Failure to communicate is often the source of conflict. And it's often the reason why conflict escalates, and persists. Of course, let's not forget that conflict can arise when we understand each other all too well. But more often, it's about failure to communicate. So let's look at how communication works. And it starts with an idea something I want to communicate something I want to put out into the world to say.

And so the next thing is I say it I communicated, I put my message out. The third thing is it hits your ears, your eyes, your sensory system, and your brain starts to interpret it and this is where it starts to go wrong. Because your interpretation is not necessarily what I intended to communicate as a result of your interpretation, the fourth step is that you respond. And that should be my clue as to the extent to which you interpreted my communication as I intended or not. But of course, before I can make that assessment, I need to interpret your response. And then, if I think you've interrupted me correctly, I can assume I communicated Well, if I think you've interpreted incorrectly, if I choose to take responsibility for my communication, I will try again.

But I won't try the same communication. I'll try to do it in a different way. Because if all I do is repeat what I said the first time, then it's likely that you will repeat the same interpretation. We won't move further forward. So good communication means taking responsibility and it's unfair. And if I'm going to communicate well, I first have to take responsibility for the message that I put out to you.

In the hope that you will interpret it correctly. But secondly, I have to take responsibility if you don't interpret it correctly. Now, interpretation itself is the cause of the mistakes that trigger conflict. And we can think of the human brains interpreting system as like a filter. And that filter will do three things. Firstly, it will delete all sorts of information it doesn't think is necessary, and usually it gets it right.

We don't need to know that there's the sound of a fan in the room. We don't need to know this. We don't need to know that. We need to know what's relevant. The problem is that our brain often when we're under stress, deletes inconvenient truths and things we don't want to hear. And that can cause or escalate conflict.

And the second thing our brain can do is generalize it can take a specific fact and make a whole rule about it. And we're good at doing that. And often we get the rules right and they become useful rules to guide our choices in decisions and how many in the workplace. But what if our brain creates the wrong role it generalizes something or assumed something is part of a general condition that it isn't. Once again, we apply a set of rules to what we hear to what we see if we apply the wrong rule back to trigger or escalate conflict. And the final thing that our brain does is it distorts the information because our brain is very good at trying to discern cause and effect and patterns and meanings and things.

It doesn't always get it right. When she says that what she really means is, how on earth can I possibly know what she really means? I am applying a set of rules. I applying an interpretation, and I might be getting it wrong because I have distorted her truth or we try to find cause and effect. When this happens. It happens because And often we get that right.

But sometimes we get it wrong. He did that because when I think he did that, because I'm applying my own set of rules to his behaviors, but he may not have the same set of rules, I may get the wrong chain of cause and effect, there may not even be a chain of cause and effect. It may simply be a random event. Those distortions, those generalizations and deletions, filter information, and they therefore cause the interpretation that we get And when those filters Distort and generalize and delete in appropriately. We get a distorted interpretation that therefore triggers or perpetuates conflict. Your job is to spot when your brain is distorting.

You've got to look past what your brain might be deleting to figure out what that is you need to go Past generalizations and understand the specifics and you also need to spot when the other person is doing that. So that you can start to unlock the solution. resolving conflict