When we are at War with someone, whether at work or in our personal lives, it is very easy (and very common) to assume that all the unreasonable behaviour comes from them and we are the innocent victims of their irritating ways. As we encounter the other person and their mannerisms again and again, we create mental threads of the things they do and say that wind us up, and we weave stories and assumptions around these until we have made something quite substantial. However, this ‘thing’ that we create is more of our making than the other person’s and affects the way that we behave when around them, often making the problem worse.
On the War to Peace workshop, we explore the Spiral of Disempowerment™ (you can download it here) which illustrates this pattern well. Person A acts or speaks in a certain way, which is then perceived by Person B as being annoying or rude, Person B then acts or speaks to Person A differently, causing Person B to perceive Person A in a negative light, affecting their thoughts and behaviour… and so it goes on in a downward spiral of disempowerment and discontentment.
The good news is that cycles like these can be broken. In this case, the very first step is to recognise the pattern and to own your own part in it too. It may well be that John from the marketing department has a way of winding you up quickly and efficiently, and your colleagues may agree that he is ridiculously annoying, but you will also have fallen into a pattern every time you encounter John. You anticipate his behaviour and when he starts, you heap your feelings and assumptions onto the already large pile that you have built up around John’s actions. It could be that he only has to breathe the ‘wrong way’ to start you off.
But take John’s actions today – this morning, by the coffee machine – in isolation. Maybe he spoke a little loudly and spilled the milk, but if he had been a total stranger, would you have felt that tight, familiar knot of irritation so quickly in the pit of your stomach? Would you have cut off his conversation as swiftly as you did today?
Or what if you found out that John has an anxiety disorder and acts the way he does to compensate for his panicky feelings? Or that he’s misguidedly trying to impress you because in fact he is intimidated by you? If you can break down the ‘thing’ that you have created around John’s behaviour with your assumptions and shared history, you will be at Peace much faster.
One of the ways to achieve this is to ask yourself ‘what else could this mean?’ (the ‘this’ being the thing they say or do that bothers you). When we are at War with someone, we make the meaning very personal to us, we believe they are doing it deliberately to annoy us and we have tons of evidence to prove ourselves right. The question is – would you rather stay being ‘right’ and harbouring all this malaise or would you rather take your power back and be in control of how you are feeling and behaving around this person?
Another way is to imagine that a person you really like did the thing that this person does that bothers you so much. Consider how you would handle them. Oftentimes we find that we apply very different rules to different people – it would be okay if x did that thing but if y does it, we are all over them like a rash! Each time we challenge our own perceptions about someone’s behaviour and consider them through a new lens, we are weakening the hold this person has over us and this gives us the power to break the Spiral of Disempowerment™. You’ll be amazed at how much easier life will become when you break this cycle and are at Peace.
And when John spills the milk next time, the first reaction you will have is to reach for the cloth. Won’t that feel better?
Over to you
In what ways can you recognise your own role in the Spiral of Disempowerment™? What could you do to break the cycle?
Do you know someone who could benefit from War to Peace?
If you would benefit from breaking the cycle, our next open-access War to Peace workshop is on 17 October is full but you can add yourself to the wait list here. Alternatively, we are now taking bookings for our first public workshop of 2015. To book your place, click here.
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©Halcyon Global 2014
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