Cohousing-L Mailing List: Re: handling conflict

[Sharon Villines (sharon]

On 2/16/04 3:55 PM, "don i arkin" <shardon5 [at] juno.com> wrote:

> Hi, Here at Sonora in Tucson we are, like Sharon, also 3 years into our
> on-site life and we have not yet fully solved this problem.  I would echo
> most of what Sharon said. In addition I was led to wonder why people who
> are conflict-avoiders are attracted to cohousing where they will be
> forced to resolve many more differences with their neighbors than in
> conventional subdivisions.

I was also amazed by this. Well over half our members self-identified as
avoiders in a workshop we did and then were very upset at being so
identified. The criterion used was when conflict arises, it is best to just
let it go and it will work itself out. I was in the group with 2 others who
welcome conflict as opportunity to engage. We are talking 3 out of about 40.

>  Perhaps it is because one of the promises of
> cohousing is that because you are more intimate with your neighbors, most
> differences can be expected to be handled at a lower emotional pitch than
> might happen with a near stranger where subconsciously you might feel
> that a stronger display is necessary win the dispute.

I think they are idealistic in believing that since this is a community
people will go along and get along. That is what community is, a place where
you get along with everyone. You are polite.

My view is that community a place where you can be real and people deal with
that. It doesn't mean you are impolite but "polite" is too often not real.
No one is "polite" when they are alone.

I'm amazed at low people's tolerances are for discussing issues on which
they disagree and how much time people need to "process" issues on which
there are perfectly good best practices guides out there. We are going on
three months to make a decision about what to do about rodent control -- is
this a personal problem, a warranty problem (the developer's plumbers left a
hole in the wall), or a community problem.

There are mice in the walls chewing up the insulation and could be chewing p
the electrical wiring! Call an expert on mice and one on condo law and get
the mice out of the walls! Emotional outbursts do get attention. I've tried
to be calm about this one having taken on more than my share of issues in
recent months, but that means we still have mice in the walls too.

Conflicts such as this one are standard for ALL coops, cohousing or not --
and even for single family houses in suburbia. Your mice or mine?

I'm beginning to believe more and more in long move in times. Do people
think that this makes any difference? How about those of you who were
"together" for more than 5 years before move-in. Did this allow you to
develop processes for dealing with conflict before you had to confront it
everyday and everyday?

(I don¹t want to give the impression that my community is riddled with
conflict -- we aren't. We're just normal. No one is moving out and most
people speak to each other more than nicely, even to me. But we do our share
of avoiding daily, moment to moment.)

Sharon
-- 
Sharon Villines
Takoma Village Cohousing, Washington DC
http://www.takomavillage.org

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