The Physiology of Conflict – Transcript
Jim Latimer
Welcome to Coaching for Interims. We are about empowerment for interim ministry, best practices and quick help wisdom from the field. This is our collaborative Wisdom from the Field project featuring short interviews with transitional interim ministers and others with practical help and wisdom to offer those engaged in transitional ministry. Thank you for tuning into this episode of Wisdom from the Field. I am your host today, Reverend Jim Latimer.
And we have the great pleasure of having with us Reverend Dr. Terasa Cooley. Terasa is a long-time Unitarian Universalist. She currently serves as the Senior Interim Minister at a church in Pasadena, California. And she has also served churches in the Midwest, as well as on the East Coast and in the south. And she has also served as a denominational executive. She has really covered a lot of bases, if you will.
She wrote on her website how she is especially dedicated to helping congregations through interim times. She and I share that commitment and that heart. She has a book coming out on conflict published by Rowman and Littlefield. It should be available now. The title is, “Transforming Conflict: the Blessings of Congregational Turmoil.” Now that title ought to get you interested enough to order it, because I’m about to do that myself! Anyway, for this first episode here, when Terasa and I were speaking, she used the term the “physiology of conflict.” That got me really curious. So, Terasa, if you could speak to that, we would love it.
Terasa Cooley
Sure. Thanks for having me on the show, Jim. Happy to be with you. So, I think that one of the things that happens in conflict is that we can automatically go to this place of thinking about the other person in the conflict. What are they doing? What are they saying? How can I change them? How can I convince them? What I try to explain is that the first place when we get into conflict is to really think about what’s happening within ourselves – not just what’s happening within our brain, but what’s happening within our body. Because what happens to us when we encounter a conflict, it’s almost exactly the kind of thing that happens when you’re encountering a physical danger.
So, if I’m seeing a snake on the path, then suddenly, this part of my brain that’s called the amygdala – a lot of people are talking about the amygdala these days – but that the amygdala, which is the part of the lizard brain, the part of the brain that we have in common with every other living being, and that part of the brain takes over the rest of the brain. It literally becomes a gridlock. They call it the amygdala hijack, because what its job is, is to say, Oh, you need to freeze so that snake doesn’t get you, You need to run, if you have the opportunity, and if you’re really fast. Or, you might want to fight it. You might want to grab a rake or something and try to do that.
The amygdala has very few responses. It’s a part of your brain that can think yes or no. It can think black or white. That’s all it can do. And it relies on stereotypes that we have inculcated in our lives over the years, and then it just immediately makes those judgments. That is true if we’re encountering a conflict with a person. It will suddenly make that kind of fear of what’s happening – why do I feel threatened? – will shut down the rest of our brain. And so, people talk about how when they’re in conflict, their gut might clench. That’s because the amygdala is sending a message to your gut that says, Generate more energy for me. I need my energy right now! It also might speed up your breathing, or slow down your breathing if you’re one of the kind of people that likes to freeze.
It really interacts with the entire body. And those are signals for us in a conflict. So, when we feel our body tensing up, when we feel our breathing changing, when you feel that gut clenching, that’s a signal that you are feeling threatened. And the best way to deal with that is not to think that the other person’s going to make us feel better in that moment. The first thing to think about is how do we calm ourselves down? How do we take breaths? How do we find ways to soothe that amygdala, which is saying Danger, danger, danger? And instead, be able to be calm enough so that that gridlock loosens, because otherwise you just can’t think. You really literally cannot think when the amygdala is holding you in that place. So, you’re never going to get to a creative place in a conflict. You’re never going to get to a place where, Oh, let’s have a complex conversation about that. If that amygdala is holding you in place.
It’s also true that our brains actually have the capacity to take in a million bits of information. We can look around a room, and there are so many things happening, But we can’t make sense of them unless we make some interpretations of what we’re seeing. Our brains would explode if we were paying attention to everything around us. And so even at the point of just observing what’s happening in the room, we’re making an interpretation. We’re choosing to look at some things and not others. And by doing that, we’re automatically acting differently than somebody else. We’re automatically choosing different things. And so, it’s hard for us to understand, when somebody comes to a very different assumption than we do, that a lot of it is built on that those building blocks of the very first things that they pay attention to, and that those are automatically interpretations.
There’s a tool called the Ladder of Inference, which talks about how we observe these things, and then automatically make these choices. And we make these assumptions right there. So, we look at what we call observable facts. And that’s already an interpretation. So, based on those facts, we make a hunch. We could say that, you know, That pulpit that’s in the sanctuary, seems really old. It seems like a really old pulpit. And so, we can make a hunch that this is a congregation that’s been around for a long time. And then we can speculate, since this congregation has been around a long time, it might have really deep roots in the community. It might have a history that maybe makes it a little bit more conservative – all of those things. And then we might assume that because of that, we might think this is gonna be a rigid congregation. And then come to this kind of conclusion that, I’m not sure that I really want to engage with a congregation that feels that rigid.
Now, this is all based on looking at a pulpit, right? This one kind of thing that somebody else might look at that pulpit and think, Oh, it’s great that it has this tradition. It’s great that they value that. I really want to be a part of something like that. So, we’re coming to wildly different conclusions based on the same observation. And it’s so hard for us to understand that other people don’t do it the same way we do. They see different reality.
And so, a part of what has to happen in a conflict is the ability to walk yourself down the ladder. The ability to say, Okay, that’s interesting. Why do I think that? Maybe there’s an assumption here that’s not a correct assumption. So, it may be the case that that pulpit is an old pulpit, but they bought it from an old church down the street, right? There are all kinds of assumptions I’m making on the basis of something that’s actually not even true. And so, walking yourself down that ladder helps to be able to then connect with people because the more we’re walked down that ladder, the more we’re in common ground. The higher up in the ladder you get, the more individual it is. The lower on the ladder you are, the more opportunity there is to say, Oh, I see the same thing. And that allows for the kind of connection that helps get to a place where a conflict can actually be something that we can learn from The Ladder of Conflict.
Jim Latimer
Wow, Terasa. This has been dense and beautiful and parses well. Let me see if I can capture it a little bit. One thing I’ve noticed about everything that you’ve said, is that you remind us that the key to getting through conflict constructively is recognizing what’s in your control and what isn’t in your control. And if something is not in your control, don’t try to control it because it’s not going to work, right?
So, the first thing then, the Amygdala brain – when that fires – your prefrontal cortex is literally hijacked. Short circuited. It doesn’t work anymore. So, recognize, Oh, man, my body’s tense. Okay, but I can control that actually. The first thing I need to realize is that I’m in this state: clenched jaw and stomach. And then the next thing was around focus. There are movies that have been made of people that have been at the same thing, and you walk out and say, So what was it about? And they say three different things. But you were in the same movie! Very different perspective. So, recognize that people have multiple perspectives. And then the Ladder of Inference as you infer a judgment. And that’s based on something in your past that’s pinging on something in your memory that other people don’t share.
Terasa Cooley
Absolutely.
Jim Latimer
But then, you can recognize it and, as you say, walk yourself down this Ladder of Inference. That’s really practical.
Terasa Cooley
Absolutely. And, you know, systems thinking teaches us that the only person we can change is ourselves, right? The fallacy is this idea that we can change somebody else. But what happens is that by changing yourself, you actually help change others. And one of the things I’ve learned about the amygdala is that it is contagious. If your amygdala is firing, then somebody will look at you and be able to pick up on that in a subconscious way and go, Oh, maybe I should be concerned. Maybe I should be worried about this. And so, after a while, you’ll have a whole room of people that are wildly anxious – “amygdalated!” But if you can do your own work of calming yourself, that invites other people into a calmer state. There are so many ways in which we subconsciously pick up on what’s happening with other people.
Jim Latimer
Well, that’s a perfect way to end this episode here, Terasa. Thank you very much. What I heard you just say there was this notion of non-anxious presence, right? And it’s not just so the person, the leader, the pastor in this case, for him or herself, right? but the contagiousness of that is also what you hit on there. That is so important, and relevant and realistic. All that good stuff. So, thank you, Terasa, very much for sharing your wisdom on the physiology of conflict.
Terasa Cooley
Thank you, Jim. I’m happy to be with you.