Ep41_ConflictEssentials
===

Adam Gragg: [00:00:00] Welcome to the Decide Your Legacy podcast. I'm your host, Adam Gragg. And if you have not already done so, if you found this podcast, helpful, pull out your phone right now, give us a review on Spotify or Apple. It helps the podcast to grow organically, which it is significantly. I really appreciate all the reviews that we're getting.

So just take 15 seconds to do that. So there's so much to worry about right now. And actually there has been, really for, I mean, there always is, but I mean, it seems like the last three years have just been insane. I mean, COVID, and we're still dealing with that. Still dealing with new variants, things like that.

The war versus, you know, Ukraine, Russia. That. Inflation, you know, a likely economic recession. All these things are on our minds. And I don't wanna ignore that. I mean, this increases stress in our lives. When we think about these, we know there's uncertainty because anxiety increases with ambiguity.

Ambiguity means fuzziness. You know, it's uncertain, you know, companies taken over by another company or purchased or a merger or there's uncertainty. So there's anxiety. So I'm gonna address today a common question that I get, because when there's increased stress, there's often conflict. But not the, not the good kind of conflict I wanna talk to you about today.

I'm gonna address today how to have six essentials for resolving conflict in a healthy way. Cuz there's good conflict and there's bad conflict. And the benefits that come from that and things to keep in mind. So like I have in other episodes, I'm gonna talk to you briefly about two risks that I've taken recently.

One is that I actually talked to a couple, by the pool on the 4th of July. I've seen them many, many times, but I just decided I'm gonna go and sit down next to them and talk to them and get to know them. Kara and Adrian. Thank you for the great conversation. Anyway, found they got married in April.

They're building a house. It was really cool. You know, they could have rejected me I guess, but it was a positive conversation. I also invited a friend to go to a baseball game. Actually. It's a new friend, somebody I don't know very well. And I said I had an extra ticket, which is the truth I did. And Hey, you want to come to the game with me and my daughter and he met us there and stayed for part of the game and had a good time, but I wouldn't have done that in the past.

Oftentimes cause I could have feared rejection. So I'm Adam Gragg, I'm a legacy coach. I'm a speaker, podcaster. Mental health professional for almost 25 years now, which is just crazy to me. So I started when I was really young. I've. Yeah, cause I'm only 40 right now. Just kidding. I'm 48. But I started in this profession a, in my early twenties, honestly.

So, my life purpose is helping people find transformational clarity that propels them forward to overcome their biggest fears, the fears that are holding them back. Usually they're emotional fears, not like fear of Heights or fear of snakes so that they can live the legacy that they desire. And I talk about things in a way that you could describe the concepts to your six year old and they would understand they'd say, oh, that makes sense, dad, you know?

Oh, that makes sense, mom, that's basic concepts that can be life. Transformative. I also speak to you as a fellow traveler, cuz I struggle. In fact, conflict is something that I have avoided pretty much the majority of the first 45 years of my life. I mean it is something yeah, maybe not. I would say the first 35 years of my life.

And so one thing that I, I created a really bad habit when I was six years old. I had been through some very difficult traumatic stuff. And I started to believe that family wasn't gonna protect me. I don't know, it was just psychological. And so I started to actually not trust. And I started to believe that if I spoke up and shared how I felt and shared my feelings and shared that I wasn't gonna get a response, which really wasn't true, but I started to believe that.

And dealing with conflict is essential for your mental health. In fact, conflict, resolving conflict in a healthy fashion builds intimacy. It creates bonds. We worked through it. We got to the other side, you know, what is conflict? I mean, people don't even necessarily have a great definition. There's.

Conflict simply stated is when you have a difference, a conflicting view on an important topic, you know, I, I don't view conflict. Like, you know, the chiefs are better than the Cowboys, you know, that's or, WSU is better in KU, you know, Wichita State University is better in [00:05:00] KU. I mean, you know, if you're having conflict over that kind of stuff, you need to see a therapist or you need to stop drinking so much.

Cuz that's not what I'm talking about here. Talking about real issues that people differ on and they need to address. And so patterns of behavior, that's good conflict, good things to address patterns of behavior that impact you or your family or your business that you see as being potentially damaging long term.

We want to address things. That express our diversity of opinion. I think diversity is a great thing. Diversity of thought, diversity of opinion, ideas, creativity, somebody may be going down the wrong path or not thinking about things in the right clear, a clear fashion cuz of their own trauma or whatever.

Think about it personally and professionally, you know, it's addressing for some. Professionals, when you address things, they have so much pride in their work. They're gonna take that as criticism and it's gonna lead to some conflict, but that can be the healthy conflict that I'm discussing here. And, you know, I had a situation actually with my aunt a couple years back, and it was just recently that I called her and I said, you know, did you say this?

And, and she said, well, No, not exactly. He didn't say that or this, but, you know, we had a good conversation about it, cuz I was kind of bothered by that, you know? And that's the kind of thing that you want to address. If people say things and blurt things out and there's a pattern of behavior where you're feeling judged or judged or excluded or in a dangerous situation I can think of.

Clients, in fact friends, numerous situations where they're being harassed, you know, either by coworkers, sexually harassed, they're being harassed by bullies, whatever, and they don't want to address it. And they don't say anything about it and they just sit with it and they sit with it. You know, because they have fear honestly, and they make excuses saying, well, nothing will actually change and nothing will be done, but they're just, they're just actually being passive in a way that can be damaging, not only to them and their mental health, but to other people who will be victims, who will, who and other people who have been victims, because that truth doesn't actually come out.

Working through conflict in a healthy fashion builds intimacy. And I'm gonna give you six essentials today. If you found this podcast helpful so far, I got something very special for you. Hit the link in the show notes to shatterproof yourself. It's a mental health stress checklist, and it's 27 items. You can do your own self-assessment things that you can adjust and change.

That'll make a huge transformative difference in your life. If you make some adjustments there, don't forget to hit. The link. So let's go to the very first essential, very first essential is that people that avoid conflict often believe that conflict will hinder or destroy the relationship it'll cause more problems cause more harm than it will actually cause than good.

You know, and one of my heroes in life is Abraham Lincoln and Abraham Lincoln, he was known for actually, well, if you ever read the book Team of Rivals, which will actually put a link in. A great book and it really explains how Lincoln would put rivals around him. People with differences of opinion. In fact, his, his political.

His political enemies, he would put them and he actually put them into his cabinet. So these are the people he's interacting with on a consistent basis and getting ideas from and talking to cuz he wasn't afraid. In fact, when you're confident in your point of view, you're willing to listen to others and you're willing to get feedback and you're willing to actually see things from a different perspective, which I think is really a damaging.

Thing that I see a lot is that people have very polarized all or nothing kind of thinking. And that's the second essential is stay away from this very damaging way of living, which is all or nothing thinking, okay, it's this I am right. And you are wrong. It's. Perfection or procrastination and avoidance it's success or it's failure and people that view conflict that way.

Well, they're either gonna cut off or they're gonna be aggressive, you know, or they're not gonna bring it up at all. So it's like nothing is ever actually addressed. When I've said this before, life is best lived in the middle. You build these close relationships, you know, I've built my closest friendships.

In fact, the bond with my parents has probably never been as strong as it is now. And most of that is because. Speak up and I say, look, this isn't okay. I'm not okay with this. You know, or this is bothering me or this concerns me, or I have a difference of opinion. It is something that can build and strengthen your relationships, that damaging way of living in.

We think of, you know, I must, I should. I can't, I won't, rather than what's the opportunity in this situation to grow and learn. What's the opportunity. What's the gain rather than the pain. I mean, we focus on the pain. It's only gonna damage things. It's gonna damage my business when really what I have seen is the exact opposite.

It actually strengthens. Professional connections. When you have conflict, it helps people to trust you when you're willing to address core things. It helps people to believe that you're [00:10:00] gonna follow through on your word, because you're willing to be honest about how you feel emotionally on core issues.

Again, I'm not talking about chiefs versus Cowboys here. I'm not talking about west Wichita versus east Wichita, that kind of stuff. Is not conflict. I mean, go ahead and have some conversations about it, whatever you wanna do, but I'm not talking about that. I'm talking about real serious stuff here.

Differences of opinion, professional, personal, whatever it may be. You know, I had a situation one time where I just, well, it was, it was a difficult situation. I mean, I didn't know exactly what to do with it, but I had a lease and. I felt like the lease really protected me from ever being moved to a different office and this and that.

And anyway, the people that bought the building, they pointed out in the lease that they had the right to move me. They didn't actually move me, but I didn't feel like I stood up for myself the way I should have. The third thing is, and I'm just kind of gonna go into this, have some guidelines with conflict.

You know, you don't wanna one up people with conflict or use power with conflict. You know, I'm the owner, I'm the CEO, you know, I'm your dad, you know, that kind of thing. I think people lose, they lose a lot of respect and they lose a lot of that, that initial. You know, openness when they hear things like that, because it's basically saying that, you know, I'm in a position where your opinion doesn't actually count and it ends the conversation at that point and they may be totally right.

You know, and legally it was totally in the rights to move me in this office. But the way it was approached was just very hard to stomach and it didn't build bonds, honestly. I mean, but anyway, Guidelines that are essential to follow in conflict again, no one upping, no name calling, you know, no getting in somebody's face, staying calm, you know, no standing up.

So you can prove your point, that kind of thing. No bringing up past topics or different topics. Those are usually distractions. Those are usually things where people are saying, they're trying to get you away and pull you away from this topic of issue. That really is important. So no bringing up the past, unless it directly relates to the current conflict.

No bringing up the past and you have to be very careful to be aware of that because a lot of people, they one up or they try and use their position in a way where they're not even necessarily even aware, you know, like the situation. I don't even know if they were aware of this, but I think there was some level of awareness personally, but I, you know, it's, it's something you can have control over. You can really be self-aware enough to know that you're not making power play. So you wanna follow some rules and some guidelines that makes conflicts safe that makes addressing things safe. You know, the fourth thing, essential thing.

And by the way, I have a link in the show notes to a video it's called a damaging way of life. And it's gonna describe to you this all or nothing thinking pattern that people fall into and how to break it, how to live in the middle and how to make some changes. So really check out that video that you're gonna find out extremely helpful.

So the fourth thing, the fourth essential is don't take the bait, don't take the bait. So there are some people in my family and you know, I'll just use my brother as an example. I love my brother dearly. In fact, our relationship is probably as close as it has ever been. And there are situations where if you address something with him, that his initial reaction can be so incredibly strong, that it makes you not want to address things with him.

And my sister can be the same way, honestly. I mean, we're all Italian, I guess. I don't know, but, so I will, at times not want to address things because I know that I'm gonna be dealing with this. Emotion and even accusation and bringing up past situations and that kind of thing. I don't wanna deal with that.

You know, it's like, I don't want to actually deal with that kind of crap and whatever, but I'm telling you don't take the bait. Okay. So don't get sucked into that. Stay calm, stand your ground, share what's on your mind share what's on your heart. I had a situation with my brother recently. He said some things, he apologized for it, all that, and I didn't take the bait.

I said, Hey, you know, don't hang up on me. I said, which in fact, you know, hanging up. That's another thing that's not really fair fighting. Not taking calls, not responding to emails, always using your assistant to respond to emails that are directly directed towards you, not calling people and looking at them and meeting with them in person.

All those are avoidance tactics that really with conflict, they show a sign of weakness. They don't show a sign of strength. I mean the strongest people and the most courageous people are gonna look you in the eyes and they're gonna deal with it head on calmly because they have a point of view that they believe in.

They're not gonna avoid it. They're not gonna use other people. So anyway, with my brother, I didn't take the bait. You know, I said, please, don't hang up on with me up. And I elevated a little bit to kind of get to his level. And I explained myself. I said, listen, you know, and he wasn't listening. He was just sharing, talking whatever.

And I said, please listen to me, Brandon. I mean, this is something that's important. And I explained myself and eventually he actually listened to me and he realized that my perspective and what he thought I had said, I had not said [00:15:00] what he thought I had said I had not said, but I wouldn't have had the chance to actually.

Clarify that he would've left, you know, and thinking what he thought. And I would've left thinking, he's never gonna listen and we wouldn't have bonded, but we actually worked through that together and he apologized, you know, and I apologized cause I kind of elevated myself, but he apologized for his distorted view of what I had said, which led to me starting to trust him.

Like he's gonna slow down enough. You know, and so there are things even with my sister that I hesitate and I've hesitated to bring up. I mean, I had a conflict with her that I just kind of cut off. I mean, I cut off from her for like a month because of something that happened, not the best thing. I mean, I, like I said, I need help with this kind of stuff.

I don't practice what I preach all the time. So don't take the bait. The fourth essential is a soft start. Now John Gottman did some research that a conflicts resolution will be directly connected to how softly the conversation actually starts. So I'm paraphrasing here, but the research is pretty clear that if you come in with an aggressive approach, you're not going to get the result that you want.

If you come in with a soft approach, like saying things like I could be wrong about this, or I may have misunderstood, can I get some clarity or even asking in advance? Hey, can we talk about something that's been bothering me? I really have something in my mind. Is there a good time in the next week for us to visit or even tell 'em what it is possibly say.

I really want to talk to you about the way the finances are structured in our business. And you know, we're both co-owners, is there a time when we can visit about this, that would be really good for you. So you're actually prepping them for a difficult conversation. That's gonna be a soft startup, you know, a soft startup too, could be admitting you're wrong.

Like I was wrong. No excuses. And I want to talk to you about this. Can we please talk about this some more? That can be a soft startup and those situations are about, you know, I would say a hundred times more likely, and I'm guesstimating here that to be settled in a healthy fashion than ones that are abrupt, that are like, you know, barge into somebody's office barge into their room, you know, and I've done that with my daughter at times, not into a room, but I've just kind of come home and I'm frustrated about something and I just dress it right away, you know, and I lose her right away, you know?

Say things like, you know, I'm your dad, and this is my role and this is my, this is my responsibility. And that stuff is true. You know, I got a 15 year old daughter. It is true, but I don't need to say that I can be calm and I can just trust that I'm gonna have the tools and I'm gonna have the ability to communicate.

The reason a, a soft startup is hard. It is living in the middle. It's not all or nothing. It's hard cuz it takes more time and energy. Than actually being abrupt. It, at least we think, you know, that's why we live in the extremes a lot is cuz we think, you know, it's easier. I can just address it now, get it over with it's off my plate or whatever, rather than the slow, methodical, timely approach, which means living in the middle it's riskier in the middle.

But I'll tell you it's takes delayed gratification, but people that wanna live now and take the easy way now are gonna have a really tough, hard life later. People who wanna make the hard decisions and live in the middle and live with integrity. And, and be honest, it's gonna be harder now, but in the future, it's gonna be excellent.

You know, cuz it's gonna lead to these great relationships with your grown kids. It's gonna lead to these great friendships, which I'm very blessed. It's gonna lead to these great business connections of people you trust, cuz you've been willing to actually address things in a soft way. It's gonna lead to opportunities that you can't imagine because you're building relationships based on integrity, not based on power, not based on money, you're building real solid foundations to things.

And those are the kinds of things that last, because when you're dead or when you're dying, I'm saying you're gonna want one of the biggest regrets of the dying is I didn't maintain healthy relationships. I didn't take care of relationships and nurture them the way that I should. Business professional, whatever it may be, that is a major regret.

We don't wanna get sucked into. The fifth thing is, is to listen, you know, and listening requires listening. It doesn't require formulating your response in your head. It requires zoning into what the other person is saying and not formulating your own response and listening in such a way that you can paraphrase or summarize the key points of what they're bringing up to their satisfaction.

So they actually. Feel understood by you. It takes that kind of effort. It's hard work to listen. It's lazy to not listen. I mean, people that don't listen, they lose connections. It, people pick up on that right away that you're not listening. They can tell by your body language, your tone, they can tell you're formulating your response.

You don't care what they have to say. You're not really trying to understand good listeners. Follow up questions. So what did you mean by that? Or how can I change or what ideas do you have or, you know, can you give me an example? That's the kind of stuff that's gonna build trust in a relationship.

Marshall Goldsmith is a coach and corporate trainer does kind of similar stuff. To me, I've read a lot of his stuff, really like his content, but I learned from him once this activity that I've used with clients and people before he calls it feed forward. And so when someone gets a call from their boss saying, Hey, Please come to my office.

I got some [00:20:00] feedback for you, you know, nine times outta 10, they're thinking something negative. I mean, generally when they get that kind of call, I mean, correct me if I'm wrong, but that's what, that's the response I get from people in crowds and everything, but feed forward, it actually establishes some guidelines.

So in a feed forward activity, you basically just. Side on something you want to improve in your life. Like you wanna get more sleep or you wanna work out more, you wanna be better connected to your daughter and you go around the room and you share that with one person and then they give you their two best pieces of advice.

And then they share what they wanna work on. And you give them their, your two piece, best pieces of advice, not perfect stuff here, but the rules are so essential here because. Force you actually to listen because one of the rules is that you can't critique the feedback, you know, and the other rule is that you can't bring up the past and then there's two roles and the roles RO LS are essential as well.

For good listening. One role is to listen as best as you can. So really zone in on what they're saying. And then role number two is. That you are going to learn as much as you can. So you're gonna focus on the conversation in such a way where you're gonna learn and you're trying to learn because that changes your objective.

It's essential. You know, I told you before, when I speak, if my objective is to look good or to show off or to be funny, or to look smart or to be impressive, whatever I'm gonna suck. You know, I am not gonna have fun if my objective, when I speak is to help people and to give them things that I believe can truly deeply help them.

Then it's fun for me, cuz if one person gets that and one person gets some kind of life transformation, it's worth it to me. And it's not about myself. It no longer was about me cuz when it's about me, I suck when it's about me, when it's about helping others, I do much better. So the last thing, number six, I.

Is when in doubt air on the side of addressing things. Okay. So you may be going back and forth second guessing everything in your mind, but when in doubt, most likely you have put some time and reflection into this situation you're gonna address most likely. Hopefully you've consulted with some friends, colleagues.

You've gotten some information. You've actually really done some soul searching to see if it is a core issue to address. I mean, not always. I mean, a lot of times as a parent, I know I need to address that right away. A lot of times as a boss or a business owner or whatever, I know I need to address that right away.

It's something I need to get some clarity on right away. But when in doubt, air on the side of actually addressing things, air on the side of courage air on the side of courage, you can always apologize and you may have to cuz maybe you shouldn't have addressed. But air on the side of courage and don't compromise your values.

Now I had once worked with this executive at a big company, big, big, big company. You know, she was in the executive team, worked with the CEO and everything. And this. Gal was really intimidated about addressing a very important issue with one of her coworkers that needed to be addressed, because it was something that was gonna trickle down throughout the company potentially provide cause a lot of liability potentially cause.

A lot of damage, you know, so scary thing to address. And as I went through tune up for life with her, which is my online coaching course, one of the sections is on clarifying your core values. And one of her core values was honesty. And one of her core values was, was speaking the truth, you know, with courage.

And so as we looked at those core values, she could see she had no other option. Except to if she was gonna be true to herself and her values and live them out for her kids in front of her friends and her husband, she had to say something and she did, and she did it in a soft way. And she did it with my help cuz she wasn't alone and she had support and it ended up being a very.

Helpful interaction anyway. So if you have found anything helpful today, I want you to think about the one thing you wanna take away and apply change happens. When first we go ahead and acknowledge, you know, we admit that we have a problem and then change happens when we take action on that problem, we have to take action.

So it's awareness, acceptance, and then action. So think about that takeaway today and remember. The link in the show notes to shatterproof yourself mental health, stress checklist. This is a great resource, super excited to give this to you, been working on it for a long time, give it to your friends. It's 27 items.

You can do a self-assessment of the way you are dealing with your own personal level of mental health stress in your life. And then it gives you clues on what adjustments you can make that will make a huge difference in your life. I just want to actually mention as well that if you want me or someone on my team to speak over zoom, to talk about some of this stuff, you know, give us a call.

You can find the link to a website in the show notes, Decide Your Legacy, Adam Gragg and my team. We are gonna talk about truthful things. We're gonna get people thinking and addressing and taking action. You make a decision today, the kind of legacy you wanna leave 10 years after you're gone. How do you want your kids to remember you?

How do you want your family to be talking about you? At Christmas? You can make decisions today to live the legacy you wanna leave. You decide your legacy. No one else. Thanks for tuning in. Please give me a, like a review on apple or Spotify. I will see[00:25:00]

you next time. Bye. Bye.