Non Violent Communication

This week we are learning about nonviolent communication. As I thought about my week, I realized I am experiencing a very unusual conflict in my personal life. I must admit, I was perfectly content with severing ties with this person simply because I feel as if I have been struggling to have a meaningful relationship for many years. I have tried many strategies, to no avail. So, I had finally resolved to just severing ties. Realistically, this would certainly be one to the hardest things to do because this person is my mother. Yes, my mother. For so many years I have been in conflict with my mother concerning how she enables my older brother. I personally believe it to be a generational habit that has been passed on through our family. For some strange reason, the women in my family have enabled the men in my family. They deemed it necessary to take care of them well into their adult lives which, has made it impossible for the men to take the role as the head of a household. Therefore, there are men in my family who are well into their forties and fifties who have never been married and although they have moved in with several women, have quickly moved back in with their mothers simply because they did not want the responsibilities. I find this to be very unfair to the health and well being of my mother because of the stress that she is constantly under as well as the stress it puts my sister and I under due to the fact that she wants us to “understand” why she continues to bail him out even to detriment of herself.

I honestly thought I just needed to give up on ever having a “normal” relationship with her until this week. “It is important that we do something because whether we like it or not, conflicts demand our energy. In fact, an unresolved conflict can call on tremendous amounts of our attention. We all know how exhausting an unresolved conflict can be. It is not always easy to fix the problem but a great energy boost can come when we do (Conflict Resolution Network, n.d.).” I decided to resolve the conflict by calling and talking with my mother after five months. I decided to use these two strategies:

1. Win/Win which states: “I want to win and I want you to win too (Conflict Resolution Network, n.d.).” I decided to take this approach and in the end, we both felt so much better about the decisions we made to make life much better for ourselves.

2. Go back to needs states: “The most important win/win maneuver you can make is to change course by beginning to discuss underlying needs, rather than only looking at solutions (Conflict Resolution Network, n.d.).” I understand that my children want and need their grandmother in their lives. I also realize that I want and need to have a relationship with my mother. Her feelings were mutual and she realized that she needed to allow my brother to stand on his own two feet so that she will have the time and energy to do exactly what she should be doing at this phase of her life which is enjoying herself and her grandchildren.

I am so thankful for this course and I am excited about the start of a new journey in our lives.


Reference:
Conflict Resolution Network. (n.d.). CR kit. Retrieved from http://www.crnhq.org/pages.php?pID=12#skill_3