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  • Translator: Jeff Broadbent Reviewer: Xinyi He

  • (music and applause)

  • I've heard it described as a volcano that's about to erupt.

  • A hurricane.

  • Like slow-dancing barefoot on broken shards of glass.

  • Like trying to hold back the ocean with a broom.

  • War.

  • The plague.

  • Like being drawn and quartered.

  • These are just a few examples of thousands of metaphors I've collected

  • about conflict.

  • What's conflict like for you?

  • Your metaphor matters

  • because it often reflects how you think and feel about conflict.

  • So it makes sense that if you think conflict is the plague,

  • you'd probably want to avoid that,

  • and avoid everybody else that has it too.

  • If it's like trying to hold back the ocean with a broom,

  • I would imagine that feels frustrating and futile.

  • So what do you do when the waves just keep coming?

  • Because conflict washes ashore in all of our relationships;

  • at home, at work, in our neighborhoods.

  • And you've probably already been given advice on how you should deal with it.

  • "Communicate."

  • But sometimes talking about it seems to make it worse.

  • "Don't go to bed angry."

  • So you stay awake, and now you're angry and tired.

  • (laughter)

  • Or, "You just have to learn to compromise."

  • But if your compromise has ever felt like,

  • "You don't get what you want, I don't get what I want,

  • but at least together we're mutually miserable."

  • (laughter)

  • Now I'm sure all of this advice is well-intentioned,

  • but it treats conflict as if it's a problem.

  • What if conflict isn't a problem?

  • What if it's a solution?

  • What if it's not negative, but full of beauty?

  • After 15 years of studying, researching, teaching, and training in conflict,

  • I've learned to see it differently.

  • I've been able to see the power it has to transform -

  • to transform us, our relationships, and the world around us.

  • It can be difficult, though, to create that change.

  • And it means we have to start looking at conflict differently.

  • No matter how negatively you think about conflict right now,

  • it is possible to change that.

  • It takes three keys in order to do that.

  • The first is to recognize what our conflict is really about.

  • I have a four decade long history of fighting about the dishes.

  • When I was a kid I hated doing dishes, and I fought with my parents and my siblings

  • on nearly a weekly basis about who's turn it was.

  • When I got to college I fought with my roommates about the dishes

  • because sometimes they'd go home for the weekend

  • and they'd leave behind their dirty dishes with their half eaten burritos,

  • with congealed ketchup, and bowls of

  • funky, fermenting, green Lucky Charm milk in the sink.

  • (laughter)

  • When I got married I fought with my wife about how you're supposed to do the dishes

  • and if it even counts as doing dishes if you don't rinse the sink out afterwards.

  • (laughter)

  • With my own kids I've fought about the dishes,

  • about them not dirtying 15 cups a day because they get a new one

  • every single time they get a drink of water,

  • and trying to get them to help load and unload the dishes.

  • I mean, maybe I ought to just switch to paper plates.

  • (laughter)

  • But maybe, it's not about the dishes.

  • As I think back, as a kid it wasn't about the dishes,

  • it was about independence and wanting to make my own decisions.

  • With my roommates, it wasn't about the dishes.

  • It was about wanting to feel respected and wondering

  • if they valued the relationship the same way that I did.

  • With my wife, it's not about how I do the dishes.

  • It's wanting to feel competent and likable no matter how I do them.

  • With my kids, it's not about the dishes.

  • It's about my identity as a father,

  • trying to teach them respect and responsibility.

  • You see, conflicts are a lot like icebergs.

  • What we see on the surface may seem small,

  • but what's underneath can send boats like the Titanic to the bottom of the ocean,

  • and if I don't pay attention to what's underneath my own conflicts

  • it can rip holes in my relationships.

  • Conflict is about so much more,

  • about our identity, our relationships, the things that really matter to us.

  • And as you're thinking about you're own conflicts,

  • maybe you can start to see that they might be about something more.

  • Now, once you recognize what your conflicts are really about,

  • the second key is recognizing when you're stuck.

  • Now, I am no stranger to being stuck in conflict.

  • I started learning about conflict because I was terrible at it.

  • Well, a couple years ago,

  • I asked my four-year-old daughter to put away a couple of "hair pretties"

  • that she had gotten out.

  • You know, a hair pretty is like little bows and rubber bands,

  • stuff you put in your hair to make it pretty.

  • (laughter)

  • So she took them, but she chucked them on the floor of the bathroom,

  • and I said, "You can't just put them there on the floor,

  • you need to pick them up and put them in the tray

  • with the rest of the hair pretties."

  • She said, " I don't want to put them in the tray.

  • And I said, "You got them out. You have to put them away."

  • She said, "I don't want to!" and started throwing a fit.

  • So she's laying on the floor, so I get down on the floor next to her

  • and I put the little hair pretties right next to her hand,

  • and I bring the tray over, and I'm just like,

  • "Just put them in the tray."

  • (laughter)

  • And she said, "I don't want to!" and flips the tray.

  • 20 more hair pretties go flying over the floor.

  • So I'm like,

  • "Line in the sand.

  • You're not coming out of this bathroom until you pick up all the hair pretties!"

  • So she tries to rush past me and I block the door with my gigantic body.

  • And she's flailing at me with her tiny little fists.

  • Then 20 minutes later I'm at the door

  • trying to explain to my neighbor who has brought a plate of cookies

  • to welcome us to the neighborhood

  • why my daughter is screaming, trying to climb over a mattress

  • that I've used to block the bathroom door.

  • (laughter)

  • Now, that may be entertaining for you,

  • but at the time, for me, not so much.

  • I was stuck.

  • That was not working very well for me.

  • Have you ever been in your own conflicts and thought,

  • "This is not working so well for me."

  • See the thing that gets me stuck there is justification.

  • Justification is believing that I'm blameless.

  • And it's so seductive, because in conflict

  • if I'm blameless, then I don't have to do any of the work to change.

  • I'm not the one that needs to change. Somebody else needs to change.

  • And it keeps us stuck.

  • As you think about your own conflicts, do you ever feel justified but stuck?

  • Again, that might feel nice in the moment, but in the end it's pretty dissatisfying.

  • It keeps us doing the same conflicts over and over again

  • and nothing changes.

  • You can get unstuck.

  • If it's not working for you, you can find a different way.

  • The third key in unlocking the beautiful, transformative power of conflict

  • is to start learning to speak responsibly.

  • To have those kinds of conversations where we can create change in ourselves,

  • in our relationships, in the world around us,

  • it requires vulnerability, ownership, communication, acceptance, boundaries.

  • It's hard work, though. It can be as hard as trying to learn a new language.

  • I've created the acronym VOCAB

  • to help you in those moments, to think about

  • how you can be responsible in your conflict,

  • how you can create the change that you want.

  • And it starts with vulnerability.

  • Vulnerability is my willingness to let myself be seen.

  • To share who I really am, how I really feel, even my mistakes.

  • To share the needs that I have that are below the surface.

  • Now when I'm vulnerable, I take off my armor

  • of justification and defensiveness.

  • I put down my weapons of blame and accusation.

  • And that can be terrifying.

  • But it's beautiful because it disarms our conflicts

  • and it creates the potential for us to connect instead of to fight.

  • The O in VOCAB is for ownership.

  • Ownership is taking accountability for my own needs, emotions, and choices.

  • Have you ever wondered in a conflict, "How did I get here?"

  • Maybe you're in the proverbial doghouse and you're sleeping on the couch.

  • Or maybe your conflicts have escalated into the ridiculous

  • and you have a mattress blocking the door of your bathroom.

  • The beauty of ownership is that when I look at my choices and my emotions

  • in my conflicts,

  • it starts to help me map the contributions that I make.

  • I can see how I got here.

  • I can see exactly which direction I'm headed,

  • and if that's not working for me it empowers me.

  • I can shift direction.

  • The third thing you need, and at the