The luxury of human communication has a downside - conflicts. They are born everywhere: in the family, at work, on the road, on the street. Conflicts can be ignored, avoided, denied, feared, but they are inevitable. One thing remains - to learn to understand them. Knowing the nature of conflicts will tell you how to handle them, how to deal with them and do it with dignity.
What is conflict
Conflict is a clash of interests, ideas, values, opinions of different people and competition for the satisfaction of their needs. The associations that bear the word "conflict" are colored in shades of negative: it is aggression, quarrel, showdown, impotence, stress, anger. But, like every medal, the conflict situation has two sides: dark and light. The bright side is the ability to benefit from and experience from an uncomfortable situation.
In a conflict situation, energy is exchanged, therefore at least two are needed for it. As long as a dispute or clash occurs in the "neutral zone", no conflict arises. As soon as the phrases “YOU misunderstand me”, “YOU are wrong”, “YOU did wrong”, conflict boundary shifts to the side of the less experienced opponent. The attacker shows aggression, the second is justified or trying to get away from an unpleasant situation.
A life without conflict is an illusion.. Even those people who call themselves conflict-free constantly get into unpleasant situations, but prefer to keep silent, leave, stop a quarrel with nervous laughter, direct aggression towards themselves. Therapists, who deal with the conflict in psychology in practice, say: behavior in difficult situations is inherent in us from childhood. To get out of conflict situations without losing self-esteem, you can develop your own tactics of behavior. But first - to understand their classification.
Conflict examples
The topic of conflicts and their resolution excites not only practicing psychologists. Diplomats, academics, government officials, and businessmen are concerned about this at various levels. The science of conflictology clarifies questions: what is a conflict, how does it arise and how can it be resolved at different levels. Their positive and negative sides of influence, the role of an individual and a group of individuals, its connection with common and personal values, social result, type of resolution, significance are considered.
Conflicts in Psychology - This is an endless field for research. Some psychologists practice counseling on one of the conflicts. On the one hand, such situations are unique, on the other - typical. Let's go through the most popular examples:
- By the number of parties there are intrapersonal and interpersonal conflicts.
- Interpersonal conflicts, in turn, are divided into categories according to areas of life: family (love or child-parent), work, household.
- Work conflicts are divided into horizontal (in which people participate, equal in position), vertical (in which leaders and subordinates participate), mixed.
Conflicts in the "pure" form are extremely rare. As a rule, internal conflicts provoke family, workers are transferred to the child-parent.
Internal conflict
The concept of internal conflict does not contradict the statement that for a given situation there should be at least two parties. Simply, these two fit in one head and literally tear apart the consciousness of the struggle of desires and interests, imposed and the true "I". For plotting plot writers often use internal conflicts, examples with a description can be found in the works of Dostoevsky, Leo Tolstoy, Chekhov, Gogol.
Internal conflicts pursue people and the most banal, domestic situations. To lie on the couch or get ready for a jog, a desire to be polite or to answer rudeness to rudeness - all this forces the inner voices to argue, accept, persuade.
Family conflicts
Family conflicts between spouses do not necessarily lead to divorce. The unproductive form of conflict leads to a rupture - silent or passive. The conflict does not evaporate anywhere, accumulates, matures over the years, poisons the lives of husband and wife, children and others. Why is this happening? Because there is a perception that happy families do not quarrel. The opinion is popular, but, alas, erroneous. It is possible and necessary to quarrel, just for this purpose it is not necessary to throw plates or to cut clothes on rags.
An example of a conflict that sooner or later leads to an "explosion" - this is silent jealousy. When one spouse is jealous, he is silent for weeks, forcing the other to suffer in obscurity. People who are accustomed to moral violence in the family endure such a psychological discofmort, but their patience will ever end.
Family conflicts between children and parents can be a continuation of the conflict between spouses, when parents try to win a child to their side, manipulate relationships. Child-parent conflict can have a completely separate history and last even when children grow up and live separately. In psychology, such a conflict is called "uncut umbilical cord".
In the literature, parent-child conflict, an example of complex relationships, and family tragedy are included in the plot by all writers. And it is not surprising, because this topic is so heavy that it makes adults cry.
Work conflicts
Work conflicts are a necessary evil. Local confrontation in the workplace is a common situation, which is often resolved quite correctly. But in any team there is an alarmist who manages to pump up any work situation at the peak of emotions. In the future, the confrontation is exacerbated by the personal enmity involved in it. Then the work conflict moves into the plane of dirty scandals, gossip, a banal showdown, revenge, humiliation. New employees are gradually drawn into such conflicts, and if the situation is left to chance, the maintenance, image, and income of the company suffer. In such a situation, the role of the peacemaker leader comes to the fore.
Example of a working conflict - unclearly written official instructions. In such cases, any difficult work, additional task or work outside the office hours is outraged: "it is not my responsibility", "why me?", "Look, a colleague works much less, assign work to him."
When a leader is involved in a conflict, the situation from the “horizontal” develops into a “vertical” one. It doesn’t matter if there are disagreements over work issues or because of a discrepancy between the characters, the subordinate in any case is having a hard time. After all, the head is endowed with additional power. If the employee values his place, he is forced to find ways to get out of the conflict with "little blood".
Domestic conflicts
Most recently, domestic conflicts were considered an integral part of life in communal apartments. On the study of the lives of different people in the same apartment, even defended doctoral dissertations. Today, examples of domestic conflicts collect millions of views on YouTube: these are scandals on the roads, at playgrounds, in stores, and in transport.
What gives the definition of conflict to the ordinary person?
First of all - understanding that not every collision leads to an unpleasant situation. It is necessary to distinguish constructive criticism, feedback and a sincere desire to help from provocation.
Secondly - Awareness of who is simply conflicted people who are called quarrelsome in everyday life. They feed on the energy of quarrels and are constantly looking for victims.
Thirdly - that the classification of conflicts is not as important as the ability to get out of them. For this there is a compromise, cooperation, conversation, psychotherapy.
Fourth - so that a person does not survive in childhood, it is possible to master the difficult science of conflict resolution at any age. Even if there is a panic fear of conflict situations.
Fifth - the way out of the conflict is also a creative act. The art of resolving conflicts and deriving benefit from it is a sign of maturity and wisdom.
Conflict is a part of communication and our daily life. On the one hand, these situations are unique, on the other - completely solvable. Emotions can seethe very much, especially if a person has not been taught to cope with such situations since childhood. But do not consider yourself to be victims or aggressors. Still, it is better to use conflict for one — a lesson that life presents to us. After all, it is precisely for this that conflicts exist.
