Avoiding conflict used to be my main go-to strategy when faced with the possibility of causing a reaction. I did not want to confront anyone with anything too emotionally loaded because I did not want to feel guilty, upset, or wrong.

A while ago, I realised that constantly withholding my deeper feelings and automatic reactions was not resolving anything. All that happened was more of the same, over and over again. And I still felt scared of what I was feeling and what you may feel if I ever revealed how I really felt. What a racket!

I decided it was time to stop avoiding conflict and instead, learn how to deal with it effectively. To begin with, my conflict resolution methods resulted in more conflict and lots of feelings. After many occasions of going almost all the way then pulling back … again and again, I decided to stop avoiding the feelings (which only made them more intense all round) and go there anyway. Rather than shut down and withhold even more, I chose to keep breathing and keep communicating and keep feeling until the energy shifted and the conflict was truly resolved.

Until the next time …

And there is always a “next time” as shown by my experiences over this past month. I would love to say that I have nailed it (whatever “it” is!) and conflict resolution is a breeze for me these days. Alas … it is not. Sometimes resolution is fairly easy, yet lately, I have been deciding that what is occurring really is a very personal attack on me and I then feel wrong and upset and angry and all sorts of things I don’t like to feel.

My avoidance and reactions to conflict simply show me where the “not-good-enough” context still informs my feelings and thus my behaviour. Much of my life I have feared being wrong so I have developed very sophisticated and elegant strategies for avoiding any conflict where I could be perceived as being wrong. And when I chose to stop avoiding conflict, I also chose (albeit without consciousness at the time) to stop avoiding this version of the “not-good-enough” stuff …

And therein lies the loving intention in my choice to keep creating conflict: It provides many opportunities to fully acknowledge the “not-good-enough” stuff and return to love.

If there never was any conflict there would never be any change or growth. And if nothing ever changed or grew there would ultimately be … nothing.

I work with small business owners and their teams supporting them to create business cultures that are truly open, honest, loving and responsive. Of course this usually requires some disruption to the status quo: “I won‘t tell you what I can see, if you don‘t tell me what you can see”.

The notion that keeping quiet; not saying what you really feel/think/know; avoiding having the hard conversations and going all the way is acceptable or appropriate because it avoids conflict is a fiction. It is a closed and defensive way of thinking, feeling and being and ultimately creates more fear and more anxiety … not less. The choice to avoid being open and honest because you fear the response/reaction you will get comes from the same fearful thinking that created the issue in the first place. And in that fearful place there is no resolution.

In order to create open and honest communication as a cultural norm, you have to be willing to deal with conflict as it arises and sometimes even actively facilitate it. This means being willing to say what you can see, feel, and know, to stay in the conversation until it is complete and to BE present and aware and responding to what‘s really going on until the energy shifts and peace prevails … and it will … when you go all the way.

When you accept conflict as a natural and integral part of the process of transformation and welcome it as an opportunity to tell and hear the whole truth, you will discover the power of conflict to create peace.