Anyone who read yesterday's post will understand why this made me giggle.
I genuinely appreciated every comment and bit of advice from yesterday! Thank you.
Today we are talking about conflict resolution. You know the joy of having a little 'situation' with someone that needs to be talked out and worked through.
Lovely.
Many of us want with all our might to avoid conflict. I love how many of you honestly admitted that. I completely understand.
Conflict is messy, emotional, raw, and frustrating.
We think we're right and can't for the life of us understand why this other person doesn't see that! But then there's this thread of caution tugging at our heart reminding us there's always two sides to every story. Always.
Bummer.
Recently, the Lord taught me a powerful lesson about conflict.
Last week, I had a meeting with my staff at the Proverbs office. I don't often go into the office because with traveling to speak on the weekends, it's better for me to work from home during the week. Anyhow, I walked in and saw my staff had made a wise choice to make better use of my office by letting others use it.
We talked about this in the past but something about seeing it in person made me pause and feel sad.
The rational part of my brain could see that this was good.
The emotional part of my heart struggled.
When I went home that day, I had a choice to make. I could get all caught up in the emotion and make this a much bigger deal than it needed to be or I could sit with Jesus and ask for a better perspective.
Often I've chosen the emotional route. And honey let me tell you, that's an exhausting road for sure. As I female I've traveled and will travel this road again. It's part of my DNA and my PMS. But for this situation some rare rationality was tugging me to just sit with Jesus and seek wisdom.
As I sat, the Lord whispered into my heart a question, 'What do you really want?'
'I want to pout and explain my feelings and pout some more.'
But that wasn't really true. That's how I felt but that's not what I wanted. There's a big difference between those two. Identifying that difference would lead to a solution. And in the end, a good solution should always be the goal when tackling conflict.
Feelings should be indicators not dictators. They can indicate there are some emotions to process but not dictate how we act and react in a situation.
I wanted an office at home. A real office. Not a kitchen table with piles of stuff here and there. But an organized space to call my own.
Seeing that clearly helped me cut through the emotion and focus on a solution. I called my office manager and told her I was thinking of setting up an office in my house. She was incredibly supportive and told me when I was ready I could either have my furniture from the Proverbs office or the ministry would help me purchase some.
No tangled feelings. No big issue. Just a great solution where everyone is happy.
Now, I realize this is a small situation compared to many others we'll face. But I think there's something to this process of thinking past the emotion and identifying what we really want.
At least if we know what we're after, we won't get lost in a tidy pool of feelings along the way.
What do you think?
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