Emotional Intelligence for Conflict Management & Resolution

If you think of your life as a DIY project, your identity houses your priorities or values, your needs, your core beliefs, and the rules you follow, among other building blocks. These building blocks, along with your building style, influence every choice and decision you make in life. Over time, these small decisions add up to a satisfying and well-lived life...or not. Building your project unafraid of obstacles you will encounter – seeing conflict as healthy – will free you to make choices that honor your genuine desires and hopes.

How you handle conflict influences your construction decisions as you are building your house - your identity. It defines which building blocks you choose to use (or let go) and how you fit them together. If you avoid conflict at all costs, it’s likely that you won’t even consider building blocks that lie outside of materials prescribed by family, culture, or experience. If you do happen to get ahold of materials outside of that box, how you fit those elements into your project will be very different depending on how you show up in the face of conflict.

How well is your house working for you? You are here likely because you feel stuck or dissatisfied with some or all of life and you want to figure out how to make life work for you. You want to feel alive, fulfilled, or peaceful, rather than frustrated, stressed, or disappointed.

The good news is that it's absolutely possible, and it's much simpler than it likely feels at this moment.

This course is part of a larger module that walks you through a tested step-by-test process that empowers you to make life work for you.

After having completed this course you will understand your conflict style, how those patterns developed, and consciously choose a conflict style that serves you!

There are five different styles of conflict management. In this lecture you learn about the different styles and understand which one creates outcomes that meets the needs of all parties. This sets a foundational understanding for the work you do in the next session.

In this section, you examine the conflict styles that your family and those most influential in your early life used. Understanding these will help you recognize why you react as you do to conflict. At the end of this section, you will understand if the style of conflict management you inherited leads you to make choices in honor of what is really important to you or if you are making decisions as a reaction to conflict. This awareness sets you up to be able to choose differently if your choices do not reflect your true priorities.

Now you should be able to see some of the conflict styles that were used in your childhood and how they influenced how you handle conflict now. In this section you will link that childhood conditioning to your current patterns to understand how your need to avoid conflict or your need to be right in a dispute are reactions to conflict not core needs. At the end of the accompanying exercises, you will be able to see where you are using the patterns you adopted early in your life now and how you may be making fear-based decisions in response to the conflict, rather than decisions that honor what you really need or want.

In this section, you reflect on whether your conflict management style helps you make life work for you or whether it is costing you the life you want. The prompts in the exercise walk you through a process to decide which style empowers you to make conscious decisions that reflect what you truly want and need.  At the end of this section, you will know exactly why you react to conflict as you do. Using specific examples, you will identify what collaborative conflict looks like in those situations and commit to making choices that respond to your needs, rather than the conflict.