13th Day

13th Day.

10
things I thank God for.

1) Sermons. again. I like the way shu ling preaches. It's very precise; to the point. then again, I'm not being bias, but I feel I see things clearer when she preaches haha.. :x (about same frequency) But, yes, pastor Jo, pastor william and invited guest speakers! I don't mean to offend anyone >.< actually some guest speakers are really funny too... HAHA okay, moving on...
2) Christianity being about reconciliation (one of the beatitudes, Matthew 5)
3) I Am Nothing without CHRIST. C.H.R.I.S.T.I.A.N.
4) Reminding me who I am, who He is.
5) Encouragement.
6) Being safe, not having any diseases, etc. My family, cousins, relatives...
7) Being close to my parents, enough to tease them, yet not go overboard; know my limits.
8) Parents.
9) Development in Singapore.
10) Maturing.

~~~

God is love.

Saying that really makes my day.

Well, I do apologise - again, as of late >.< - that I keep posting stuff past midnight as a result, the date would say I posted this the next day instead of the day I'd actually posted.. well, technically, though past midnight, and I'm still awake typing this, it's still Sunday to me. Not monday, as stated above before the big big title of this post.

Having to go through the struggle, emotional pain, frustration of attempting to reconcile two parties today made me remember what I used to do in primary school. Well... in a different way, but... Technically, both parties have some problems with each other and so I help them work things out and they're fine after that. Sorta like a... mediator. Yup. It's frustrating and I would admit I've sometimes allowed my emotions to overpower me at that moment and I become one of them, flaring up and uttering gibberish. ._." Anyways, I do try. As a friend, knowing there's a problem, I must do something.

It ended pretty... well, I'm not sure, but I did what I could, the rest is up to them.

Well.. I'd like to talk about...

CONFRONTATIONS.

Pardon me, but I do not point or refer to anyone in particular. Yes, some incident led me to recall about a point I learnt some time ago.. which, well, many people overlook.

There're few different kind of reactions people get when it comes to confrontations. First, there'll be the ones who are head-on "fire fire" kind, second, there'll be the ones who don't dare to face up to it either because of lack of courage/being afraid, whether having setbacks or not, and lastly, those who.. can't be bothered, really.

Haha, okay, don't judge me. I'm just typing this based on my experiences, all right?

First of all, I find the 3 most important things about confrontations are..

1) You NEED to be CALM. Really, otherwise you're not thinking. and the whole point of a confrontation becomes a meaningless argument, a snowball effect.
2) You NEED to come with a mindset that you want the best for both parties. What do you see at the end of the tunnel?
3) Take turns to talk. DON'T INTERRUPT EACH OTHER. This allows you to THINK BEFORE YOU SPEAK. so you won't look like a dumbass fool/smart alec.

1) Be CALM.

Well, like I said, earlier, if you're not, you're gonna be arguing the whole time. And the whole point of a confrontation would just go down the drain.

I know at times you really really don't hate confrontations because you have to see this person you're not very comfortable with at that moment.. but try to see things beyond the confrontation, like some possible results. You see, if the confrontation goes well, you might be able to solve things and end things peacefully. If people keep having that "jarring" image that you can't even trust this person for a good 10minutes (talk), FORGET ABOUT CONFRONTATION DUDE. You're not even ready to give this other person a chance to talk. You're not giving yourself a chance to listen to this person. You're just making it so much harder for yourself to forgive this person.

Think positively. When it's hard. Try your best to. Think of anything to keep you calm, but not distract you from the main point of a confrontation.

2) SAME OBJECTIVE/GOAL.

I have to stress this time and time again, I foresee - if I'm ever gonna blog about confrontations again.

I'll give you a situation. It's silly, but really, even I went through this before.

Two friends. They were fairly good friends. Apparently, due to some incident, miscomm, whatever, they fell out. They bickered a lot. They chose to listen to their friends badmouthing about the other friend. No one ever thought about reconciling the both of them back together. The both of them avoided each other. Each time they walked past each other, they look everywhere else but each other. One day, one of them steps up to say "Can we end this properly?" The other person, feeling a bit unwilling to, agrees to that. Cos things were just getting really awkward between the both of them. Now, despite them organizing this "confrontation", they were talking behind each other's backs. One of them saying, "You know, when I asked for a talk, then my friend gave me that look as if like, wts are you kidding me, don't lame please." The other one saying, "that weirdo think like he/she very big like that. Come up to me want to talk to me. FORGET IT can. argh." And they go on and on about each other's behaviors and stuff.

When they started to confront each other on one fine day, they couldn't even talk for a good 3 minutes and they fell out and gave up. Apparently, one of the two hates the other, but the other doesn't.

What's my point of telling you this weird story? Well, you see, the root of this kind of confrontation is that, One look at the north, the Other, south. They have different goals of the argument. One chooses the confrontation because this person wants to reconcile, this person doesn't hate the other person, still treats this person as a friend - or at least, willing to - if only the other person is willing to clear some misunderstandings with this person. Apparently, the other person hates this person. This other person is bearing a grudge against this person and doesn't want to be friends with this person anymore.

You see, if both of them had the same goal, they could've ended things peacefully... Even if they didn't want to be friends anymore, both of them deserved and had every right to know the truth behind the miscoms. and clear some air. yeah.

okay, I'm not sure if my story was right hmm.. but it was about that... i think...

3) DON'T INTERRUPT.

I personally am a person, whether in confrontation or not, hates to be interrupted. Why? Simply because I get distracted very, very easily. So if you interrupt me during a confrontation, I forget my point I'm trying to make, I get mad and forgetting the main point I'm trying to make, I get mad at the person who made me forget it, I get mad for being so easily distracted, and..... at the end of the confrontation, I get mad I lost my points and the confrontation ended up as meaningless because I didn't get to bring my points across.

I'm sorry for that a little confusing paragraph there.. haha I didn't know how to phrase it otherwise. :p

Yup. So like I mentioned in my above above paragraph, (argh, why do I keep typing paragraphy. ARGHH) when you interrupt someone, you can affect the other person's thinking, and the results of the confrontation wouldn't be very promising.. or rather, the confrontation might take longer than expected to reach a proper resolution.

Not interrupting the other person would give a chance for this person to actually have a good impression of you. Why do I say that? You see, let's say you're invited to a seminar, so this speaker walks out and starts talking, everybody turns to look, mouth shut, eyes fixed on the speaker. Why? Not only do they want to listen to what he/she has to say, but also out of respect. Thing is, if you show respect to the other person, the person will naturally feel more at ease, more confident of saying what he/she wants to say, like, properly and not divert elsewhere........ Respect is something both parties need to have during a confrontation. It's linked to my previous point, having the same goal.

~~~

When you have the same goal/objective, both parties will be patient, showing respect to the other, remain calm, keep telling themselves that they just want to reach this objective (win-win). Nothing more, nothing less for themselves.

Confrontation is putting down your pride.
Laying it aside, for the sake of friendship, relationship, whatevership.
It's realising those things matter to you so much more than yourself.

"Apology doesn't mean that you were wrong, or the other person was right, it means the your relationship is more valuable than your ego." - taken from a pic I saw on fb.

So if any of you have to face up any confrontations with someone, think of this. How much do you really value this friendship/relationship/whatevership?

~~~

OKAY. AH. I HAVE SCHOOL LATER. GTG. BYEBYEBYEBYE!

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