BREAKDOWN: 4 Powerful Ways to Calmly Resolve Disagreements
All you need to know to be in control of the situation and not regret making the wrong move.
“No matter how good you are at your job, or how good you are with your ideas, or how good you are as a human, PEOPLE WILL DISAGREE.”
A few days ago, I was watching this YouTube video by one of my favourite creators, Ankur Warikoo: 4 Powerful Ways to Calmly Resolve Disagreements.
But this time, I wanted to go a step further and summarise and share it with you guys. This article is basically a summary + my interpretation of that video.
I hope you’ll get some value out of it. So without any further ado, let’s get into it.
First of all, let’s try to understand why we’re (most of the times) bad at handling disagreements.
When someone disagrees with us, we feel attacked. And thus, we fail to react in a sound way.
Plus, it’s also crucial to note that we’re wired to make mistakes while handling disagreements. That fight-or-flight mode immediately takes over and we lose our control.
As Ankur puts it:
“Our mind is trained in a way where we don’t know the right way to handle disagreements. Our brain is wired to react to fear. It’s designed to protect us from danger.”
For instance, tens of thousands of years ago when we were still nomads and hunter-gatherers, our only focus was to “stay alive.”
And keeping that in mind our brain invented a process:
“If you’re in danger, I’ll warn you immediately.”
Our brain became used to responding in this way.
It’s interesting to note that although the definition of danger has changed, but how our brain functions has more or less remained the same.
Today’s danger: SOCIAL VALIDATION
Types of Disagreements
Before we move on to tackling disagreements, it’s crucial to understand that there’s not only “the disagreement.” It comes in various shapes and sizes.
And we can’t use only one technique to deal with all of them.
Interestingly, that’s actually how it becomes a problem—we tend to deal with all of them in a similar fashion.
Ankur takes the reference of one of the pictures Paul Graham tweeted.
If the above picture is clear, then you’ll be able to see the different forms of disagreements.
Every form is not the same, and nor it should be treated as such while handling them.
Here’s different forms of disagreements, as expressed in the picture above:
- Name-calling: When someone mocks you in a way that’s not true or relevant to the topic of disagreement. “You’re an ass hat.”
- Ad hominem: Attacks the characteristics of authority of the writer (or speaker) without addressing the substance of the argument. “You’re not mature or qualified enough to talk about it.”
- Responding to tone: Criticizes the tone of the writing (or speaking) without addressing the substance of the argument. “Your writing is so naïve.”
- Contradiction: States the opposing case with little or no supporting evidence. “Writing good is a talent and not a mere skill that you can acquire.”
- Counter-argument: Contradicts and then backs it up with reasoning and/or supporting evidence. “Your article is bad because it doesn’t get enough views.”
- Refutation: Finds the mistake and explains why it’s mistaken using quotes. “You can’t write well because you’re young and they say the skill of writing well comes with time and experience.”
- Refuting the central point: EXPLICITLY REFUTES THE CENTRAL POINT. “Your writing is not at its best because (I think) it has more than acceptable grammar, spelling and/or formatting mistakes. And I don’t like pieces like that.”
I know you might be thinking, “who will remember all this and then find which type of disagreement that is… and then figure out how to deal with it?”
Luckily, there isn’t any necessity to remember them all. But having a rough idea—and I guess until now you’ve had it—definitely helps.
Filtering different forms of disagreements will not only help you handle them correctly but also make identifying productive criticisms that really matters to you a lot easier.
So How Do You Treat These Different Tiers of Disagreements?
First of all, remember:
Make sure you’re in control of how you react. You CHOOSE to react how you react.
Once you’ve made sure you are, you’re half done in dealing with disagreements because we all know how many times we’re unaware how we’re reacting, at that very moment. And we regret it later.
In that video Ankur presents a broad framework to deal with different types of disagreements. And he also clears that you’re free to customise it to suit your personal interests.
1. Name-calling and Ad Hominem: The best way to deal with these types of disagreements is to “ignore them” right away. They’re BASELESS.
2. Responding to Tone and Contradiction: When someone disagrees with you in one of these two fashions, acknowledge them, but try not to entertain.
3. Counter Argument and Refutation: From this type of disagreement things become a little serious (and interesting).
What I mean by that? THERE OPENS SCOPE FOR LEARNING.
Therefore, it’s best to listen to them patiently and bear some fluff. And as Ankur puts:
“Don’t forget that you still have the right to agree or disagree with them.”
4. Refuting the Central Point: This is where your scope of learning and improvement is maximum. This is where you’ll find criticisms that you can genuinely act upon and improve. Don’t let your ego creep in and take control.
Try to understand who disagrees with you at this level. They might be wrong, and as do you. But what that’s sure to happen: You’ll both learn and help in upskilling each other. Embrace it. Patiently listen to them and try to understand nuances in their disagreement. Learn and improve.
That’s all from my side; hope you liked it. If you did, don’t forget to check out Ankur Warikoo on Twitter and YouTube.
“There are 2 kinds of people in the world:
Those who show you where you are wrong.
Those who tell you that you are wrong.
If you run away from the first kinds, you will continue to run into the second!” —Ankur Warikoo
Here’s your next read: An article on my takeaways from one of the episodes of Ankur Warikoo’s podcast: Woice With Warikoo. Until next time, byeee! ❤️👋
