I was just thinking about a sticky situation right now with my housemates and our new landlord. We all have the same fundamental issue with him and we’ve been writing emails together to uh, make it clear to him (great way to bond with flat mates, 10/10 recommend) On the one hand there’s me wanting to take a diplomatic approach and cut out the threatening tone and some of the word choices that they’re punching into the keyboard (“hey, save the over analysis for the poems you do in English lit”) and the other three wanting to go in there (and duly doing so) with pitchforks and fire (law students… 🙄).
I was thinking about how much I hate confrontation and how according to common belief that’s supposed to be a major insecurity but then I thought… is it though?
[A] I can see how in some ways it can be unhealthy. Like if you’re terrified of confrontation (and I must own to getting a lot of adrenaline and a heart rate which I could almost hear echoing back while simply reading our landlord’s most recent reply.)
[B]But on the other hand, is it necessarily a weakness to value trying to get along/ take a peaceful approach to tricky situations?
Also isn’t keeping the rapport as strong as possible in all parties’ best interests?
I think in my personal case, both A and B are in play here. But thinking in non-personal, general terms, how about the idea that people are too quick to assume that disliking confrontations is weakness?
I hope that doesn’t sound ranty. I should have probably left the writing of this post until I was a bit more detached from the event that inspired it. But oh wells 🐸
Stories of a Social Klutz 