Dialog across difference #23: Emotional power in conflict

According to Harvard scholars Douglas Stone, Bruce Patton, and Sheila Heen (2023), "While few people are good at detecting factual lies, most of us can determine when someone is distorting, manufacturing, or withholding an emotion" (p. 111).

However, if that emotion is not explained, all too often it leads to defensiveness, irritation, or other unhelpful emotional responses. 

Many decades ago, as a young white man, I married a black woman. Literally from that moment forth, for more than half a century, I have been absolutely obligated to respond to every occasion when racial language was used, most often when there are only white people in the room, and most often in those cases, when only white men were in the room. 

While I began that journey with zero training in communication or conflict management (aside from what we all get from our families), I tried every possible response I could think of except for violence (although in the 1960s, yes, I idiotically threatened violence more than once). I finally found two responses that worked for me every single time. 

One, a variant of, "While you have a First Amendment right to use language like that, I want you to understand that when you do, it hurts my heart."

Two, some permutation of, "You're a better person than that." 

In both cases, my body language or my visible facial expressions may have suggested I now regard them as no more worthy than the lowest pond scum, my language that accompanied my emotional response, rather than striking at their power, gave them even more power. 

Literally, for 55 years, that person who utterly filthy racist language in my presence never did again. I didn't argue with them that they had no choice, instead I ceded all the choice to them. I didn't call them grotesque excuses for human beings, I let them know I could see a better version of them and wanted to see more of that better version.

Emotions are power, but they can take power away from the one wielding them, or they can give power to the one who wields them wisely. They can transmogrify a conflict (make it destructive) or transform a conflict (make it constructive and productive).

Stone, Douglas; Patton, Bruce; Heen, Sheila (2023). Difficult conversations: How to discuss what matters most, 3rd ed. New York, NY: Penguin.