Why "We Never Fight" is a Red Flag: How to Fight Well with Priya Parker

0:00Welcome to We Can Do Hard Things. Today, we have with us a teacher who is going to help us Do one of the hardest things which is learn how to fight effectively well and with love Priya Parker is a facilitator strategic advisor and a claimed author of the art of gathering how we meet in why it matters Trained in the field of conflict resolution Parker has worked on race relations in American college campuses and on peace processes in the Arab world Southern Africa and India. She studied organizational design at MIT public policy at the Harvard Kennedy School and Political and Social Thought at the University of Virginia. Also my major PST buddies for life at the University of Virginia. Priya was three years after me, but PST forever I thought you were gender studies. I was a double major political social thought and studies of women and gender

1:00But anyway, this isn't about me. This is about Priya, but I'm just saying the PST and me sees the PSD in her Is it any surprise that you're a double major of just say it again? Political and social thought and then the other one was studies of women and gender with a minor in espionage You're the only person I know who like really literally uses their major every day. Okay, her new book The Art of Fighting the transformative power of conflict is available now and Holy shit. Do we need this book right now? Welcome Priya Parker Priya Parker So excited. Oh my gosh Let's get into a big fight. Let's get into a big fight right now Let's get it on actually Glennon when I first met you in the flesh and we were part of that together live tour the warm up the onstage

2:04Walk on song was pinks like let's get into a fight Isn't that wild I really love fighting Priya But the frequency of that song like is exactly the right frequency because it's not fear and it's not avoidance But it's fun and joyful and kind of you know Let's get anything you reminded me of it. Well, I don't know how you always figure out exactly what to be writing So that it lands at the exact right time in the world But teaching people how to fight Effectively and with love and with intention seems to be exactly what we need right now and You're the person that we need to teach us So let's start with this You open your book with a story about being at your grandfather's funeral and the minister said

3:08Was explaining the marriage that your grandfather had and the minister said something like oh and those two they never fought They just never fought and the minister meant it as a compliment but your stepmother turned to you and said oh dear Tell us why what was in that oh dear? Why did she say it my stepmother a wise woman was worried that I would take the wrong message? and that Health is not fighting and what she wanted to make sure I knew by the way She was very cognizant that she was in a second marriage to my father That fighting is actually healthy but the right type of fighting is healthy and that if in 50 years of marriage as the minister said Ruth and Lyle Parker never fought That is not necessarily a sign of health and that relationship is my parents and she knew this my parents divorced when my parents

4:15Separated everyone was shocked because they too never fought and Part of what she was just in her you know, she said one word two words right? Oh dear and I was 16 years old and I was so surprised and and you know many years later I'm so grateful She just sort of whispered a little bit of a flick in the air be careful of this narrative Mm-hmm if two people never fight with each other what might that be a sign of? unhealthy peace unhealthy peace avoidance not having enough safety or trust to say the thing an inability to do the hard thing and and so much of what I and I think so many of us see in popular culture is what I would call unhealthy heat right or abuse dominance

5:16Insulting just trying to destroy the other person that is not good But the opposite of unhealthy heat is not Quiet or unhealthy peace It's actually inviting something that is not taught or often even seen in our culture which is what I call healthy heat. I love your Healthy heat is such a beautiful way to understand and Like really see what we're going through right now in the world and in our relationships and in our communities and You say something that I just want to say out loud for the Pod Squad Everyone wants a village But no one knows how to be a villager and Your book to me explains that we don't know how to be villagers because we don't know how to handle that healthy heat of conflict that it's

6:16This conflict is not like a bump in the road that ooh is regrettable in every relationship But it's actually at the center of every meaningful relationship in which you can either move away and not say what you're thinking and Write people off in your head and become alienated from them or you can clear What is blocking that connection and move toward them and I think the heat is so helpful to me because it's like you're getting something out of the oven It's like we feel the heat and we just reflexively let go and we exit before we can engage and what your work is doing right now which feels like So vital that it feels like one of the most important things we can be thinking about and diving into is that you teach us The ovenman the way to You know hold the heat without letting go without burning ourselves without shattering the dish Which is what we do to our communities and our relationships and our organizations is it either

7:21We get burned or we shatter the dish and we walk away and that is why We're lonely we we want to belong so badly, but we're so lonely because we don't Know how to be villagers and the oven is hot. It's hot. It's so hot in here The oven to cook the dish But yeah grab it with your bare hands You put a mat on yes And you don't say oh well, I'm only gonna make cold food for the rest of my life. We're eating cold food That's what we're doing we're eating cold food Or we're not eating at all yes, we long for community we long for a bar or a barbershop or a bodega where everyone knows our name And yet we're not taught I mean you see means of Friend groups right being texted around going viral for all buying you know houses on the same call to sack together And yet so much in our popular culture is only focused on assuming that everything's fun and easy

8:24Yeah, and we're not actually taught that friction is actually formative And groups and communities and friends of all types actually can't form they can't figure out who they are Without a fight Who are we how do we want to do this if we are sharing Call to sack are we sending our Kids into each other's homes are there moments where we actually don't want that are we barring onions without being announcing? Is that the essence of community or is that actually kind of annoying and I I don't want you to do that It's not as complex as we often think about as reckoning It's actually difference and conflict exists in every human relationship Yeah, and when we're not taught the tools so much of our apps so much of even therapy Are teaching us boundary drawing which is helpful But we also need the other side which is connection forging Yes Priya, did we overdo it with the boundaries? This is I feel like

9:26What I love about your work in this book and why I hope everyone get reads it and gets into this is that It is so nuanced We did this binary of like yes either yes no fence, but like I'm in Allonon So I'm all for this sort of vibe, but like either you let them you go dead inside Just let everybody do whatever they want to do or you cut all ties you go no contact your these two Binary's which is like two elements of actually distance Distancing and then we wonder why we're lonely because we have this Binary and you're giving us the wrestling match in the middle Which is how we get close But first we have to decide whether we even need a conflict This is what I love you said how do you fight with those to whom you want to belong? Start with that Not all conflicts are meant to be faced great. I'm not saying everyone should fight more Some people I'm saying we should fight better And in some cases we are having fights that we should actually just sort of let it be they're not

10:27Worth the fight they're not worth facing it not because of conflict aversion But because the fight is revealing okay. Can I give a simple example? Please this was in a like a co-op building in New York City So sort of all of the families you know live on multiple floors and there's these two couples and they Had kids at the same time as often happens not planned but at the same time and then a two or years later They each had second kids basically at the same time and so in a lot of ways they were sort of parallel tracking And while the kids were young they'd exchanged texts and helped you know are you using the quiet out method? Are you using that snott thing and sucking it out of their nose? The answer is yes use that thing And as the kids started getting older they they were able to basically move in and out of each other's homes right five six seven years old And they started having play dates is probably too structured They just went in and out of each other's homes and the and the mother one mother of the one of the couples as they were picking them up Was surprised to see in the other home that a number of the kids were running around naked

11:29and she was just sort of startled and She Thought okay is like is this what we're doing here? Is this okay? Is this healthy? Is this not she actually didn't totally know But she noticed a little you know you you feel that sort of like the charge And I don't know exactly if it was on that play date or another one she kind of took a side and it was the father in that case Of the other family having to be home and said hey I just wanted to check in here. Are we allowing naked play dates? And he leans out and says What do you mean? And she says well if we are I noticed the last time I was here a bunch of the kids were just stripping down and running around And he was getting sort of hurt he were coiling And as she was speaking and she said I just thought you know we should sort of talk about it Like what if we are they're now old enough where and you know she can you can hear her like grappling the you know finding the language

12:32If we are letting our kids into each other's homes Like what does that mean is there someone always home is the door open or closed And he just sort of like kept on recoiling not engaging and she finally was like I just think we should talk about it If we're raising our kids together And he said we are not raising our kids together Okay revealing Right revealing and for that parent the mother is like okay, this is interesting this for me right again nothing to do with him Do I want to continue maybe the type of relationship we had for the first five years Worked because of the needs of the children and the parent and maybe we're not necessarily on the same page For the next five years now she has some choices Mm-hmm And that gets to me. It's like it's revealing Yeah And so maybe less play dates Yeah, or at least I know what we're doing here

13:33And I know what we are to each other and I feel like we're very acclimated to the like DTR the define the relationship in Coupled them But truly in any meaningful relationship you should be doing the DTR With your friends with your community with the people that to find out what is it you're doing here? Are we raising our kids together? Yeah, are we are we not right and sometimes it can be an explicit DTR But what I learned as I was researching for the art of fighting is that there's actually so many studies on groups on group life And one of the most formative studies it came out in the 50s It was by a researcher named Bruce Tuckman and one of the things he found was that a group cannot become a group Without what he called a storm what are we to each other? Are we a community? Are we raising our kids together? Are we not that's actually a sign of progression and it's yeah to become a group You form you kind of come together maybe have a trivia night one time and then you have a trivia night

14:35Six times and nine times people keep coming back together like oh you maybe have a nickname for the group huh? Right the slackers and making this up right and then one day Two of the folks in the trivia group realize they have it at the same bar right it's starting to form It's starting to form this is so fun. This is so great. Wow. Wow. I'm really part of something here and then one day two of the members decide to get sober Hmm and they start going on a journey and they start realizing oh For now, I don't want to be in a bar as my regular Tuesday night. There's only five members Right it invites the storm. What are we? Yeah, are we a trivia group? Is it this bar? Are we just six strangers that keep coming together But we're actually not much to each other It's inherent in the ecosystem and the ecology of a group to form you have to storm and then those who come through the storm to use Tecman's language norm what are we to each other? Let's agree and then perform and then eventually a

15:37Jorn groups also end and they might end one one of the things I'd love so much is like the idea that Okay, when do we need to fight when do we want to fight when do we know it's worth a fight and fight just meaning confronting something asking questions about behavior or why Who are we to each other? It's called relational longing. Okay, so I love so much that you're picking up on this This is so beautiful. This is why you know when Abby and I Came together and I was more like always bringing things up and she was never bringing things up because she was taught that love is just no conflict And I always felt like no love is like constantly wrestling to get to a shared understanding I Inside of me had a relational longing that you call which is okay, Pots. God listen to this We don't fight because we hate each other and want nothing to do with each other anymore We fight because we are yearning to be in relationship with each other still

16:39Perhaps just not in the form of the relationship we're currently in When that's no longer true. We don't fight we leave Where there is strong feelings there is energy energy is easier to work with than apathy Because there's a there there. This is from Priya's book So what I think is so simple and beautiful about this is We know we should fight if we feel a longing to be in relationship with that person But differently if somebody's doing some shit. We don't like and we don't long to be in relationship with them But bye right? Yes But the yearning for closer relationship or more aligned relationship is the signal to us correct Yes, that we should engage in conflict pay attention to the tension Hmm, I learned this term relational longing. I actually think she kind of like first said it on our interview So for the art of fighting I I spent time with three types of groups individuals who

17:42profession is fighting So conflict resolution facilitators for sort of justice practitioners lawyers And then a group of people who are in conflict and those are my characters. So a taiko drumming circle a Boy scout troop a church deciding in the 90s whether or not to allow for gay marriage And then the third category is people who study conflict and say to nair is a facilitator and she on a call with me While she was describing this amazing work she did with a local government agency that had erupted into a flag war Between black lives matter flags and blue lives matter flags She was telling me the work she did with them and she said at the center of what I do I know that there's hope if I can help a group tap into their relational longing And she said the relational longing is the residual even underneath the mad the hurt the upset underneath if you can still almost tap into this River below of still of a residual desire for connection

18:46Makes so much sense just on a practical level It's like the quality of the conflict you're talking about because there are some conflicts that are so Worthy that it's just clear that they're the ultimate compliment. It's like an investment in A possibility that doesn't yet exist But something you treasure so much that you're willing to put in the effort to see if it can exist And then there is a quality of conflict that can be just like someone bringing you garbage So like how do you tell if you're I mean most of us are what we would call conflict averse I just can't handle it. I just can't handle it and you're saying no, it's a skill The reason you can't handle it is you haven't learned the skills the tactical things you need to learn to equip yourself to handle it so I'm wondering Both from the perspective of if I'm someone who feels that kind of churning in me And I'm trying to figure out oh god. Do I stay quote unquote safe by not bringing this up or am I brave enough to risk saying something

19:57And if someone brings something to me How do I tell whether it's like disregard at its garbage or there is some kind of compliment of investment Being offered to me whether you're conflict avoidant or conflict seeking just because someone likes to fight Doesn't mean they're good at it That's for sure correct So just like you know just because it's the conflict aversion is just sort is unhealthy piece But conflict seeking can also be unhealthy heat Yeah, we all need to learn these skills Priya you should use Abhinized an example of that at some point in the world because we've decided as a couple that I always know when there should be a conflict I know when we should go and I do not know how I should never do it I should never ever do it like I should bring it to Abbie Not go with my instincts and then she will believe me that we should engage in some sort of conflict But she as a brilliant leader will lead us through the how that's

20:59Awesome I often joke like there's often a conflict seeking in a conflict avoidant person and they're often married to each other No, it's like chasing the other one around the room for her really you know like Literally Priya When I talk about unhealthy heat I'm also like I am not talking about abuse I am not talking about domination like there is no space for that in any of what we're talking about This is what I like healthy heat and I loved your question Amanda So first of all one of the books that really informed this book is on Called on repentance and repair by rabbi donya rutt and berg beautiful book We have an episode on that go back and check it We'll link it in the notes to this so you can refer to it. I'm so happy So one of the things she says just to kind of like get it out there is we all cause harm We all experience harm and we all witness harm There are not harmers and non-harmers There's not harmed and non-harmed

22:00And that is actually it's sort of a relief So as you're listening to us like Amanda I loved your question both how do you know if you are the one wanting to say something But also what if you're on the receiving end right of the of the facing So if you I have actually I open the book to this because I actually have questions of how do you decide whether or not to face Can I just read some of those it's a lot of their defining is actually about Inviting discernment Yes curiosity. What's happening here? What's happening with me? What is it that I want this to be do I believe I can alter it by doing something? So here it's questions to decide whether to face or not Can I continue to engage meaningfully without facing Do I care enough about this relationship or group to take this on do I still have longing for this relationship or group? Is this conflict touching on a core value of mine? And does the group or the community or the relationship need to reflect those values from me to be a part of it

23:02This came up I wrote about a group of girlfriends in the art of fighting who are friends for 30 years They grew up in a rural town in North Carolina. They've been friends since kindergarten. They're now in their 30s and 40s The late entry joined in sixth grade And over the pandemic as this happened in many groups There was an unspoken internal reckoning in which they got onto a zoom happy hour like so many did during the pandemic And within a few minutes They basically multiple people said things that kind of shocked and horrified the other side About the pandemic like that's it's fake or it's overblown about those quote-unquote dangerous Protests and those dangerous cities half of whom had been on the streets By the way, these are all white women majority except for one woman One of them deemed me on Instagram what you know when you research for Book a lot I said anybody have a have a group fight and DM me and she slid into my DMs and she said I do And I ended up talking to half of the group to sort of understand what was happening And the core question that at least four of them have to answer they had gone on a journey

24:05They had gone on a progressive journey. They had gone on a racial they had been developed racial awareness They lived in cities where white wasn't necessarily the normal or ubiquitous thing like they had changed and been altered and yet They loved their childhood friends, but they were also Kind of horrified by some of their beliefs and they had to really reckon with a question that so many of us do Which is is this conflict touching on a core value of mine? And then the second thing that they really had to think about Does the group need to reflect those values for me to be a part of it? It's an open question As many of you know who listened to this podcast Dressing myself is a huge challenge for me the clothes I end up loving the most aren't ever the trendy ones They are the ones that somehow make me feel kind of put together But also completely comfortable if that's you too

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26:12It left me feeling informed and also pretty dang inspired too. I love giving masterclass Memberships as gifts for this very reason Encouraging the people around me to stop doom scrolling and instead keep learning Masterclass keeps adding new classes so there's never been a better time to get in right now as a listener of this show You get at least 15% off any annual membership at masterclass.com slash hard things 15% off at masterclass.com slash hard things head to masterclass.com slash hard things to see the latest offer Okay, friends. You know how I love love love a bargain But I also want qualities. I just can't stomach Exorbitant retail prices which is why I am very excited to make sure you know about rebel Okay rebel is an online marketplace for returned open box and overstock products and they're from brands like Grayco kitchen a nuna curieg

27:13They're all assavings of up to 70% off retail also ideal for the trendy stuff that your family might Really want but you don't want to break the bank on I was on there the other day and they had a Stanley Tumbler for 16 bucks rebel also inspects every item and clearly labels its condition before it's listed plus you're giving Perfectly usable products another chance instead of having them end up in a landfill Head to from rebel.com to shop daily deals on top baby home and kitchen brands save up to 70% off retail That's from rebel.com What I loved about that example in the book Priya is that it opened up this third way Where it wasn't like throwing out the baby with the bath water one of the women reached out to One of the women who had been basically insulted you know on the call

28:16And said I saw that it's not okay. I'm sorry Do you want to connect and it ended up being that like you know half of the group Really reconnected in a very meaningful way together and they took it forward So instead of having you know a wide but shallow set of relationships they had a narrower but deeper set and so That sometimes feels like the choice you have to make and that you don't have to have the same relationship with everybody Right and even in a group you don't everyone doesn't have to be equally close I sometimes work with intergenerational families and real example of a second generation Elder came to me and said it's so terrible Like we are all in clicks in our family I wish we would all just get along And what I said to her was it is totally normal and in fact healthy to have different textures of relationships within the families

29:20It's if there's so much distance and there's antagonism between the clicks But having proximity and distance across different people is not a bad thing. It's totally normal It actually those cross ties strengthen the group and so part of what happened in this group and this friend circle was Four of them got on zoom with me and they were really grappling They is it was the heartache right? It was the relational longing and at some level they realized one of the women She said to me is I keep thinking about should I face that woman or not my friend for 30 years who will literally fly across the country for me when I have surgery But I'm also like can't understand how she's reacting to this pandemic Mm-hmm the first conflict is within me loyalty Right versus alignment. I'm loyal to her. She's loyal. She would literally like stand up on a traffic for me But some of her beliefs are actually affecting a different part of me And so she went through these questions and to continue the list knowing conflict arises in every group Are these the people I want to be in a mess with?

30:21So another thing is we tend to run away. It's like ah, this is a dysfunctional group or oh when people call me They're like I'm sorry. We're so dysfunctional. I'm like it's not dysfunction Right, so the relevance is coming up. He is coming up and so you go to another group if you say long enough They'll be a mess So yeah, is it what these people are? Is someone else is the conflict making the group worse? How might not facing heart the group? Can I imagine vibrancy in this group in a different form? Do I think that by saying something I could alter the situation That's important. There's also actually core conflict theory Lewis Kreisberg one of the fathers of conflict resolution He doesn't say it like this, but this is basically one of the four indicators of whether or not conflict can Create change will I regret not trying and counterintuitively you're all gonna love this? Do I want to be closer to this person? Yeah, that's good Yeah And when you say can I continue to engage meaningfully like when I'm imagining that group the pandemic group that you're describing

31:27And some of them are like there's no pandemic and are completely un-race aware you know all of that I'm thinking Do you mean can I Show up to this group and still be embodied and say what I need to say because if I were in that group Yeah, the only way for me to stay would be to completely disembodied To not say are you freaking kidding me? So is that part of it that in order to stay in a group meaningfully we have to Be able to say what comes up in real time and stay embodied and not dissociate You know, I'm not a therapist and I I use the word meaningfully purposely Okay, because meaning is relative Meaning what's meaningful to you might mean I need to say the thing in the moment Because this is what I know is gonna keep me healthy and therefore for me

32:29Authentic meaningful connection means that that needs to be true. Otherwise. I'm destroying part of myself Mm-hmm for someone else It might be this becomes my dancing group. I go out dancing with these friends. I go play soccer with them I don't need to have meaningful. That's not what they're there for one of the things that the friend who called to texted And he said oh my gosh, that was not okay. I saw that and I'm so sorry It was actually a racialized comment and it was a white woman texting the only Mexican American in the group It was her birthday. It was the Mexican American girls woman's birthday and someone jokingly hit says she said I can't be here very long in the zoom I need to go and one of the other women said oh is it a tacos and tequila party? Jesus and in her head and she told me this in the interview like she was like this shit again Like this shit again and she left and that's when her friend texted her and said I'm so sorry like my heart fell into my stomach That was not okay and what that woman was doing her friend was doing is she was providing for the first time

33:30Her friend what I call a meter check She was being an anti-gas lighter So if everyone in a group basically Pretend something else isn't happening or frankly just doesn't see it right and racially to prefer groups and religious diverse groups Sometimes we actually are truly missing each other. We don't realize it She was actually saying hey, you know the term gaslight came it got popularized actually in the first Trump election I went back and look at sort of the genealogy of it But it came from a play in 1924. There's a play called gaslight and it was about and it's terrible It was about a man who was literally slowly driving his wife crazy by pretending to flicker the lamp on and off on and off on and off And every time she'd say do you see that he'd say no And so I asked and I asked like if we continue this metaphor What is this friend doing and if we update our our gaslight to the modern electrical age She's providing a meter check she's going in and she's actually seeing is there gas in this lamp

34:31Look, there's gas in this lamp. I mean this is the meter check the meter says there's whatever 50% full and so by saying hey, that was not okay for the first time the the Mexican American friend was like Oh my gosh, by the way, she's gone on a journey as all of us do she moved to a new city She had therapy she started realizing that the thing that the comments that they used to all tease each other She was the different one. This is what she said to me Some of the jokes the way they'd tease her were about being Mexican But everyone else was teased also in other ways and part of she's like what am I gonna say for I've never said anything Now for the first time in 30 years I'm gonna say something is like wow you've changed All of a sudden you've gotten sensitive and so when her friend texted proactively It was actually one of the most healing moments for her Oh Someone else is seeing this I have a question about One of the ways that you talk about unhealthy peace is you know not saying the thing we're thinking toxic politeness That kind of vibe of you know, I am holding this in the back of my head, but I'm not bringing it forward

35:36It feels like often so for example in that example you just said someone says something that's not acceptable And if you said something in that moment because if I'm the woman who received that text after Part of me is like why the hell didn't you say that in the moment why you texting me after exactly so One of the problems that we have is that like So-and-so says something then if I were to say What are you talking about I am the one bringing the conflict right totally but if I am being toxicly polite Then I'm not saying something so in some ways it's like we have to re-understand conflict As reinterpreting who is the origin of it because Responding to a conflict the person who brought the conflict was the person who made that Unacceptable comment. I'm just responding to it. I'm not bringing the conflict because I am addressing the conflict You've brought so correct talk to us about like kind of a license to and I feel like that overrides our entire political

36:44World right now where some people might say something that is deeply offensive to us if we respond to that We always have to make things full of conflict But the person who says whatever the hell they want whenever they want to is never the one being accused of bringing conflict The tukko and tequila comment in a way is what in the book I call a triggering event So something happens in a group and yes to your point like Somebody says something somebody does something that is not okay, but there's a Servable witnessed moment And then there's a tear is what I call it. There's a tear right and then there's a moment where you have to decide Do I face or not face right? Do I say something or not say something do I want to is this the group one of the questions that those women said is Do I want to be a new mess with this group party was like not really so part of what they kind of Through was like actually this is making me realize that I'm actually not as close to them anymore

37:47They really are my childhood friends And if I want to use my limited labor. I'm also a mom. I'm also a working person Actually and I and I have a limited amount of juice Maybe I want to take that to my current colleague Right who said something and that's actually where I want to really focus and be have a generative right do I want to continue having this relationship with somebody So that's the first thing I'd say and then I also think You're part of what I hear under your question is about is a question about power dynamics Right, so it's like the uncle who in a family Thanksgiving that's always saying this is like Right poking the bear or saying stuff and everyone's just like Not sure what to do and freezes and I have a example in the book. It's actually a family. It's a woman who came to me Those years ago who had been part of a Passover sater in her family for decades And as a child as she told me it was one of the most meaningful It was the way the family sort of clung together multiple generations her grandmother was a Holocaust survivor

38:51It was the way they came together they come together three days They would eat and cook when just it says and it was also it was like so many of our families whatever culture you're from Whether it's Thanksgiving or whether it's Passover whether it's Easter These family moments actually hold so much more They become the moments were sort of metabolizing and witnessing like what are we? Who are the parkers now? We have all these new in-laws like what does it mean to be us And one of the moments at the Passover she said you know when a niece came and brought her new fiance and her chair fell And he didn't instinctively go to catch it Everyone there knew that the relationship was over Like all of these things are witnessed right is that and we all have this like forget the exact cultural specificity And this one woman she came to me she we're on a zoom and she started crying She said over the last decade It's what was so much joy and binding has become like very painful. I don't like going anymore We have it within our family such deep political disagreement I get sick every time my kids get sick every time there's like

39:55animosity between family members like and then the pandemic hit Which gave them actually all a break? They couldn't gather and in that case she came to me and then she I was taking the call And I was on zoom and she just went silent And I like toggled back to look at her because I was taking notes and she was crying And she said I'm so sorry. I'm crying And I said no, no, no, don't apologize Crying is actually is the relational longing and she said I wish I didn't care so much Right you can just feel it right here, but I do like what do I do? I'm stuck And what she ended up doing to go back to the it's not I'm not the conflict creator someone else is behaving this way Is in a family and in all groups there are power dynamics. There is hierarchy And so the first things she did there's also often punishment Maybe not on the zoom call within friends, but in a workplace or in a family when someone says the thing at the table

40:55There may be even more blowback right sometimes conflict a version is wisdom. Yeah, this is this is nuance. This is complex But part of what I had her first due was go I said are there any is there anyone else? Let's just focus on this structure of the family gathering Do you think there's anyone else who also is kind of over it over this form of it? It does not want to come and then she's like oh, yeah Well, this cousin hasn't come for years And these three cousins are definitely on the fence and she was like well, where are your allies? There you go Yes, I love that There are your allies and part of the art of fighting is like It's not what you would do in that room or what don't you do in the room? Fortunately relationships are dynamic and you often get more chances to practice It's actually a rotation to zoom out and ask what facilitators ask is just what does the need here? Yes, what is the need for this family in this moment? And part of what she ended up doing is working with her other cousins to Stage a coup no to to ask Is this still the form we actually want to meet in yeah, and years later when I checked in with her

41:59She said you know part of the grief I was feeling was a internal conflict with my own Jewishness and this was the Forcing mechanism Passover Seder is just what we do was kind of The moment for three days a year that was the form I was wrestling with my Jewishness And so she went on a journey and it doesn't mean throw them away. No, no, no We should not be cutting off our families forever families also lineages deeply matter But every group and family at over time changes And to become cognizant that these transition moments Our moments of danger, but also deep opportunity the need is so huge and that I feel like underlies so much of your work both in gathering and conflict is Discerning the need like what is the real need here?

43:00That is kind of one of the main mistakes that you identify is that people jump super quickly or Or like latch on to what they think it is so maybe it's the Do we or do we not do Passover as a family? But that is kind of Just not even the most important need the wrong question right so how talk us through Discerning the need and like when you have that thing that pops up how to figure out the thing that six levels under that That is the thing you actually need to be talking about There's actually a term for it and it's called ritual asking and part of the invitation of this book I don't think everyone should become a facilitator like a specialized facilitator I actually think facilitation skills are human skills This shouldn't be a specialized field. Yes for super complex stuff great In the same way we teach people to write and read we should teach people how to actually fight How to hold a fight how to repair how to apologize how to discern what is the need here

44:01And so during 2020 there was a lot of reckoning's and you may have heard In-con in organizations and families in all sorts of religious institutions and I was a facilitator That was called in like many of my peers to do some of that repair work and it was on zoom right so 50 squares 80 squares People can just hit a red button and leave like we had to learn new skills. How do we actually host this? And I got onto the phone so the first thing is just like with the art of gathering 90% of the success of the facing Happens before the facing. Yes This is a big theme that like we think there's a problem and our first instinct is get everyone together and talk about it And yes that is can come from a brave place the people who are willing to do that But you're like stop the training cases of emergency sometimes you can make it 10 times worse So do the work. So what are you supposed to do first? I'll slow down Slow down Don't just dive in chapter three is called not so fast

45:09No running near the pool Yeah, not so fast so chapter two I'm like people were avoiding we're avoiding we're avoiding and then I when I on these calls I finally get someone to face it then chapter three is like great. Let's host a zoom on Monday And it's like no, no, no, no, no slow down Slow down slow down first you didn't figure out what is happening here What is this about what is the need and so the ritual asking is what is the is asking over and over again to yourself And if possible to others who are you know, head care and a part of this what is the need of this group right now What is the need not of the individual person what is happening kind of zoom out? There is an English law firm that was like 30 years old and They were trying to diversify like many firms and One of the things they realized was people don't always say the thing So they create a slack channel. This is super interesting. They create a slack channel called elephant in the zoom Those English they're so clever

46:11So clever so witty and and idea was if you have a question that you feel like you either don't know the answer to but also like you kind of want to say it put it in here And again, does this work does this not work to people actually use it all great questions new intern came and happened to be joining the week of the World Cup in 2022 This person was queer and young and a totally different generation than many of the other people and knew the world cup was happening you know doing his work and And was like shocked and and like really stunned that half of the people in the firm were wearing English football shirts That during the game they rolled out TVs and everyone stopped working and watched the World Cup and he's like what the heck is going on like in in his mind in a country It was in Qatar that bands homosexuality and with all these human rights like okay fine. It's happening We're gonna pause work to watch this Put it into the slack Maybe we could think about whether or not we watch the World Cup given all the human right it's abuses in Qatar

47:14Right thanks. Oh, let me just say the thing Uh-huh Dear reader it did not go well What they didn't understand was happening is they triggered a deep cultural trip wire in the firm That no one would have said if you had said what matters here And it grows into this then into this confrontation first With somebody who's pulling in the TV and then like and it grows and grows and grows and then three days later And also down a second because this is like all of the dynamics come up the partners here But they don't know about it because they're not on slack Right the older generations often not on these communication channels Seize the comment on their assistance phone because the assistant puts in front of their face And then knee jerk like comes from a good place. Well, let's get everyone together about and talk about it Send out a company wide email With a calendar hold saying World Cup colon. What do we think?

48:20And by the way you may be like this is extreme. It's not It's just a work version of like let's get everyone together and talk about it What what can and the mental model of that partner was I'm a founder here We've always gotten together around the table and just sort of this out And actually he didn't realize his power right or how much weight that was putting on the intern And it was the wrong question. What do we think about it? What do we think is a really big question It's too big with a million different answers. It's asking the wrong people Who cares what everybody thinks this actually isn't a democracy And it was the wrong question and I want to fast forward to you know, if I was advising them what the right question is And it's this is a complicated thing so we can say ha ha ha those you know those people who need jerked house of the zoom and on the zoom Like the loudest person spoke first. It was half hybrid half zoom The first person who spoke was not a person trying to create Context not everyone had the same story some people like why am I calling into the zoom right? It actually created more of a mess and the question they should have asked is

49:24What's happening here? What is the need here for us as a firm and then by the way leader should be asking this What is the need here? What is actually the need here? Why is this happening and the question underneath is If we say we want to bring people who are different from us What do we do with our most beloved rituals When they exclude the people were trying to attract That's an interesting question That's a question that every group every company every institution every church who's trying to bring in new members Faces that's a universal question. That's what I call a worthy grapple and not everyone should answer that question Let's bring it to family because I think when we Go smaller we can see it. Yeah more and you know Let's say one of the things I love about the book is that if I am in a family And I am

50:24Feeling a major conflict. Let's say every time we get together my mother mistreats my father in a way that like Hurts me and makes me feel like it's setting about example for my children. There's a behavior in the family That I feel is heartful and harmful and I Also feel a deep relational longing for my family to be gathered It's a beautiful example and deeply relatable. I think to many people right So let's say that this behavior has been going on since I was a child, right? But suddenly I have the consciousness and I'm a parent so I have a responsibility to the next generation and It's so fascinating because it became clear when I was reading that when this imaginary person is considering confronting the mother about this behavior The question is underneath is who are we as a family? Are we a group who decides it's important that we all treat each other kindly?

51:30The daughter is thinking that it is important to me. What do we allow here? What do we allow but the mother is thinking a family is something maybe where the old guard rules and the young guard part of this is allowance for to wrestle forward To allow conflict Beautiful futures Right to like beautiful to allow like the old guards of things Part of cultures being we allow confrontation From the late the newest generation We want that so we can grow forward Let's take that micro example. We are in a family the grown daughter has identified behavior in the mother That she does not think she can allow anymore in the family How does she put on her oven mitt what preparation does she do before and how does she confront this is beautiful So I would start with a set of questions

52:32And still much of the art of fighting as I want to make you a better question askers So here are some of the questions the first is because at some level again that reckoning is starting within her Great as their parallel or shared friend Recently said the biggest moments in any family's life is the entrance of a new member and the exit of a member And part of what that woman the mother is is happening to her meaning the the daughter great the daughter who now is a mother Is with the entrance of the daughter of her own daughter. She now has a witness Yeah, and part of what's happening is she is now part of a lineage and what's happening within her It are these questions that by the way we all have What is it from my lineage that I want to pass through And what stops here There's a woman. I know Jennifer Yinello. She's an amazing coach and she says our work here is to expand our range of options

53:34So what I would want to say to her is I want to expand her range of options of Of the choices she can make in that moment all of the work of the art of fighting is expand our range of options expand our geography of possibility Of what she could do both within her and then within her own her lineage and I'll just give a couple of different examples I'm not judging them right or wrong, but expanding our range of options one is the inoculation theory Which is I'm going to talk to my children About what is happening here And Discuss it with them and talk to them about that's not what we do That is the pattern that I've seen for 50 years it causes me deep pain. It's not okay And I may talk to grandma on the side, but I want you to know that this is not how we family Right, it did not meaning you inoculate the by the way, this is it may not be that but we all should be doing that

54:35I'm not trying to be tongue in cheek about this, but when you were talking An example came up that went recently viral about the Orioles in the school. Did you see this? Oh? Yes, did you see this Okay, go there for a sec. Yes, please or you okay, okay, please I'm gonna pause and I'm gonna say with a very large asterisk I'm not comparing these two situations in terms of their severity or sincerity severity or sincerity but In terms of inoculation So there is this group chat a parent and a mother was on a group chat with other mothers in her school And someone came on the group chat and said can you please stop sending Orioles In your with your kids school lunch because I don't give my daughter Orioles and she's coming home crying every day And one of the other mothers to her credit said wait something like I'm not I should probably read it Wait, what like what's I don't understand what you're asking me to change what I send my daughter to school

55:37And she's like I don't understand then the other person the the woman who first asked for it is like I don't understand Why why don't I actually know it's so important I don't want to respect she's like why can't you respect the way I want to parent my daughter And they're like come now and they're like we each get to Bring what we want to lunch and she's like well, I don't understand what you wouldn't do this You're they're excluding my daughter and they're like no no no we're not excluding your daughter So then the woman goes to the school and the school that sends out an email and says could we please Think about possibly packing healthy lunches But it doesn't say no Orioles So then they go back and say I can't believe you went to the school and she said well, I actually think we should have some agreements here It's gone totally viral and I think a lot of people are hating on the Mom saying don't bring Orioles There's two elements here one is inoculation theory We all are raising our children in a culture in some way that we disagree with double steps about

56:41And so part of the parenting is to Teach your child resilience and that we have these values and you're gonna go enter into a world where people have all sorts of other Values and we are people who don't eat Orioles because of this but here's an apple right? It's building the resilience of the child That's the inoculation theory that is by the way all of community I mean it's interesting because I was judging like while you were talking I was judging this Oriole mom so hard But then also what was coming up is I have felt versions of that like I have been I have secretly been like if we just all don't give our kids Phones in the utero exactly we maybe could so could we all come together and just or for example The parent who insists on sending peanuts even though there's an allergy in the classroom and that is something we could So there is like you know your parents in the classroom are sending their kid with cigarettes and they're smoking at lunch Like we might all come together. There are levels exactly. There are levels. There are and part of what I'm gonna

57:43Bring it home to the family, but part of what the school had to do there was decide Where's the freedom of choice in their membership and where are they actually agreeing and enforcing a common norm? And part of what that woman was doing and the Oriole is a perfect example because it's it feels so silly And there's like you're gonna ask my like you're gonna control what I put my lunch Honestly all of America at different levels is fighting about who gets to bring what right and what are the rules? We all enforce for us to have collective a collective and shared experience and not hurt one another What we're disagreeing about is what is hurt. Yes. Yes furniture is one of those purchases where I can spend approximately 900 years deciding what I want so I shop with article They make modern furniture that feels adult and elevated but still is so reasonably priced article works directly with manufacturers which helps them offer high quality

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1:01:52Bringing back to your friend One is the inoculation theory another is thinking about that again 90% of the facing happens before the facing what is her need Is it to once just say to her mother for herself? I love you so much It hurts me and breaks my heart the way you again and what are you going to say when you and then not treat dead observable behaviors yell at dad in front of everybody observable behaviors, okay, right? Don't label don't Don't just observable behaviors when you do x it makes me feel why so you wouldn't say it hurts me the way you mistreat dad Because that's a judgment so you have to say it hurts me when you yell it hurts me when you if I was in a session What this is what we do in common resolution facilitation sessions and so Also sometimes just saying the thing is messy it is as it is as progress So there you know all as I see in the art of well art of fighting welcome to the mess and

1:02:53Part of what is helpful when we're thinking about pro social connection Across that boundary right one boundary drawing of like I'm out of here right I'm cutting free of my family But to practice sort of getting in there Right relational boundary drawing is to make it here in a way that they can't deny the behavior So part of it is actually an effect to alter her not because she's not mistreating him. She is mistreating him But if the purpose is to try to say something that alters the person naming a specific observable behavior that they can't wriggle out of or storm off of because you've called them something Makes it as clean as possible These moments are actually very fragile. There's so many threats to them And so finding a way to sort of make the arrow as clear as possible And to help it land so that has a potential to alter and by the way if she doesn't alter Your friend has made her piece that she said something to her mother And then it's a different choice if a she goes back into that home or b

1:03:56It's actually that home that gets them stuck in their roles and hey You know what this year we're all going to go to Disney World for Thanksgiving right this year We're actually going to all meet at the beach and do a picnic this year we're going to do a kickball game I have a sub stack called group life and every month I teach a webinar Just one simple skill of group skills I called group help instead of self-help And on a Thanksgiving during Thanksgiving last year I had a webinar called How to hold healthy heat with your family over Thanksgiving And when to turn it down And one of the elements the one of the most surprising things in the artifacting for me as I researched it was often Not to engage not to face the thing But to engage in strategic conflict avoidance in certain cases if you choose you still want to be in relationship with these But to water the garden around it to have fun to grow connection like Conflict shouldn't be sterile. It should actually be part of a dynamic thriving hilarious

1:04:57Thing and often after a fighter facing into a friend group this happened to they had a reckoning that a facing and everyone just had that bad taste They're mouth like they said the thing but then they're all kind of like grieving afterwards and just trying to figure it out Just like didn't really want to see each other and then they happen to like all be invited to the same dance party for like another friend And so and like part of this is like oh, okay, I guess we're gonna sit you know God, okay, we'll go Also great no one was hosting it in the group friend group. There's no powered dynamics There's no are you going or not they show up the song comes on It's like they're anthem and like despite themselves right they find themselves in the middle of the dance floor like dancing slapping their high like looking at each other laughing Remembering that they love each other Right, and so it's like also make sure you're watering the garden You can't always change up your parents You don't have much time left them like have an effing blast with them Take them on adventures that they would never otherwise do like shift it up

1:05:59And then make sure you are parenting and modeling what you can and honestly like for for me at least from my perspective If my daughter sees me trying Tears me scared but trying seeing me do the hard thing I told my kids that I was going on a podcast today called we can do hard things And my son gassed and he's like wow Because I often I mean I got it from I often say we can do hard things Yeah, right we can face we can talk to our mom in a private moment Right, it's not necessarily. I mean even on that zoom call. Yes. There one option is saying the thing in the moment There's so many reasons we often don't I mean I kick myself half the time. Why don't I say anything? Why don't I say anything? Why don't I say I wish I said this but the good news is It's a dynamic relationship and we want to expand our range of options, but first what's the need How are the many ways I could do this and then how do I want to move forward if that person is up for it in these other ways

1:07:00And often having fun together Chuckling asking specific magical questions that have nothing to do with politics Getting people to hear questions answers from grandma that they've never heard because they don't thought to ask Right water the garden water the garden Conflict shouldn't just be in a vacuum There's a wonderful essay by Joyce Ann Mercer called fighting like Christians and she's talking about her Christian family. She's a theologian And she says one of the things after church conflict that is really important to do Is make sure you continue daily business. You're meeting in other ways, right? You're having the bake sale You're meeting for worship. You're going to do the Community drive the clothing swap in part because we get really stuck in binary and conflict And so just having a moment to like experience each other again in these other ways It just takes a little bit of out of the of the charge out of it and remembers. Oh, we're a blanket here We're weaving something and this isn't the only patch Yeah, and I guess that models that conflict is part of it

1:08:01It's not just something that stops everything It's like just part of the ongoing work of being in relationship And what you said I keep thinking about the COVID group that you're talking about and it's helped me figure something out which is that You know Abby and I are always struggling with the idea of like am I like too rigid? Am I too like I can only be friends with people who think this way And that has honestly been the case That is true for me But based on what you're saying. I don't think that's true I don't think that I have to only be friends with people who think like me But I do think I can only be friends with people who have the shared understanding That we in our friendship and our micro groups are going to acknowledge and wrestle with macro things Beautiful. I think I could be friends with that COVID group with those

1:09:02Stupid people in it if the stupid people were open to Constant wrestling with my righteous self like if I They would think I was really righteous. I would think they were stupid But if we had a shared understanding that we weren't going to pretend we weren't those things And that when things came up we were going to do some wrestling with it And we weren't all going to just smile and be polite about it I don't think I need everyone to think like me but I do think I need people who agree in group That we're going to acknowledge hard things and not ignore them Which is pre-as definition of a group in terms of all groups are defined by the questions they pursue together Yes, which is it's not the answers that they have It's the questions they pursue and then the second thing being that all groups offer something to The individual and the individual offers something to the group So I think that that framework is so helpful to me to be like

1:10:05Do I really want to invest myself in it? Do I really want to show up to this thing? You can reframe it not about do I like those people but am I still interested in the pursuit of the questions that this group Is Grappling with and sometimes the questions just aren't that interesting? Yes, I'm interesting enough to keep your Attention. Yeah, I'm convinced yes. Are there questions still my questions? Yeah, one of my favorite examples in the group and one of the in the book that I that I spent the most time with was this Tyco drumming circle. Oh, I loved them Right Tyco drumming circle and I was like wait, what what what what is this? So Tyco is this Japanese art where these and then historically it's all men and it's a very higher article sport And you it's called playing drums and you you sort of hit these massive drums. It's a sort of physical art dance And there was a group of women Asian women

1:11:08Who kind of defiantly created a Tyco group that was going to be a cooperative Meaning it was not going to be a hierarchy. There was not going to be a sensei and they became more and more popular and Long story short They're they're over time one of the women was like I think actually I should be the leader and they're like what Like no, no, no, no, no like where what this is the antithesis of who we are Like you want to be the leader and They got mediators they like talk to each other and then one day they went and opened the locker and the drums were gone Hmm and they were like oh my gosh and they had no more resources and While they're figuring out what to do and like the woman it's like we were conflict diverse Why we're figuring out what to do they to stay in shape would like work out together They beat pillows together they go running together They were so conflict diverse at some level, but also maybe why is like we don't do we really want her

1:12:09If this is what she needs maybe the next right formation is for her to form a group with a hierarchy Maybe this is the best thing that ever happened to us and they literally like ordered leather And watched youtube videos to learn how to make they made their own drums wow And then the next generation they were then very successful for 10 years and Emmy the character in this book joined heard the drum story Because they were so clear as a cooperative. They were then much more clear that this is who we are now And as they became better and better they started getting invited to perform at the Olympics They started having these sold out crowds because this new member was making them really good Long story short over 10 years the issue came up again a new member came in and wanted to be the sensei and had made them much better And was starting to change how they rehearse and Emmy in one of the performances it basically feels like they're no longer who they're supposed to be like not everyone gets Share time the oldest member of the group that was part of the drum making who was like wild and free

1:13:10But couldn't keep a beat was like no longer on the roster And long story short we go through the sort of arc with this carrot with Emmy and she ends up like in a performance Jumping so high that she ends up falling to the ground. She tears her ACL She ends up in the emergency room and as she tells me she she sets there and she weeps And she realizes it's over and not just because of her injury And as she started realizing she basically realized that for 10 years the questions that the group was Can do we need to dress feminine just because we're women What does it actually mean can I smile on stage if I'm in my supposed to smile on stage? Do I not smile on stage the context that the group held the questions of her life And as the group became more and more about performance and execution and excellence and attracted professional dancers The questions they were asking For good questions, but they were no longer the questions she was interested in

1:14:13And so it was time to part That's beautiful. What is your best advice For when someone comes to you Someone that you have relational longing for and says you're hurting me or brings conflict to you. Yeah, and let's just say they're not doing it in like a super enlightened Priya back away because usually people aren't there yet, right? So yeah when I was reading you It made me think so much about how when people bring something to us Even though it's usually packaged unwisely It's an act of great love. It's like a person saying I care so much about my relationship With you or I respect and love you so much that I am doing this incredibly hard and brave Thing which is tell you that but usually it sounds something like you suck So it's hard to hear I love you totally

1:15:15Yeah, totally right. It's like here. I'm placing all of this risk that I conjured from my soul and placing in your left But it usually sounds like why are you so unthoughtful? How do we translate it real quick? How do we do it next? I mean the first thing is you I mean this is what I try to do and by the way This happens to me when people deliver it beautifully right? Yeah, right like you can deliver beautiful I was like I wonder what you know, so first of all like if it's me like the if it happens to me like the blood goes out of my face And it may just be a text yes, I'm a moment of chat. Oh god. No No, don't Right, so I'll tell you what I try to do is by the way if they are coming at me in a way that doesn't feel fair I get really defensive and I'm it's very very hard for me to hear it if I feel like they're insulting me And so I honestly I sometimes I'll even just be like I need a moment and I like there's so much princess hemp Hill

1:16:19The amazing facilitator It says you know conflict is physical, but just not in the way we think Mm-hmm right it's physical within us And so one of my favorite chapters of the book is I ask Prentice what are their rituals before they go into hold a fight So the first is just notice this is super uncomfortable, right? I my symptoms my heart source palpitating my tongue gets dry I sometimes feel kind of dizzy. I feel angry. I feel shame. They're not even said the thing yet Right, I know it's coming. I know it's coming. I know I probably did something wrong. Yeah, you know Yeah, you're flattered What things you did do? What are you? Which one they're gonna bring up? And all right, well like a little like cat with like a mouse in my like a little like And so the first is like notice and this has helped me like oh there it happens again Just notice the physicality and breathe breathe breathe and I mean some of this and I have a cemented coach

1:17:20I work with for my own facilitation tapping my chest Breathing very deeply calming my body and then trying to hear Right also some of this is it's helpful to have conversations like this like oh, maybe this is healthy heat So if you've never seen a model before It's hard to know that this is what's actually happening And so trying to remember this conversation this podcast episode you heard pod squad and say maybe this is coming at me in a different way and what I've tried to do It went at someone that I want a relationship with even if I'm like shaking or seething or feels unfair. I try to say the sentence Which is thank you for trusting me enough To tell me yeah, I may totally disagree with you Thank you so much for trusting me with this utter horse shit I But you guys it's like We have to have these things because it's cognitive dissonance to think this shouldn't happen if we all agree

1:18:24Which everyone in the earth now understands that yes, we will hurt each other yes It is not an if there's not a bunch of good people who don't hurt like you said in the beginning if it is true that if we are in relationship We will hurt each other Then it follows That we must be open to talking about having hurt people these are tools their tools It's like what it's like we're like cooking with just one burner We're leaving the other burners like it's like they're these are tools and so much of self-help is talking about tools of the individual Right, how do we eat better? How do we have take more steps? How do we even speak persuasively like there's some that are trying to like alter the other But part of what we're talking about here is relational skills relational tools Group help is like where and how do we actually have the skills to do this in relationship? Yeah With others were desperate for it It's the depth of your life is really what it's a barometer for because if you don't have heat

1:19:26In any of your relationships That might be like a more calm way of living But if you don't have heat in your relationships It's true that you don't have depth Because it's required To get deep well, it's relevance Heat is relevance as you're just kind of like skating outside. I mean, I'm midwestern I'm half midwestern my father's from Iowa and like Part of what I am a dialogue facilitator right? So I literally my professional life is listening to language noticing my first job with with in with sustained dialogue this process that I worked with was literally being in a room eight hours a day In these it's called track two diplomacy 18 leaders from the Arab American and European world my boss house unders and run this I'm just moderating this whole thing But my job my little life you know green little facilitator was to take verbatim notes eight hours a day tracking the exact language everyone is using Because they weren't allowed to record it

1:20:27And so my core like craft training is actually listening to language and dialogue and how in the moments that Relationships are grouped change and part of when you don't allow for heat to happen you are not allowing relevant Conversations And I listen to my father and I love him and I by practice is trying to get more meaningful conversation with him Our core training is basically to like avoid heat Mm-hmm. We talk about the weather we talk about this we talk about that Which is fine and actually really important in a diverse society But with your intimits saying just on the surface There's so much left on the table and the promise of the of the fighting is actually it's a promise for closeness Is it on the other side richer community richer connection and also by the way when you have a fight It doesn't mean you come out agreeing it doesn't mean that you'd necessarily change you may just realize oh We see this differently But as you said earlier Glennon, but I trust them because they're willing to grapple with me

1:21:30Yeah, he said my parents were so afraid of the fire that could burn the house down that they lost their spark Yeah, this is a deeply personal to me, you know, I was so confused. I was shocked. That's not what divorce looks like Mm-hmm. That's not what I see in the movies That's not what I hear I never heard any screaming and my mother is somebody who deeply deeply over the last 30 years Has like learned these skills and god help or make sure her daughter learned these skills right again It's like all of this it's dynamic. We can always learn is never too late And then it shifts the ancestral line Yes, it does You When I read the part in the book about about how now we have so many groups that we can choose as opposed to being born into a certain

1:22:31Situation we can choose what groups we enter But then the downside of that is that there's no shared rules or traditions or yes when I read that I kept seeing in my mind All of the seven million wooden signs there are in every like home goods that look all the parents put up like in this family We say goodbye like in this family we live laugh love That's oh my god This is we know in our in our guts that we need some like directions Yes Way in these directions instead of grappling with the hard questions that we want to have a shared rule We go to home goods and we're like that looks good You just believe that you cover it I said let's laugh love That is one of this I said live while you see the time we live while loving here Tell me right now whether you are living laughing or loving on the floor right But it doesn't that show our desperation for like a

1:23:32You know shared understanding of what we're doing here in this family and like even if Even if our shared thing was like oh we're in this house. We're human beings. We know we're gonna hurt each other So I as a parent We'll tell you that in this family We consider it love when you tell me when I've hurt you yes, and I will not always respond perfectly Yes, but I will listen yes, and I will consider that an active love yes Like even if that's the only really you have in your family printed out children get it on Etsy tomorrow I mean, you know, I have a really beautiful experience. I actually haven't shared this out loud I haven't shared this publicly or really with anyone but my husband But you know when I finish writing the art of fighting one of the things they tell you to do is read your book out loud Like before you submit it read your book out loud and I knew I needed to do it I knew I needed to do it and I kept on putting it off because like you always have other stuff to do

1:24:33And I went to visit my father and stepmother in Florida. I needed to do it while I was visiting them And then there's a part of me that was like Maybe this maybe over dinner Hey You know, I actually need to read this out loud would you be interested in reading it and his wife my stepmother very You know generously. It's like I would love to hear it and my father was like absolutely and so we got some coffee and I read them allowed the prolog And the prologue is his father's funeral That's right the prologue is his divorce And the prologue is my wise stepmother right who keeps on kind of saying like hey, this the story is not the whole story And I read it to them and it was so moving for me for them and what we ended up doing for three weeks as I said Hey, this actually was really helpful to me

1:25:35Would you want to keep doing this and help me read out loud my whole book and so for three weeks Two hours a day or every other day or an hour day or 45 minutes a day we'd schedule time I can sort of complicated. We were all we'd schedule time times at 7 a.m Like bless their hearts. They'd set their alarm and wake up early And they'd sit there and we'd get on the zoom and I'd read it out loud and I'd hear them laugh or I'd hear them go Hmm and as I started talking about the stories It's also good for a writer to like tell you know give someone a heads up tell the story of like the fight I had with my father about my baby shower. Yeah, right? I was like okay dad. Um this part's about you Ready and then the final part is me telling the story of Zora and my father to him and the whole Process was so moving right it was like re linny. I didn't plan this But it was actually like me sharing if I literally could write a book That I wish I could like tell my family

1:26:35I did and then I got to read it to them and at the end of this my stepmother who's a white woman from Florida And also Pennsylvania She said to me we are a ritualist country aren't we and I said what do you mean? And she said part of what I'm taking from your book is that we are a country that has become so celebrated the individual which I believe in but and in trying to Like be part of becoming an American right all melting pot all and she's a different generation We have also let go of all of our rituals Yeah From our sub communities from our the places that we left and we are a ritualist Country so you're a country that is longing for ritual again That's right and I think part of the invitation as the family right it's like yes put up the target gather sign

1:27:35Right which by the way they've given me right have a gather sign from target They have And Specificity ritual right the art of gathering is about this it could be macaroni Mondays And we check in and on Mondays we all ask a magical question and we all sit there our phones are off But on Mondays we know everyone's home and we ask one question everyone wants to answer and everyone Here's everyone what is interested in hearing each other's answers and we just do that one specific meaningful ritual is a family gives so much safety identity Belonging and it actually starts to affect the rest of the week That's so beautiful Priya your teamwork is so good It just really gets to the heart of everything. I'm just so grateful for you and your husband I mean your whole family and really has an important part of our No I so deeply I mean honestly like I are one of the mantras I now say to my kids is we can do hard things I don't even think they knew his podcast and I think so much of what I think your work is the three of you in the world is

1:28:40Is really like I actually think the art of fighting is just It's like a symptom of what you're inviting people to do in all of these different ways like it's just one ornament on the tree But so much of what you're inviting and in your work In your books in your podcast and your conversations is actually like lean into the mess right we can do facing We can do asking we can do Expanding our Options we can do right Oreo debating Yeah And and and on and work also you and my husband he His so much of his work is like Can we face this right his new book it's called the man in the mirror. It's so freaking good. You've read it She's having him on about it right amazing. I don't know. It was happening. Yeah. It's so good It's so good. It was recently called the best New York City book since the power broke since the power booker which is like 13 years ago. It's a crazy thing. So I'm gonna say like yes

1:29:42Yes, and so much of what the man in the mirror is about is about a tragic encounter on a subway and The opera that is New York City and the opera that is cities and the opera that is America And inviting us to face To look to hold to humanize to grapple so that we can actually live together Yeah Oh Priya, thank you. All right y'all today the book is out. It's called the art of fighting the transformative power of conflict It is something that y'all need to read If you're a part of any group Anywhere or want to be a community or a nation or considering it. Yeah Toppers Priya, we adore you. Thank you so much for being here with us Thanks for reading it so closely and I just so appreciate it. Thank you so much

1:30:45Beautiful. All right y'all We will see you next time. Bye-bye We are proud to say that we can do hard things is an independent production brought to you by us Treat media treat media makes art for humans who want to stay human and you can follow us at we can do hard things on Instagram