Living with a Posture of Courage and Care
We need to develop a posture of courage and care. We are in divisive times, so living with a posture of courage and care makes us counter cultural—and we need to be so. And we also need to be equipped to be able to initiate, and manage, productive conversations with those with whom we disagree. First of all listen to Mark’s Gospel, chapter 12:
28 One of the teachers of the law came and heard them debating. Noticing that Jesus had given them a good answer, he asked him, “Of all the commandments, which is the most important?” 29 “The most important one,” answered Jesus, “is this: ‘Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one. 30 Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.’ 31 The second is this: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ There is no commandment greater than these.” [Mark 12: 28-31]
Why did I start with this scripture? Because Jesus makes it clear that loving our neighbor is central to our calling as Christians. Let me put it a different way— when you are having a difficult conversation or a conflict with someone, you need to remind yourself that: IT IS NOT ABOUT YOU—It is about understanding them.
According to theologian Douglas Hall, being made in the image of God means that we are made for relationship. As philosopher Nel Noddings stated: We cannot be fully human if we are alone—we are drawn to the joy that comes from relational wholeness. It is a basic human need. The journey toward building strategies to maintain those relationships is a journey toward spiritual wholeness. It is a necessary piece of the Christian life. It is not optional. It first requires that we seek information—We need to know more, in order to form a more accurate picture of who our neighbor really is. We need to talk to them, to see their eyes and facial expressions, and to receive what they are feeling. Secondly, loving our neighbor involves clearing a space for conversation.
These conversations require us to learn to inhabit “Brave Spaces” in contrast to “Safe Spaces.” These Brave Spaces are where we have authentic engagement in the context of a learning environment (see: Brian Arao and Kristi Clemens. “From Safe Spaces to Brave Spaces” in The Art of Effective Facilitation, Stylus Publishing, 2013). And in order to inhabit Brave Spaces we must first learn to manage ourselves.
Few of us enjoy conflict— our tendency is to avoid it if we can. I am no different, so I have made it my mantra to say to myself: “Walk toward the Conflict.” But, as you walk toward a conflict, you need to be intentional about your own behavior:
Pause. Stop yourself from making assumptions about intentions when others make particular decisions
· Own the impact of your actions apart from what your intentions might have been—own the fact that often the impact of your actions is very different that your intentions.
· Keep asking yourself—what am I afraid of? What keeps me from challenging myself?
· Speak only for yourself, avoiding the tendency to hide behind phrases such as: “many people think…I know many people who believe…”
· Practice the courage of having direct conversations. How many of us have experienced families with three adult siblings where two are not speaking to each other so the third carries messages back and forth? Break this cycle.
Build communal rules such as these as you enter into intentional engagement across disagreements. And hold each other accountable to these rules. A strong team leader pulls their group back to rules and agreed-upon ways of operating again and again, and through doing so, seeks to build a resilient culture that exhibits integrity. I remember the day when one of my team sat in my office—bringing me a good cup of coffee, of course—and shared a reality with me. I didn’t want to hear it, yet I knew that I needed to choose to listen because that was our mutual commitment. Such communal rules build capacity to manage differences. Establishing and following agreed upon guidelines such as speaking only for yourself, can stop gossip and side conversations. This nurtures authentic engagement.
Along with managing yourself, walk toward conflict equipped with strategies for listening to your neighbor.
First, practice the art of finding and using neutral language. Think like a mediator. There is one perspective on an event. There is someone else’s perspective on the event. Work to find what is called “the third story”—a way of describing the event or situation that both sides would recognize as true. Similarly in mediation training, mediators are taught to listen to both sides of a dispute and come up with an agenda for the discussion that is neutral in its language but accurately describes the issues for both parties. Let me give you an example. Communication scholar Tarla Peterson worked on an environmental conflict in Cameron County, Texas in the late 1990s (See: Cameron County, TX: Border Culture, Complexity, and Growth: Sustaining Community through Bounded Conflict, “How Adversarial Relationships can Enrich Opportunities for Managing Environmental Conflict”).
The two side of the conflict included environmentalists who wanted to protect the Santa Ana Refuge and its species, and farmers who benefited from the land and its mild climate which allowed them to plant and harvest year-round requiring high levels of pesticide and herbicide applications. As is typical in these situations, data was questioned; sources of pollution were questioned; economic livelihood was a concern. Petersen’s strategy for bridging the divide involved engaging participants on both sides in a two-day environmental ethics workshop. The result was that:
Participants incorporated concepts into the explanations of their own, and others', perspectives that they could use to frame the disagreements more precisely with language that both sides could use as descriptive.
Opponents moved from seeing the other side as purely evil people, to seeing each other as thoughtful individuals with positions that differed
For example, environmentalists could be described as bio-centric rather than tree-huggers. Farmers could be described as anthropocentric rather than evil.
This approach encouraged calm, interactive reflection, rather than posturing and confrontation, leading to greater possibility of collaboration.
This workshop created a new language that helped individuals on both sides of the conflict describe the Third Story—a description of their differences that both sides would recognize.
So first, find the Third Story, and second, practice strategies that encourage active listening:
Reflect back what you think you heard before making a comment—we often rush to make our point before we first make sure we have heard what our neighbor is saying. Make sure you have understood.
Ask clarifying questions: When you find yourself moving into a defensive mode, stop and consciously focus on the other person and choose to be curious—ask them to help you understand what they mean…Be curious!
Own your own perspective and state it after clarifying their perspective, saying: “This is what I hear you saying. Is that correct? My perspective is different—this is my perspective.”
In summary:
Love your neighbor—remember it is not about you
Care for others through the process of entering Brave Space—walk toward conflict
When you enter those spaces, manage yourself—speak only for yourself, enhancing the possibility of authentic engagement
Go into these conversations looking for the 3rd story and equipped with strategies for listening
I have found a profound pair of questions used in the context of hospice settings. These two simple questions are: What is your greatest hope? What is your greatest fear? When you are at a loss for bridging a divide, try these two questions. These questions tend to remind everyone of our common humanity, with all of us acting out of our own individual hopes and fears. When we begin to understand a neighbor’s greatest hopes and fears, we begin to really know who that neighbor is—and what it might mean to sacrifice for their well-being.