On Conflict

“STOP IT! AH! STOP!!!!!” I was alerted to the conflict brewing in the back corner of my classroom by a shrill scream. My students froze and looked at me, awaiting my response. Immediately, I issued a request to the other students, “Alright class, please keep working on your end-of-the-day jobs.” As the classroom shivered to life again with bustling second graders, I quickly swooped over and separated the two students who were in the heat of battle. I asked the boy to quickly and quietly go to the buddy room, and had the other student take a break. Once her breath had ceased to come out in heaving gasps, I gently crouched by her and asked, “Could you please tell me what happened?” She choked out that she had been cleaning up around her table, and getting something off the floor when the boy had hit her from behind. She said he did it on purpose. I thanked her for letting me know her side of the story.

When I asked the boy about it, he explained that he had been jumping around, excited about the end of the day (I usually play some clean-up music and he likes to dance along to it), and hadn’t been looking where he was going. In his second-grade exuberance, he had flung his hands out and accidentally hit the girl as she was standing up. She thought he had done it on purpose. He had done it on accident. Of course, as seven-year-olds, their responses were purely emotional, and each reacted on a presumption of the worst about the other person. The fruits of these hasty assumptions were screaming and shouting at one another, disruption of the classroom, and inevitably, tears.

When I had calmed both children down (always step #1—don’t enter into a discussion before tempering your emotions), I was able to hear both sides of the story, piece together what had actually happened, and was able to bring about genuine apologies and reconciliation between the parties.

After this particularly heated afternoon, I sat, exhausted and drained, in my swivel chair. The incident got me thinking about how we adults handle situations very much like these in our own lives. Sure, we are beyond issues of someone hitting another person on purpose or by accident (I hope!), but we still have disagreements and unfortunately, I feel like most of them resemble this second-grade altercation more than a civilized and respectful conversation.

I love having conversations involving people with whom I disagree. Just the other day I was talking with a coworker about some political things. She and I disagreed with one another. Both of us are very passionate about certain policies and standpoints, and both of us are emotional people. However, she had the grace to hear my side of the story, and I had the compassion to listen to her and understand why she believes what she believes, and therefore why she sees things from a perspective that is different than mine. I walked away from that conversation with more compassion for people who have had more difficult upbringings than I have, people who have encountered more difficulties in life and have experienced more racism or negativity than I have.

I have another dear friend with whom I disagree on quite a few things. I love having discussions with her, because I always walk away with more things to think on. I have learned more about the world and different lifestyles by having discussions with people of an opposing viewpoint than I have from people with whom I agree all the time.

Next time you are in a conflict or discussion (hopefully IN PERSON—please, social media is NOT the place to have these discussions. That’s another topic though) with a person of a different mindset, I encourage you to step in with an open mind and a compassionate ear. Please don’t enter screaming and arguing, as this solves nothing and brings about no reconciliation, understanding, or compassion for either one of you. Take the time to listen. Agree to disagree if you must, and love that person for who they are and why they are the way they are.

You could walk out of that conversation learning what my second graders did: your initial assumptions of a person may not be correct, and in the end you could discover something you didn’t know before and come to reconciliation. Because, really, isn’t that what we all want? To be listened to. To be heard. To be understood. And to be brought together in harmony with others, not forever separated because of different ideals and beliefs. At least, that’s my opinion. J