Resolving Interpersonal Conflicts - Do It; Not Merely Try

Interpersonal conflicts are almost inevitable in everyone’s life; from minor issues like the unhappiness of a couple over their inability to compromise on a dating place to major conflicts like a family breakup. The causal of most interpersonal conflicts could be due to the lack of effective communication. However I believe that it is important to realise that it is not the conflict itself that is detrimental to a relationship but the management of the conflict and how the conflict is approached and resolved that determines if the relationship in question can be salvaged.

Personally, my family is always my pillar of support in life thus family issues are upsetting to me. Hence I have decided to address a conflict between a mother and a daughter but well, I am certainly not one of the leads. This conflict persisted over some time and was not really a one-off issue.
The teenage daughter was always the main concern to her family members especially her mother due to her truants, lies and secretive behaviour. However it was important to note that the 13 year old daughter was from a nuclear family, with loving and attentive parents and siblings and the mother was a housewife who took time to understand her children and fulfilled their needs to her most possible capability.

The conflict began when the daughter started to be rude to her mother and was unwilling to give more details regarding her whereabouts. She went home late without informing the worrying parents at home but the parents could only wait up as they had no access to her friends’ contact numbers. The mother had even spotted the daughter wearing clothes that had never appeared in the house before and perhaps were skimpy clothes that the conservative mother would not have allowed her to wear at her then tender age of 13. The mother had not confronted the daughter at this point in time, in hope of her turning over a new leaf. This must have been very hurtful for the mother to experience.

On the contrary, things only got worse. The daughter began to skip tuitions and the mother had to bear with repeated humiliating phone calls from the tuition teacher that her daughter was absent, yet again. The mother still did not approach her daughter, fearing that she may worsen the situation and made her daughter felt stifled. Hence all she did was to continue to show her love and attention and instruct her daughter to attend her tuitions religiously, which was obviously not taken to heart.
The daughter seemed to have enjoyed the thrill she was going through and did not take into consideration her mother’s feelings. The daughter may be merely interested in seeking some thrill and going through a stage of being rebellious while the mother might have understood this by not confronting her but simply ensuring that things did not get way out of hand. Indeed, the situation slowly improved and the mother-daughter relationship is now close beyond words.

A mother-and-child relationship (especially that of a teenage child) appears to pose sensitive issues that require tact in handling, so how would you have handled the situation if you were the mother? Just being curious, do you think there is any precaution to take to ensure that the daughter (or any child) does not enter the stage of being rebellious?

I guess at the end of the day, blood is certainly thicker than water and when both parties take on an effective approach to a conflict, more insights will be gained on the relationship rather than an infliction of harm.

Take the effort; do not say try but do it!

Effective Communication Skills

Communication is an integral part of everyone's lives, more so is effective communcation. This is largely why I took up this course - to improve my communcation skills, in order to communicate more effectively.

To me, effective communication is very much a two-way thing - the speaker must speak audibly and concisely while the listener must play his role in listening attentively and not merely hearing. When either the speaker or the listen faults, I believe that effective communication will not be achieved successfully. However I do have to admit that sometimes I fail to play the role of a listener well because I may start to 'daydream', well subconciously I would say. On the other hand, I try to perfect my role as a speaker by bringing my point across as effectively as possible.

I think that it is vital to be equipped with effective communication skills, so that whatever I say is always well understood by the listeners. I certainly would not like to encounter frequent moments of misunderstandings which arise due to my poor commnucation skills since that may bring about conflicts and unhappiness among the parties concerned. The lack of misunderstandings can undeniably maintain or even enhance interpersonal relationships. I guess situations of misunderstanding are best avoided when one is of superior position as one unintended mistake (due to miscommunication) may well effect in some dire consequences. But at the end of the day, I think that any speaker would not like their intended message to be twisted by the listener in any way because I certainly would hate to have that happen to me!

Effective commucation skills also allow portrayal of a good image of myself; portrayal of someone who can speak confidently, understandably and concisely. This is surely important, particularly during interviews or presentations these days whereby image contributes to quite a bulk of the total score, so to speak. However this definitely does not mean that I'm not guilty of feeling jittery and being tongue-tied during presentations. Well, that is why I still require this course to improve my communication skills. Sometimes, I cannot help but wonder why people who are unable to speak well are employed for jobs which require them to speak or present themselves professionally, for example lecturer and people in the service industry. Encounters with these people make me more determined to advance my communication skills, so that I look more presentable and others would not have a bad judgement of me.

The art of communicating effectively will undoubtedly give me an edge over those who does not share the same skills, in the sense of influencing or persuading people around me. I believe that the ability to bring my point across more confidently, precisely and concisely will increase my chances of successfully affecting people's opinions (not that I'm really keen on doing so though. but we never know when such skills will come in handy, do we?). This can be demonstrated by elections processes; I doubt the majority will vote for someone who communicates unpromisingly and poorly.

This art of effective communication is indisputably a set of skills that one must be armed with because in my opinion, effective communication is the foundation of interpersonal relationships, which makes up one's life. I am certainly in for the game of further improvement and devlopement of my communication skills! (: