Rabbi Yitzchak Shmuel Ackerman, LMHC

One of my oldest friends called me the other day. Lazar said he was preparing for an interview, and he knew he was going to be asked how he, were he appointed to the senior position for which he had been recruited, would handle conflict resolution. He wanted to know how I would answer that question.

Let's imagine that someone who is comfortable critiquing my work read the preceding paragraph. The following is a fictitious conflict which ensued. I offer it as an example of conflict addressed poorly, to be followed by a more efficacious alternative.

Reader: Why did you refer to Lazar as your "oldest friend?" That's such an unflattering expression even if it were true and it's not. Quite a few of your friends are older than he is. And he's not your oldest friend in terms of how long you've known him because you have friends you've known from the time you were two years old and you only met Lazar when you were both in high school.

Me: Nobody who reads this article is going to think that Lazar is old. People understand that it's an expression; it's a way of describing someone as an old friend in terms of the duration of our friendship, not about how old he is or how old I am. You just get some perverse pleasure in nit picking at anything I write that is not concrete, literal and devoid of any idiomatic color or style.

Reader: I guess you can empathize with that like you do with everything. You know about perverse pleasure; like you get from telling me that my writing has all the flair of a thesaurus entry.

This example of an argument ends here. Before we look at how this could've been a productive conversation rather than an argument, I want to clarify something.

The above argument as I recorded it is fictitious. But it is closely based on actual expressions and ways of speaking that I hear all too often in my practice. There are expressions bordering on contempt and ways of speaking that are extreme.

"Nobody who reads….People understand" are extreme ways of speaking. Few things in all of human experience apply to no people or all people. All People are born, breath, and die; that's about it. Everything else is most people, some people, many people, not "People." Broad generalizations like these are attempts to demonstrate that "you are wrong and I am right because this is the way everyone sees it." But it's not. Not everyone sees it the way you do, and not everyone sees it the way I do, so lining up the entire world on my side or yours is extreme and inaccurate.

"You just get some perverse pleasure" is a contemptuous accusation. Ad hominem attacks usually signal a shift between a disagreement and an argument. In a respectful disagreement, the discussants decide what they are willing to do, considering that they disagree. In an argument, they decide what they won't do because the other party's thoughts aren't worthy of consideration. The rest of the discussion is an exchange of derogations to justify and inflame the contempt.

In the above example, the discussion is no longer about the propriety and felicity of the term oldest friend. It has devolved into an ugly diatribe. I will no longer seek this reader's comments and this reader will no longer offer suggestions. We both lose.

Here's alternate version of our conversation.

Reader: Why did you refer to Lazar as your "oldest friend?" That's such an unflattering expression even if it were true and it's not. Quite a few of your friends are older than he is. And he's not your oldest friend in terms of how long you've known him because you have friends you've known from the time you were two years old and you only met Lazar when you were both in high school.

Me: I don't mean to imply that Lazar is old. I think many people understand that it's an expression, it's a way of describing someone as an old friend in terms of the duration of our friendship, not about how old he is or how old I am. Besides, how else could I word it?

Reader: How about "Lazar, my friend of long standing?"

Me: I don't know. That just doesn't sound right to me. How about, "Lazar, my friend since we were teenagers."

Reader: I like that better, too.

Why am I giving examples of adults in conflict in an article on parenting? Because the most effective way for you to teach your children how to disagree respectfully and resolve conflict is by showing them how you as husband-and-wife , their parents, listen to and work with each other.

My answer to Lazar's question was this.

Ask respectful, open-ended, forward looking questions, and give few or no answers.

Spend very little time on what happened last time, and a lot of time on what each of the participants would wish to see happen next time. When one person answers, ask the other one, "what do you think about that?" If they don't agree yet, ask, "what would you like to add to, change, or exclude from his suggestion." Invite them to build on each other's ideas, not tear them down.

Help them decide what they will do, not what they won't. That's a triumphal conflict.

Rabbi Yitzchak Shmuel Ackerman is a Licensed Mental Health Counselor with specialties in marriage, relationships, and parenting. He works with parents and educators, and conducts parenting groups for men and women. He can be reached at 718-344-6575.