Psychotherapy and Counselling Articles

I recently binge-watched Queer Eye on Netflix. This show brings five gay men  who try to improve the lives and confidence of straight men by giving them makeovers and advice.  I think I cried while watching 80% of the episodes. I don’t think I’m seen so many straight men cry so openly on television.  These five men open their hearts and with fierce compassion help men who are often depressed or in a period of self-loathing shift and make big changes in a very short time-frame.

Why am I sharing this?  The show decides to visit men who often hit wounds in the lives of the fab five.  In Season 1 Episode Dega Don’t the men are told they will be helping a white, Trump loving policeman.  All of them are a little wary of this, but especially Karamo Brown, an African-American man whose son is afraid to get his driver’s license because of his fear of policemen.  The conversation between Karamo and the policeman is amazing to watch. I read a post about the show that Karamo and the policeman have become friends and watched the episode together over the phone when it originally aired. Fake news? Maybe, but after watching the episode that seemed believable.

We often tend to spend time with people who share a similar political and religious lens. We don’t often have a reality tv-show to put us in uncomfortable situations, but with the Holidays near people often spend more time with their families. Families are full of individuals with opposing beliefs.  We often try to shame another person into seeing our view point, or try to convince them with facts.  Guess what – neither of those will work.

Vaccines

I recently brought one of my sons to get some of his vaccinations. I have consistently declined the chicken-pox vaccine, but I was speaking to a resident who had a note to try to give me the facts to see if that would convince me.  We had an excellent conversation in which I told her that I have found myself in my life with professionals who are 100% in favour of vaccines and other professionals who are 100% against vaccines.  If I look at my family and my friend group, they have all made different choices as well.  I told her that I appreciated that it was her role to try and convince me to get the chicken pox vaccine, because she was medical doctor.  I also told her that I decided to give vaccines because I was more fearful of serious illnesses and I want my kids to be able to travel to different countries.  My decision about the chicken pox vaccine is not entirely rational, it’s more emotional and about my own feeling of stuckness. I told her that in my experience people make their decision about vaccines by what they fear more – serious illness or mistrust in the medical community.

My blue-sky fantasy is that there would be more dialogue between the medical profession and health practitioners such as naturopathic doctors and chiropractors who often oppose vaccines.  While realizing this unlikely to happen any time soon, it would be of great benefit to have these controversial conversations to build bridges and open dialogue about this difficult topic. I wonder whether this would help many of us make a more informed and less emotional decision about vaccines.

The rest of this article, I wrote a year ago about how to have civil conversations.  I give you some strategies you can start using now to help you build bridges with those you love or those you have to spend time with (e.g. colleagues or clients) who have opposing view points.

Civil Conversations

So – did you vote for Brexit?  What do you think of Trump?  Are you pro-life or pro-choice?  Vaccine or anti-vaccine?  Belief in a God or not at all?  What do you think of Trudeau or Doug Ford?

I don’t know about you, but it seems like there are multiple sources of emotionally charged topics that are causing conflict and rifts between friends and families.  Sometimes it feels like the safest thing to do is to find that group of people who share our views and stay in the safety of that bubble.

We can choose to do that to some degree, but if you want to spend time with friends & family who might not see the world from your perspective, that can make it much more challenging.

Common Strategies

• Avoid all conflictual topics

Try to pass the holidays without touching on hot topics.  Sometimes this is the easiest and best option – no judgment.

• Avoid all friends and family that disagree with your viewpoint
• Try to convince everyone of your viewpoint

Isn’t this the one you wish would work? I certainly do.  Often, we think that reason and logic are needed for persuasion.  Unfortunately, this is unlikely to work with hot topics.  Incredibly, research has shown that you can’t use reason alone with issues around morality (listen to the Jonathan Haidt podcast listed below to learn more). If you’re a family who loves a good argument or debate – carry on. But be curious if this is true for all parties involved and whether this debate brings you closer or further apart.

• Discuss conflictual topics with those you love in a less argumentative way

This is by far the most challenging option, but if you want to do this, find some courage, and read on.

1. Self-Reflection First

If you’ve read a few of my blogs, you might see this as a theme.  Whenever conflict arises, this is where we go first.

What are your sensitive areas? Where do your emotions get heated up?  What are your assumptions and biases about the “other side?” What is something you don’t “get” about the other side?

Next – Why do you want to connect more with your family, friends, or others?  How do your personal values give you reason to connect with people who have different opinions?  Is it to have more peace in a relationship, community, country, or world? If you don’t want to connect with people who think differently, why don’t you?

Example

Here is an example of applying this to politics.

I found it incredibly helpful to listen to the interview, “The Psychology of Self-Righteousness” with Social Psychologist Jonathan Haidt and Krista Tippett.  Jonathan Haidt explores reasons to be compassionate and potentially even grateful for those liberal or conservative minded people in your family.

Jonathan identifies as a strong liberal/democrat and talks about his journey from hating republicans or those with a conservative viewpoint to understanding their views, having compassion for them, and using some conservative morals in his own life.  He is a social psychologist and talks about how his research influenced his journey. He also talks about how reason will not work in debating issues of morality.

Some highlights:

• Liberal and Conservatives share two values Fairness and Compassion
• Conservatives also have the values of Loyalty, Authority, and Sanctity
• Liberals value diversity and variety more and Conservatives value structure and order more – both are important
• A country with only Liberal or Conservative values will fail – both are needed

2. Create a Safe Place to have The Conversation

No one likes to be ambushed.  Consider your environment. If you have a way to talk about the heated issue one-to-one, that is always best.  It is better to do it in a safe space where neither of you feel like you will be attacked, shamed or blamed.  Have one person who is pro-choice in a group of people who are pro-life? That’s not the place.  Have one person who voted from Trump in a group of people who voted for Hilary?  Maybe somewhere different.

But what about family dinners?  What if you’re in public and the conversation just happens?

Safety also comes with your intention and words

• Have you done your own self-reflection? Or do you have an agenda?
• Do you really want to hear the other person’s point of view or not? Be Honest.

If we’ve done our own self-reflection this can help us ground and stay centered during those surprise conversations.

3. Ask Curious Questions

Brené Brown’s new book, Braving The Wilderness is great for digging deeper into how to have those potentially divisive conversations with family.  She explores how to have deeper connecting conversations with those we’re struggling to get along with.  She also talks about how to address it when a person is overtly racist, sexist etc.

Want a little bit more detail on what this could look like?  Read Brené Brown’s interview with Dr. Michelle Buck in the chapter four “People are Hard to Hate Close Up. Move In.”

Brené recommends trying these 3 steps:

a) Really listen to hear what the multiple layers of reasons are for this person’s point of view. Is it a moral or a value that is leading them to have an opinion so different than yours?

b) If you start to get into a conversation about the past (who said and did what), try to shift it to the present or look to what the person wants for the future. What do they envision your country looking like for future generations?

c) When you want to make a counter argument, see if you can say, “Tell me more” instead.

It will take some groundwork for you before you can have a conversation about a topic that is very important to you.

• You can have these conversations with a wish to share your point of view, but you must be able to go into it without expecting that you will get to.
• Jonathan Haidt talks about how it can be helpful to start a conversation by complimenting a few things that the other side has gotten right in the past
• Or if that’s too hard, with a few things that your side has gotten wrong historically.

The Art of Asking Meaningful Questions

I remember earlier this year being introduced to Krista Tippett on the Tim Ferriss podcast.  Her own podcasts are often about connecting people across lines.  In the podcast Calming Philosophies for Chaotic Times, she talks about deeper questions that help us connect with one another and be less separate.

• “Answer this question through the story of your life” (apply to all heated topics e.g. voting for Hilary Clinton or Donald Trump”
• Give your opinions through your experience, not just to give an opinion

If you want to hear more, you can start listening at 1:22:42 during the podcast.

4. Set Boundaries Where Needed

Brené Brown also wrote the chapter about how to speak truth to bull-shit (BS).  She describes the nature of BS and how to approach to with others.  These tips are also good if you are the one being ambushed by others points of view.  Her main tips are:

• Approach it with generosity, by not assuming that the person is being malicious or acting out of hate. If you’re ambushed, you can approach with generosity by being calm and curious. Why do they want your opinion to change?
• Be civil by owning our “stuff” and having curious conversations. We can be civil while disagreeing or stating our boundaries.  Civil isn’t the same as “nice”.  Civil is firm and grounded.  Notice your body language – are you open or defensive?

Brené doesn’t encourage passivity when she speaks of being civil or being generous.  She talks of courage and disagreeing with grace.  I liked the quote she shared from Elie Wiesel, “We must always take sides. Neutrality helps the oppressor, never the victim.  Silence encourages the tormentor, never the tormented.”

Speaking truth to bullshit is very difficult when emotions are high.  The chapter is well-worth a read as she goes into more detail about how to approach this with people in our lives.

The Cheat Sheet

1. Self-reflection first
2. Create a safe space to connect with a person
3. Ask curious questions
4. Set boundaries where needed

A Funny Story

I will share that after writing all of this, I shared it with my husband.  We then proceeded to have an argument about something extremely stupid (whether or not to buy a black Friday deal) and not even in the realm of big issues.  Later, we couldn’t help but laugh at the irony. Those thoughts of, “If I can’t even do this with something trivial, how can I do this with bigger issues!” can be blocks to trying it with bigger issues.  Upon reflection, we jumped to step 4 without doing steps 1-3.

The Gift of Wisdom and Kindness this Holiday Season

It is a gift to be kind to others and also ourselves. Remember to be compassionate with yourself if you try and fail dramatically.  Be compassionate if you notice a time you could have tried to have a civil conversation and didn’t.  Find courage and then try it another time.

Emotions can get in the way of connecting in a difficult conversation.  Sometimes we can be ready to have a conversation and the other person is not.  Sometimes it’s the other way around. Start small by picking a topic that’s less heated and work your way to the more difficult topics. Finally, speak your opinions from your experiences:  “I experienced this, which is why I think this”.

Good luck and Happy Holidays!

Stay tuned – interested in how of all of this relates to energy healing and energy fields?  I’ll be writing more on this topic in a future blog.

This blog post was originally published on December 19, 2017. It has been updated with current content.