Managing Conflict – Hollywood Style!

No less than Cecil B. DeMille or Martin Scorcese, you are in charge of the movie called “Your Life”.

Your parents were the original producers, but now you’re the boss. You are in charge of contract negotiations, script rewrites, casting, and directing.

Here are some techniques for resolving conflicts and disputes in real life.

SHOOTOUT AT THE OK CORRAL (emphasis on OK)

Bugsy Malone is a “gangster” movie in which all the characters are kids and the machine guns are loaded with marshmallows. If you and your partner or colleague really need a showdown, load your guns with marshmallows. And set these rules to protect the cast from injury:

Limit the scene. This is a discussion about one subject. Stick to that subject.
Know your line … a clear definition of the subject (what’s bothering you), how you feel about it, and what resolution you want. Dialogue: “Let me tell you what’s going on with me. I’m feeling/concerned about ___, and what I’d like is____ .”
This approach points your finger at you, not the other person, and so does not invite defensiveness and escalation.
Take five. If tempers are escalating, call a short Time Out. You are not abandoning each other, just taking a break to get control of your reactions and turn them into responses.
Respect the other player. Be kind. You probably cast each other because you liked each other.

HEAD ‘EM OFF AT THE PASS!

In old Westerns the sheriff cried, “This way, boys! We’ll head ‘em off at the pass!” The posse cut across, through or around, and sure enough, headed the bad guys off.

You can do the same thing with conflicts that aren’t necessary. Your early warning system tells you when your Bad Guys are gathering inside. You feel irritable, defensive, hair-triggered.

Anger, like some drugs, puts you into your lizard brain. Here are some ways you can stay with your higher power in cognition and character.

1. Know your cues.

We all have pet peeves or recurring situations that tend to put us over the edge. Maybe it’s getting dressed (you are not a morning person), or drive-time traffic. Be aware of your mood and stay prepared to respond instead of react.

2. Make those role transitions.

Find what works to move you from one role (job, work-out, whatever) to another (playful parent, loving spouse). Give yourself a chance to decompress between one pressure and the next.

Anger is like a tea kettle; when it’s about to boil, you need to turn down the heat and chill out.

Costume changes. For some people, just changing uniforms is enough gear-shifting. Off with the pin-strip. e or uniform, on with the shorts and sandals or the sweats. Off with the pantyhose, on with the jeans.
Background music. In movies you can tell by music cues when changes are about to occur. In real life, choose the music you know can help you set the mood you want.
Action! Change your activity, change your attitude. Exercise, swim, take a walk — they are all good strategies for blowing off steam.
Stuntperson. If you just aren’t up to the task, hand it off to your partner, with the understanding that you’ll be his or her stand-in when needed.

3. Stop action.

We’ve all seen the science fiction movie or drama in which all the characters are in freeze-frame except the hero, who can walk among them. It’s a stop-the-world moment. You can do that — just install an imaginary Pause Button in the palm of your hand. Press it when you feel irritation or defensiveness start to rise inside. You create a breathing space that lets you to choose your next behavior, not be at the mercy of an old script written by your seething or martyred Unconscious.

4. Breathe.

Take a few deep breaths and exhale slowly. Now count down from 10 to 1, telling yourself that with each descending number you are getting calmer and more relaxed.

5. Big Deal Scale.

On a scale of 1 to 10, how big a deal is a slight speed bump on the roadway of life? Which is more important, getting something else checked off your list, or taking a few minutes to play with your kids or your guitar? Go on, heat up a can of soup and spread a sandwich instead of making a Big Production Number.

6. Character motivation.

If you have a habit of being defensive, remind yourself that somebody’s remark or action probably was not about you personally. You may be the star of your show, but you aren’t the center of the universe.

7. Quiet on the set!

Sometimes your irritable mood just won’t go away, in which case you should (a) tell your loved ones it’s not about them, and (b) give them fair warning to give you some space. Remember the Bette Davis line in All About Eve, “Fasten your seatbelts, kids, it’s gonna be a bumpy ride.”

Follow these Hollywood rules and you’ll find yourself engaging in less conflict, and when you DO engage, it will be swift and less painful than your old way.

1dae990b21ade2e1925edb8c02c558cd

TOOTHPASTE WORMS

Or, What did I inherit along the way that makes me special?
(or, what might I still be doing that doesn’t work for me, and that I have the power to change right now?)

Are you still doing stuff that’s been obsolete for years, but it’s bone-deep in your Unconscious? I don’t mean just prewashing the dishes before you load them into the dishwasher, I mean really weird stuff you learned in your family. It’s hard to give up, because it’s so automatic you probably don’t question it.

My grandmother, Fairy, used to tell the story (which she probably stole from the Reader’s Digest) about how when she was a young wife she always used to cut her roasts in two and put the larger portion in one pan and the smaller in another. She had always done it that way. When someone finally asked her why, she said it was because her mother had. Finally she asked her mother why, and the old lady said, “Well, honey, I don’t know why you do it, but I didn’t have a pan big enough for a whole roast.”

Fairy’s version was greatly expanded, but then she always used to say, “Honey, any story worth telling is worth putting a top hat and cane on.”

I was seventeen before I found out that not all people put toothpaste on their thumbs.

We had four family members and one bathroom. Also one tube of toothpaste. If we all scraped our brushes against the same toothpaste tube, weren’t we spreading germs? Of course! So mother taught us to squeeze out a little worm of Colgate onto the first joint of our left thumb, apparently reasoning that germs are not easily transmitted via thumb backs. (Never mind that the backs of our thumbs might be germy too. You’ve got to draw the line somewhere.) We would then pick up the little toothpaste worm by the bristles of the brush and brush our teeth.

This is an actual historical fact, which my sister will attest to.

I spent my entire childhood and adolescence putting toothpaste on my thumb, then picking it up with the toothbrush, and then brushing my teeth.

Fast forward to my first day at college. Big communal bathroom in a girls’ dorm, rows of sinks, rows of toothbrushing girls. I am humming away, doing my toothpaste-on-thumb ritual, when I realize that the girl at the next sink is staring at me in the mirror, her arm frozen halfway to her mouth.

“What are you doing?” Silly question. “I’m brushing my teeth.”

“But why did you put the toothpaste on your thumb?”

Dead silence. Moment of truth. No answer. (Doesn’t everyone?)

(Because I’m weird, honey, and I come from weird people. I’m the only one who uses this tube of toothpaste, but this is how you do it.)

What weird habits do you have from childhood? What bizarre family behavior has become automatic with you? Send them to me, and I’ll publish the most outlandish in my newsletter, with or without your name, as you wish. We eccentrics have to stick together.

Eccentricity loves company!

55a6a6cc5bda0d48ffd8d1eabc6eb028

Moving, Mending and Maximizing

When we were all just starting out, I had a friend who moved every year from one wonderful huge old flat to another in an artistic, shabby-but-genteel part of town. High ceilings, space heaters, antiquated kitchens, tiny bathrooms, two closets, infinite charm.

She did two things I remember with admiration.

(1) She had a wonderfully eclectic art collection, all cheap and all amazing. She never hung the painting, collage, prints in the same way twice. What was featured over the fireplace in the former apartment now graced the bathroom, etc. What had been a dresser in the last place became a dining room sideboard in the new one. Or the dining room became a cozy library.

(2) After we friends had carried in the last box, she would unpack her grandmother’s cast iron skillet. It was well-seasoned over three generations. Marsha would fry up bacon, then onions in the bacon grease. (We had never heard of cholesterol, and bacon and onions was a Southern staple.)

When the bacon-and-onion aroma had permeated the whole apartment, she had claimed her new home. It was her sacred space till next year when she was ready for a fresh experience.

To those of us who were stuck in situational stability, her adventuring was a revelation. We didn’t yet realize that periodically moving to new digs and redecorating or rearranging your life was a way of life, an attitude, not necessarily requiring packing up actual boxes.

Where would you like to move, metaphorically, today?

b6379e322823bf6b521629250566313e

Celebrate your personal style

I’m one of those people with a short attention span. I used to think it was shallow or restless of me to fly from blossom to blossom like a butterfly, until I remembered that such a judgment came from others, long ago. Variety is simply what I most enjoy, so that’s what I’ve built into my life.

Right now I’m completing an ebook. I’m also coaching, doing seminars, keeping a private counseling practice, traveling more than ever before in a single year, and enjoying Hammock Mode when I feel like it. I never get a chance to burn out on anything.

But that’s just my personal style.

What makes your life hummm? Focusing on a passion and following it to its joyous payoff? The deep satisfaction of completing one journey to its conclusion before starting another?

Or, like me, purposefully moving back and forth between projects, sticking with each till the flavor fades, then giving it time to rejuice itself while you work on another?

Whatever your style is, it’s YOURS and it works for you. If there are some ways in which you need help to prevent old habits from sabotaging you, get a little behavioral help, but protect your innate style and talents. They are part of your very essence.

!*!*!*!*!*!*!*!*!*!*!*!*!*!*!*!*!*!*!*!*!*!*!*!*!*!*!*!*!*!*!*!*!*

bae30e9bfe2c5fa4ebdd039098c54add

CELEBRATE!

Happy 2010! What a challenging decade we’ve just been through! As a friend wrote, “Happiness is the 00s in the rear-view mirror.” So, welcome to the shiny new-and-improved decade.

[Do you say two-thousand-&-ten or twenty-ten? I say twenty-ten because I used to say nineteen-eighty, etc., but I think I'm in the minority. If you vote strongly for either one, drop me a note at roz@coachroz.com and tell me your rationale. I'm open, either way.]

Why am I late in sending this New Year’s greeting? No excuse. Just lazing through the holidays and waiting for inspiration. It came this week in the form of an obituary about a woman I never heard of but would like to hold as a role model for living life out loud. I’m changing only her name.

“On January 4, 2010, at the age of 65, (Dottie Jackson Morrow) passed away. One who did not know Dottie might say she was laid to rest, but such a person would be wrong. Dottie did not rest in her earthly life, and there is no reason to believe that she has started now. … Rarely was Dottie not in the presence of friends, all of whom she considered family. She would meet random people in unlikely places, and she would nurture relationships that would last. If she liked you, she loved you, and she treated all her friends as best friends. … Dottie embraced life with a passion unattainable by most, and she did more living in her 65 years than most could do in 100.”

There was also a sentence about how she met and married her soul mate, but that’s not essential for living with gusto — it’s just a gorgeous added-value.

I was particularly intrigued that she would “meet people in unlikely places” and nurture relationships that would last. That is a delightful adventure, and it was very affirming to have it validated. At one of my birthday parties, friend David said, “Roz was with Robert at a concert, and she leaned over at intermission and said, ‘What’s a good-looking guy like you doing here alone?’ — and that’s how she picked me up. Is there anybody else here that Roz picked up?” And lots of hands went up. I was both embarrassed and tickled. I hadn’t realized how often I do that, just strike up a conversation with a stranger who can become a friend.

Think about it. How else, really, do we make friends? I mean, they are all strangers when we first meet, so unless a mutual friend introduces us, it’s kind of up to us to start the connection. What’s to lose? They weren’t our friend before we met, and worse-case scenario, they won’t be afterward. Of course, I’m assuming safe environment and prudent behavior.

Here’s what “Dottie’s” obit reminded me of. Decades ago, when I was in corporate America instead of a counseling practice, I would become close friends with another employee. We might lunch together a couple of times a week, maybe see a movie, certainly support each other when we were sure we could run the company better than its leaders. (Lord, I was SO young.) When one of us moved on, we swore we’d continue to see each other often, but we didn’t. And now I can’t even remember their names.

For years I’ve considered that a natural occurrence, that the trajectories of our lives just parted — but maybe if I’d nurtured those friendships the way Dottie did, I’d be richer in friendships than I am.

So in addition to the ritual I’m-gonna-lose-20-pounds resolution, this year I intend to stay better in touch with friends I seldom see but dearly treasure. I thank “Dottie” for reminding me, even from beyond her life, how sweet such relationships are.

Meantime, I can revel in the memory that I introduced David to one of my best girlfriends, and they’ve just celebrated their 26th anniversary. I’m so glad I picked him up, and I intend never to set him down. Now I want to get crackin’ on emailing or calling some others I’ve neglected. They are just to precious to let fade away.

Hoping you feel the same … Cheers!