It turns out that the best thing to do when you’re fighting with opponents isn’t to persuade them you’re right.
That just breeds negative feelings!
According to Harvard psychologist Amy Cuddy, the best thing to do when you’re in a position of power is to listen.
His book “Presence: Bringing Your Boldest Self to Your Biggest Challenges” argues, among other things, that when we feel powerful, we also have the ability to bestow that power onto other people, either by building them up to feel powerful or by tearing them down.
“When you walk into those situations that have a lot of conflict in them,” Cuddy says, “the first thing to do is to be present enough to allow the other person to speak first. You’re not giving power away; you’re actually allowing them to feel seen and understood.”
By listening to the other man’s side, you’re giving him the chance to become a part of the conversation.
If the other person is saying something objectionable, “I think you have to bite your tongue. I do. I think you have to wait,” Cuddy says. “First of all, when you respond in that moment of anger you’re not going to respond well. And if you let them get through it, you’re going to get a little more information about what that is really about. Maybe then you do pause and say, ‘I need to step away from this for a moment.'”
Even if you don’t get new information relevant to the fight itself, there may still be nuggets of wisdom for how to handle later situations.
Subtle insights can only be found once we shut our mouths and actually try to understand the other person, not crush them.
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