straight weeks they lived together and actually he was the one who wasn't talking to her

like talk about being committed to something 14 days of total silence like that is completely dysfunctional totally damaging to a relationship but a

hundred percent unnecessary because we can all learn how to communicate when we're in conflict hence why i did this episode for you and why i created a course real love

revolution where you can learn how to effectively communicate in your relationships we dive really deep into communication in the course itself and boundaries and self-love and a million

other things it's a 12-week virtual course so if that sounds interesting to you just go to terrycole.com forward slash r we are starting on january 26 2022

okay that was my little pitch for my course moving back into this communication conflict issue number three this is the inability to express your

needs now this is something as a psychotherapist for the past almost 25 years i've seen a lot so the tip is this you have to take responsibility

for getting your needs met just like the people that you're in relationships with need to take responsibility for getting their needs met because listen nobody can read your mind

and you can't read their mind so you've got to gain clarity yourself about why you're upset about what need of yours is going unmet by writing it down

and then approaching your partner because we can't be vague we can't say you have to be more sensitive because nobody knows what that means

and even though it might feel awkward at first to write down what you're feeling and what you've come to and what the problem is you can use it in a conversation with the person

when you are dealing with conflict you can say hey i've written down a few things that i want to communicate to you so can you please wait until i'm done sharing them with

you before responding you know that asking for what i want is challenging for me and i would really appreciate your patience and compassion while i

work at getting better at it so even though that may sound weird to say for you you think about it and go i couldn't say that of course you can and a lot of people in

therapy i will instruct them to write down how they feel and what they want to communicate because for so many of us when we're in the heat of the moment our mind just goes blank

maybe you have a partner who's like an expert communicator maybe they're actually a lawyer right and they they've got all the arguments ready to go and you might shut down

when you're in conflict so giving yourself time and space to write down what's going on for you and then sharing it even if you have to read it is so incredibly effective

for you to communicate effectively when you're in conflict okay so the last issue i'm going to cover is defensiveness and blame this is another one that is really um common

feeling defensive which you know what would dr harriet lerner one of my heroes in the world of psychology would say that defensiveness is the arch enemy

of listening so what creates this sometimes unresolved shame can be the thing that is fueling blaming

or defensiveness or excessive feelings of being judged in a relationship especially when you are struggling with someone right especially if you're in conflict

so this is where the self-work has to come in you've got to work to understand your own reactions and not use blaming or shaming as a tool

to sort of win an argument or win a conflict because again this is another thing the reason we don't want to do any of this stuff when we're in conflict is because it's damaging

to the relationship and of course it doesn't resolve the conflict which is what we're hoping it'll do so the script here could be i have something important i'd like to share with you and again can you please listen

without judgment and without giving me your opinion i know i'll figure it out i simply want you to know what's going on for me just knowing that you care

really helps giving your partner insight into what is happening for you without blaming them necessarily for what is happening for you

is so productive when it comes to resolving conflict effectively remember speaking up

talking true resolving conflict and having the communication to do so that is good for you and good for your relationships because none of

us want to be stuck in this purgatory right of being misunderstood and that's exactly what happens when you cannot communicate

effectively when you're in conflict you end up feeling so misunderstood and it is super duper painful so again any of these scripts these are just loose ideas

for you i wanted to give you something to start with that you can end up making them your own i hope that this was helpful and hey if you want to join

me in reel of revolution and lots of people from all over the world and you really want to become an expert communicator because we handle that in

this course go to terrycole.com forward slash r l r to get all of the details if you love this please share it on your

social media i'd love to hear from you so please drop your comments you know where i hang out i'm mostly on instagram share this in your story i will usually repost it and i just want to say thank

you thank you thank you for being in my crew i hope you guys have an amazing week and as always take care of you