Someone I know once gave me what I still think is pretty good advice on how to have a difficult conversation over the phone. Here were the 3-step instructions:
- Stand tall and take up space; apparently you sound more confident.
- Be sure that you can at least see your face in a mirror and be vigilant about keeping a neutral to pleasant facial expression that will be reflected in your voice.
- Write out all the points you would like to make beforehand so these are fresh in your mind but don’t use your notes during the conversation, choose to actively listen instead.
When I first started to lead yoga classes, I worked from various locations. One place I held classes, was a dance studio I sub-letted from another woman. She had a strong personality, she was a force field actually, and I was a bit scared of her 😉
Initially, her own classes were few and far between. The first part of the year things went really well between us but mostly because we rarely crossed paths. Once she started using the space more often we ran into difficulties around scheduling. Here are three of the bigger examples:
A: The days/times I would use the space no longer worked for her schedule after we’d agreed and I had printed my flyers. I was out of pocket for printing but since I hadn’t distributed them yet, I decided not to rock the boat.
B: An hour before one of my classes was scheduled, she left me a voice mail to say that the space was not available to me or my students that day because she would be using it for a private session. I received her message only after arriving for the class since I had driven straight there from my day job.
C: Much like the situation above, I was called the same day of a class (the morning of this time), and advised to call my students right away so there wouldn’t be an embarrassing repeat of our last scheduling conflict. From my perspective these weren’t examples of unforeseen or unavoidable conflicts but an emerging pattern of poor planning on her part. She saw it differently.
This is when I employed the ‘difficult conversation over the phone’ guidelines for the first time. Here they are again under a mindfulness lens:
- Stand large (remain grounded in the body).
- Watch your face in the mirror (stay present, act with intention, allow emotions to move through you).
- Write out your concerns clearly so you are ready to listen (appease the voice in your head that compares, critiques and needs to be right and remove the distraction of planning your response while the other person is speaking).
The call was like a magic elixir for me. I stayed grounded, calm and kind. I expressed how I perceived the situation and responded to her concerns from the present moment. It was a very different experience from previous interactions between us. I also made the decision during the conversation that it was necessary to go our separate ways…and not in a hot-headed way, it just made sense.
Mindfulness practices are practical.
In retrospect, here’s what I also learned through this relationship. Her behaviour was a problem. My behaviour was equally the problem.
She was able to steam roll me because I was willing to be steam rolled. She could be unclear about boundaries because I was also unclear about boundaries. She chose to fixate on my inadequacies (my lack of responsiveness to her needs as the primary user of the space) and I chose to fixate on her inadequacies (her lack of respect for our agreements and my students time). We were stuck in this struggle with each other that we each created and upheld. Years later, I chatted with her during a chance encounter in a parking lot and she shared the strain that she was under at the time which also placed a lot in perspective.
Examine your own difficult relationships this week. Start in the past for more ready-access to reflections with fewer emotional attachments. Then, work forward to a present-day struggle. What is at the root of your difficulties with others? How do you tend to project onto the other person? What role do you play? How can you start with yourself right now to make a shift?
You can’t change another person but you can create the conditions for their response when you make a change in yourself.
You could work this out on paper, with a therapist or explore an openness to ‘what is’ through a meditation. Or maybe…try picking up the phone. Good luck.
