The Windhorse Institute For Conflict Resolution

Newsletter

Back to Archives

Uncertainty

by Trime Persinger

“Questions unite people. Answers divide them.” —Elie Weisel, Holocaust survivor and Nobel Peace Prize Laureate

When we’re in conflict with someone, we tend to think that we know exactly what the other person is thinking. We think we know his motivation, his beliefs or thoughts, his feelings.

We create a whole scenario about the other person in our mind, and believe it to be true. We might become very attached to this perspective, to the extent that we feel the need to protect ourselves from the other person. We build an emotional wall around ourselves.

When we try to resolve the conflict from behind our emotional wall, we generally get nowhere. We make accusations, we feel attacked or belittled or misunderstood. The other person fights back in the same tone. And we think that the situation is unresolvable because we just can’t get through to him.

Sound familiar? To a greater or lesser extent, we all construct these emotional fortresses from time to time. Our interpretation of the other person’s behavior doesn’t seem like interpretation, it seems like fact. We don’t realize that our story about the other person is just that—our story. It is constructed out of our assumptions, our projections, our fears.

Actually, the story itself is not the problem. The problem is that we believe it so much. Our certainty limits our perspective, it puts us on the defensive, it squelches our curiosity. Certainty is perhaps the greatest barrier to working effectively with conflict.

In order to resolve conflict, there must be movement. Not just movement from the other person, but also movement from ourselves. And in order for there to be movement, we must soften our approach. First, we could recognize our story as our own creation. Second, we could allow the possibility that our story, as convincing as it seems, may be inaccurate or incomplete.

We can never really know what another person is thinking unless she tells us. And if we’re feeling angry with her, then our version of what she’s thinking is even less likely to be accurate. Our anger clouds our judgment, it shields us from our own pain and leads us to believe that the other person is the source of all that’s wrong.

In other words, certainty is conducive to conflict. Uncertainty, on the other hand, opens up the situation and allows for the possibility of a shift in perspective. Often, it doesn’t take much of a shift to completely alter the tone and outcome of a conflict. By allowing even a little uncertainty, by being slightly curious, we create the possibility of a gap, of movement, of engaging more effectively with the other person.

Uncertainty shakes us up. We feel less solid, more vulnerable. Uncertainty is scary for us, because it calls into question our very identity. The story we have created about the other person is part of our arsenal. We use it as a weapon, and we think we need it to defend ourselves.

But what is it that we’re defending with this weapon of certainty? We’re defending our ego, our small self, our “me”. Letting go of this certainty shifts us into a greater view, one that is more tender, open, and wise. Even if the other person is stuck in his version of the story, our uncertainty will reach him far more effectively than our accusations. The conflict becomes less of a battle, more of a dance.

So, if you’re in a conflict with someone, allow the possibility that you don’t have all the information. Allow your certainty to soften, and shift to a more questioning mode. The riches of authentic communication await you.

Back to Archives