Get Clever in Conflict

January 21, 2024

Did you know that the way you fight with your mother, brother, kid, or significant other is the same?  

The “what” you are arguing about may be different, but “how” you navigate conflict in one relationship is how you will handle conflict in all your relationships.

This is how all your relationships are here to support your personal and spiritual growth.

Yes, each and every one of your relationships is here to support your spiritual growth and evolution. 

When your relationship conflict helps you see yourself more clearly, you have the opportunity to shift, transform old disempowering habits, and create something new from an empowered place.

In conflict, you take on one of three disempowered roles in victim consciousness: the victim, the villain, or the hero.

All these roles co-create conflict, drama, and disconnection in your relationships, whether it’s your mother, brother, or significant other.

Not ideal.

Do you know your favorite role?

The key to being creative in conflict and shifting to authentic connection is to focus on knowing what role you are playing and how to shift yourself rather than the conflict itself. 

You learned how to be in conflict when you were 2, 3 & 4 years old.

Something happened when you were little that scared you – you felt a threat – and in that moment, you devised a strategy to feel safe again.

Your strategy, like your thumbprint, looks different than everyone else’s. It is unique to you and has been shaped based on those you’ve interacted with and their 3-year-old self strategies.

This is completely normal and human. 

However, this strategy only served to create temporary relief.  

The key word here is TEMPORARY.

Why?  Because true transformation does not occur in the field of threat and fear; only conflict and drama exist here.

True transformation occurs in the field of TRUST.

You see, all relationship conflict is an attempt to get back to a feeling of internal safety and security.

So how did you learn to feel safe in conflict?

The key is to get deeply familiar with YOUR UNIQUE FEAR PATTERNS so that you can shift them.

You cannot shift what you are unaware of.

Being conscious of your patterns in conflict actually helps you to feel more empowered, and from empowerment, you have access to infinite intelligence where you can create any outcome you desire. 

The trick is that the patterns created when you were 2, 3, and 4 years old are so deeply ingrained into your subconscious that you are not even aware of them.  

To become aware requires you to pay closer attention and look closely at your results.

Here are some flags to help you learn to discern when you have fallen into old disempowering patterns.

1. Look for the one in you that blames and criticizes. (Villain) This defensive strategy aims to keep the attention on the other as a means to control feeling afraid.
2. Pay attention to the part of you that wants to flee or run. (Victim) This reactive strategy aims to control feelings of fear by disappearing and shutting yourself out.
3. Notice the one who analyzes or tries to figure it out. (Hero) This strategy aims to control fear by keeping attention on the what, why and how. “If I can figure it out, then I can change it.”  

All of these strategies are attempts at keeping your heart from the inevitable heartbreak that comes from being a human being. These are all your ego’s attempts at controlling what is actually happening. It is a form of resistance.

Don’t worry. It’s perfectly normal and simply what humans do.

However, when you let go of fear & control (left brain), surrender into trust, and open your heart (right brain), you shift to infinitely creative possibilities.

Learning to let go of the control that creates Drama in your relationships starts with being aware of your patterns.

This week, pay attention to the ways you think, feel, and act when in conflict. Notice your thoughts and jot them down; pay attention to your fight, flee, fawn, and faint reactivity, and let those reactions inform you.  Lastly, be aware of what you do.

 All of the above are clues to what roles you are used to playing when in conflict.

I created a little cheat sheet to help you out!

For more worksheets and to learn more about how to be clever with your conflict patterns, join my latest online course, Drop the Drama, where each week, I deliver an easy, short, relatable lesson for you to integrate into your life immediately for real-time relationship transformation.

With deep gratitude,

Annmarie Chereso
Author, Speaker, Coach, & Meditation Teacher