Nice to see you again. Follow me, @SydneyOwen. Thanks for being here!
I’ve been hearing a lot of people talk about standing up for themselves lately.
Good for you.
Now let’s talk about how you’re doing it.
For the record, if you ask me, passive-aggressive behavior is not standing up for yourself – in fact, it’s pretty coward-ish. Side note, is coward-ish a word? If not, go with it… you know what I’m getting at.
Let’s chat about being passive-aggressive for a sec. It’s great for some things. I can’t think of any off the top of my head, but I’m sure passive-aggressive behavior is key in some situations. If you know of any, feel free to add them to the comments box.
I think if you have a problem, you should find an honest way to address it. Beating around the bush, sugar-coating things, or even worse, doing nothing at all, is no way to solve your problems. We’re all adults here, chronologically. Now I understand everyone has their own way of dealing with conflict, I get that. We can’t all be forward and address things as they come up because then there wouldn’t be any drama in our lives. ::taking a step back:: Wait – I think I’m on to something.
I’m going to go ahead and throw this out there. This is the hypothetical, rhetorical invitation to say whatever you need to say to me, because if I have a bone to pick with you, I’ll pick it. Now I’m pretty much Miss Merryweather Sunshine all the time over here so I currently have no bones to pick. But in the event that I do, I’d like to get that out of the way ASAP because letting it fester is like a time bomb waiting to explode.
So while you try to figure out your conflicts, you can sleep easy tonight that you don’t need to fabricate it when it comes to me. You don’t need to think of how to spin it, how to soften the edges, or how it needs to be delivered. Give it to me straight up, because I am not good at trying to read between the lines. And I’ll do the same for you, because that’s how I roll.
Now, for your other problems (because surely you don’t have any with me, because I’m an angel at all hours of the day ::coughNOTcough::), let’s work on that. Practice on me if you have to. Let ‘er rip. I’m totally okay with being your conflict-solving test dummy if you need one. Then, maybe next time, you won’t have to text message and email your way around your problems, instead, you can pick up the phone or ::gasp:: come up to your conflict-ee in person and address it. Like an adult.
I understand given my affinity for the digital space that this may shock you – but I prefer to deal with matters of the heart in person. Friends, family, colleagues, men, whatever – let’s settle this stuff face-t0-face. So much can be lost in an email or text message. You can’t really read emotion in an email. You can’t see their face – read their body language, what have you.
My weakness with conflict stuff is that if someone approaches me in one space, like, in an email for example, I feel like it’s only courtesy to respond in that same space – which completely contradicts what I’m saying above. So what I’m working on, what I’m trying to get better at, is handling conflict face-to-face, no matter the format the problem is originally brought up in.
So let’s have some face time. Solve it that way.
How do you handle conflict? As much as you’d like to think that you’re good at it, what are your weaknesses? Any secret strategy you want to let me in on?