The Expert Podcast

So what do you do if you're in a conflict with another party? Maybe it's an argument with somebody in your family, maybe it's a dispute with somebody at work, maybe it's your business and one of your vendors is having some argument about a bill. Maybe it's a larger issue; maybe you have a lawsuit against somebody. Maybe it's a neighbor that is building their fence on your property. Who knows? Any type of dispute, any type of argument, any type of conflict has the potential to escalate and spiral out of control.

You don't want that to happen because typically the real conflict in any dispute is something relatively small. It's a kernel; it's a seed of an argument, and it blows up out of proportion because people take it personally. They get offended, they have resentment, and it balloons very, very quickly. That ballooning creates a lot more damage, expense, time, attention, distraction, anxiety, depression, anger, and you don't want it to expand beyond what the real problem is.

As certified mediators, we see that the core of all these arguments we deal with is usually one very small true genuine dispute. Everything else has just been layered on top of it. So, how do you keep that from happening? Most of that happens because of personalities or exaggeration, or it comes from what we call blind spots, where you think somebody's doing something worse than they are, or you might be not intending to do something wrong, but it's taken the wrong way by the other person, and they create spite towards you.

The way to avoid that is to get a neutral third party involved: an arbitrator, a mediator, a court, a magistrate. There are a couple of ways to do that. If you're going into some type of an argument with a person, you can actually talk to a mediator just one-on-one and tell them what the story is, tell them what your case is, tell them what your dispute is, and let them dissect it just based on your one side of it.

Now, if you hire a mediator to deal with you, they can't now mediate with both of you because the mediator has to be neutral, and if they've already engaged with you, they can't be a neutral third party. But they can help you untangle it, maybe coach you and guide you into how to deescalate and talk yourself and the other person off the cliff. Another way you could do it is to get a mediator to talk to both people and work it out.

Another way is kind of a virtual court, where instead of going to court, going to an official government circuit superior court, you do it virtually, kind of like a People's Court. It can be done online. You can click the link below; we have some options for that, where you get both people on a Zoom call, and you say, "You tell your side of the story, you tell your side of the story," and then that person, a mediator, an arbitrator, whatever it is, will say, "Look, this is what I think really is happening. This is what you both should do."

The good thing about that type of virtual court is it's not official. If you both decide you don't want to abide by what it said, you can walk away and say, "Heck with you. I'm not going to do this." But it gives you some idea of what might happen if you do take it to an official court because if you go to an official court, at that point, whatever they say you have to do, you have to take it. You can't leave it; you have to take it, whatever they say.

The verdict, you don't want to go to that point because even if you win, it's going to take you a lot more time. It's going to take you a lot more money, legal fees, travel fees, whatever. More importantly, everything that's said in that court is now public record. So all the things that you would have to say to defend your side, maybe your business records, maybe your personal records, is in open court. It's public, and everything the other person says about you is now in public records. So there are advantages to doing mediation or arbitration or virtual court to try to sort this out in a way that doesn't open up more cans of worms.

Here's the other thing: if you go to court, that judge or jury, whatever it is, is looking at both of you as being ridiculous. They're saying, "Look, you two are both exaggerating. You're both being unreasonable." And the court is going to really have animosity towards both of you. They're not going to want to try to help one over the other. A mediator, on the other hand, is trying to help both parties. They're trying to look out for both parties. They're literally neutral; they could care less who wins, but they want both people to have the best outcome that they could.

The court doesn't care if people have good outcomes, right? They just want to get you out of their courtroom, and they also want to punish a little bit because they think that anybody who comes to court has probably wasted opportunities to solve it outside of court. Matter of fact, some courts require that you do mediation before you even step foot in a courtroom. What does that tell you? That tells you they think this should be done elsewhere. So take advantage of that even before it's required and get a mediator, an arbitrator, a People's Court type scenario. It might cost you a few hundred bucks, but it's a good way to start to test the waters.

Here's the thing: that mediator can help peel back all those layers of animosity, resentment, spite, pride that's keeping you from solving that one little kernel of a problem that exists. You might think the problem is bigger, but I can guarantee you the mediators can see through all that and say, "Look, it's really only one small thing. So forget about everything else." And there's probably already a lot of agreement on the things you think are in dispute that you may not even be aware of because the other person wants to agree, but they have spite too, and they have pride, and they don't want to say, "Yes, I'll do this," because they think they're not saving face. So take advantage of it.

The last thing you want to do is drag out a dispute. It creates anxiety, creates sleepless nights. It's not good for your health, your well-being. The less dispute conflict you have in your life, the better. Most people want to avoid conflict, and even if you're good at it, even if you can win, even if you're good at conquering people, the less you have to do it, the longer you live and the healthier you'll be.

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