Conflict Podcast

[Tattered Heart]

I'm a podcast junkie. I have a 30 min drive to work each day and listen to them on my commute. I found a podcast that I wanted to share with all of you. It's called Conflict Reesolution with Tammy Lenski. She shares short 5 minute lessons on conflict each week. I listened to a couple this week and she shared a few things to say to get someone to stop yelling. Of course like all conflict, these are not guaranteed to work, but these phrases will cause the person to get out of their emotions and go into their thinking mind. The phrases she shared are:

"Help me understand what you are saying."
"I can't heart you when you raise your voice."
"When we argue like this I can't think straight."
"Hang on. I missed that. Tell me again please."

You can find the podcast on itunes. Not sure where to find it on android as I have no idea how android phones work. 

[PLEASE - NO RUN MESSAGES]

PLEASE - NO RUN MESSAGES This is a high level discussion board for solving ongoing, day-to-day relationship conflicts. Members may appear frustrated but they are here for constructive solutions to problems. This is not a place for relationship "stay" or "leave" discussions. Please read the specific guidelines for this group.

[WifeOfProbableBP]

Ooh thanks! I'm interested. I have an android phone  :/  but I'll figure it out.

[Grey Kitty]

One that helped in my marriage was "What are you afraid of?"

Anger is a secondary emotion. Usually fear is behind it. We are afraid of something, and we jump to being angry as a way to avoid the fear. And since the anger isn't the root of the problem, it doesn't help resolve it.

Often when my wife and I were in arguments, they went like this:
I was afraid of "X" and thought that doing "A" would protect me from "X"
My wife was afraid of "Y" and thought that "B" would protect her from "Y"

We'd get stuck in an argument about A vs. B... .
I'd be upset at my wife because I thought she was trying to push X at me by arguing against A.
She'd be upset at me because she thought I was trying to push Y at her by arguing against B.

But if we backed up and acknowledged the original fears, X & Y, it de-escalated everything.

I didn't want her to suffer, I didn't want her to experience what she was afraid of. She didn't want me to suffer, didn't want me to experience what I was afraid of.

And we could start working together creatively to find solutions that didn't include either fear... .or we could find a compromise, at least knowing what we were really asking of each other.

I don't know that this would work out of the blue, but having talked about this process earlier, the question would often jump us out of an argument.

[PlasticOno]

Thank you both for the helpful information... .