Interpersonal Conflict and Stress Management

I have always believed that there is a lot to be learnt about ourselves by interacting with others, facing difficult situations and analyzing our reaction to those situations. The past semester has been a difficult time for me and as a result, I have come to introspect about my behavior and drawn a few conclusions. I have also figured out what avenues of my personality need to be worked on and improved upon.

Alex, Megan, and Mary are three of my closest friends in university. Megan and I are also roommates. The first instance of things going downhill during the semester was when I fought with Mary. This happened during the Chinese New year break when Megan, Alex, Mary and I met in a park at night to spend some time together. I was very tired and stressed out that night due to academics but since social support is a buffer to stress, I decided to spend time with my friends. During a conversation, Mary accused me of being lazy and whiny and told me that I was being very unreasonable. I became angry and denied her claims. When the argument escalated, I just walked away. This incident bothered me for days and significantly deteriorated my relationship with Mary. In hindsight, the fight had occurred because two different ego states were involved in parallel. Mary was the parent (superego) since she judged and criticized me, while, I was the child (id) since I rebelled and walked away. We both believed we did nothing wrong.

There was another change in the group dynamics around the same time. I came to know that Megan had revealed to Alex that she liked him romantically. Alex too, had some feelings for Megan and they had been discussing a potential relationship. I was the only one kept in the dark about the whole situation for a month. Soon, Alex started spending all his time with Megan. In addition, I came to know that Alex and Mary would often meet up and never invite me to join them. This made me feel as if all my friends were abandoning me. In the midst of this scenario, Alex mentioned that my self-disclosure was quite low and that he always felt as if I was hiding things about myself. After worrying about whether I was a good friend or not, I interpreted that he was comparing me to Megan who is a more open and trusting person. I blamed Megan for changing my equation with Alex. Essentially, there is a progression from an event to its interpretation to an associated emotion, i.e. anger in this case.

In light of the said events, I realized that I was lacking empathy as I was only considering my feelings without thinking about Megan. It must have been extremely difficult for her to deal with the changes regarding how she feels about Alex. I could see that she was confused about beginning a relationship since she was not sure if it would last long term. But I chalked it up to indecisiveness and thought she was torturing my best friend. I was ignoring her perspective, wherein she was trying to prevent long-term damage by not rushing into a relationship. Making false judgements and thinking only in terms of logic was wrong on my part since I was not putting myself in Megan’s shoes. I was constantly trying to provide a solution to the problem when all Megan needed was for me to listen. Ben-Shahar (2011) says that offering solutions often creates a distance between two people as the person proving the solution might seem judgmental and condescending. As Beebe (2011) suggests, we have to shift from egocentric communication to other-oriented communication in order to have healthy and empathetic relationships.

Meanwhile the confrontation with Mary was causing me distress. The stress was because of conflict due to two incompatible methods of self-expression. The conflict here can be classified as an avoidance-approach conflict as there were two ways to deal with the unresolved fight with Mary, each with its own merits and demerits. Firstly, I could talk to Mary and sort out the matter. The merit of this method is that I would have knowledge of where I stand with her. The demerit could be that we have another fight and never talk again. Secondly, I could avoid the issue. In that case, our relationship would always be slightly strained but at least it would not end completely. Another factor that was giving me stress was the sudden change in our group dynamic. I was receiving less attention from Alex, not talking to Mary, and my roommate was sharing her every interaction with Alex. While the others had some time to get used to the situation at hand, I was pushed into it after a month of not knowing anything.

I did not confront Mary again to solve our unresolved fight. I was desperately trying to avoid further changes. Thus, not dealing with the conflict was my defense mechanism against the stress caused due to change. It can be observed here that I use the withdrawal strategy to deal with conflict by giving up my personal goal of eliminating stress and letting the relationship suffer at the same time (Salami, 2010). But during that period, I thought I was preserving my relationship by not confronting Mary again. After some reflection, I noticed a pattern, which suggests that I usually take an avoidance method for conflict resolution.

My discomfort with confrontations and conflicts could be linked to the fear of abandonment. Somewhere I feel that if I fight with people I am close to, they will leave me for a nicer person. This feeling might have stemmed from my childhood when I had no inhibitions about conflicts and often expressed my opinions plainly. I was part of a trio where I felt like I was the less important member as compared to the other two girls, who would leave me out as soon as I disagreed with something. It felt as if the same thing was happening in university as soon as I engaged in my first fight. Since our personality development takes place through interaction with others, it is not surprising that conflict-avoidance has become a part of my personality.

The third incident that triggered self-introspection was when Alex said that I had low self-disclosure. I was quite bothered by his comment. This could be evidence to the collectivist nature of Indians, which is similar to that of Chinese individuals (Yang, 1995). Even though I am not a very empathetic person, I am other oriented because I care about people’s opinion of me to avoid ridicule and rejection. This is apparent from the action I took after I realized that the comment was eating me up. I immediately messaged a few other close friends and asked them what they thought about his claims. Since they agreed to Alex’s statement by referencing to incidents in the past, I decided to accept their feedback. When I completed the Johari Window questionnaire during the class, the results coincided with the feedback. I had hidden dominant characteristic. I can relate to John Powell, who said “I’m afraid to tell you who I am, because, if I tell you who I am, you may not like who I am, and it’s all that I have”.

Using cognitive behavior therapy, I can infer that I need to work on shifting from the 3Ms to the 3Ps. I was magnifying the magnitude of the change in equation with Alex and Mary, minimizing by focusing only on my emotions, and making up conclusions regarding Alex’s comment regarding self-disclosure. The three Ps can be applied by permitting myself to accept my emotions rather than avoiding them, focusing on the positive things in a situation, and shifting my perspective to become empathetic. Also, according to Pastor Bobby Schuller, focusing on the bad things hinders us from having a happy and fulfilled life. I have come to realize after taking the course that my avoidant behavior can be ultimately destructive. Thus, I should discuss the fight with Mary and adopt the ‘adult’ state of ego during the discussion. This will avoid further fights and we will be able to have a comprehensive discussion and deal with the conflict using the negotiating strategy. Regarding my issue with self-disclosure, I feel I will become more trusting if I improve my self-esteem and avoid comparison, therefore resulting in a more positive self-concept. I concur with Pastor Bobby Schuller that pressures and stresses build character. It allows us to see things more clearly.

Works Cited

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