Thoughts on conflict

 I wasn't sure what I would take home from this weekend's conflict resolution workshop. When I signed up for it, I was viewing it as an opportunity to see one of my favorite Aikido instructors in a professional coaching role. I was thinking about helping people resolve conflict in a professional setting. 

That's sometimes part of my job, especially when there is a lot of change management in an organization. When I tried to think of conflict in my personal life and in my relationship, I kept coming up empty handed. It's pretty rare for me and Satu to fight about anything, and I feel like the communication we do have is always healthy and respectful. Reflecting on this weekend's workshop though, I think it's the things we don't talk about that weigh on us. 

I am a different person at work than at home.  I am used to working with mostly men, and I feel like disagreements are expected, if for no other reason than to reach considered decisions. What I have been thinking about though is how I have a really fragile sense of self in the context of relationship conflict. I worry about being a disappointment and always fear that I will learn that I am letting Satu down. I think it causes us both to avoid what would otherwise be very healthy conversations. When I hear negative things from her, I immediately go inside myself and start picking away at all the ways I am not good enough or I have let her down. I don't know why I am so quick to believe that I'm not worthy. 

That reaction is protective, but it's selfish and near sighted. I'm not able to listen correctly and consider her point of view when I am busy focusing on my failure. I don't know how to regain my integrity and make the conversation productive. It causes Satu to swallow all those negative conversations and her feelings go unacknowledged. The conversations I need to make room for get buried too because I am afraid to learn that she is disappointed in me or that she doesn't want me anymore. 

Even when she does such sweet things to show me her love and that she sees me.  

Satu, 

I'm not sure how to talk about that thing I said that one time when I reacted out of some spontaneous frustration. I am worried that you stopped loving me and I can never be good enough for you again. I feel like I spilled ink on your trust. How can I stand up straight again and deserve to hold you? I don't even remember why I was in my head then, or what that felt like. I definitely don't want to have that conversation because I know you will remember how you felt. 

I am afraid of what you think of me and how you feel about me. It's eating me up sometimes when I should be thinking about you. 

I want to be a person that can feel loved and imperfect at the same time, but I only think about my own failure when we have those uncomfortable conversations. 

I'm sorry I packed up so much stuff and moved so much stuff around. I needed to talk to you about how I was feeling in that downstairs space. I wanted to see change and do something to help me feel like I was moving forward from this past year. Doing something makes me feel like I am helping, even though I knew I should give way to how you needed to process your own feelings. 

I am sorry that I crush myself down when I should be giving you sturdy shoulders and space for your own feelings. I'm not sure how to do better. One thing I want to try though is to make time for a reset during those conversations. I need to come out of myself and make more space for you in those conversations. You have chosen me every day for the last fifteen years, I know I can trust that. I will try to lean more of my weight on that knowledge and not let the fear of losing you break my structure. 

I learned this weekend that I have to do better. Please help me be the person that you want to talk to and choose for the next 15 years and the 15 after that and possibly into our next lives. I am not a strong person, but I want to do better for you.