Cohousing-L Mailing List: Re: Conflict resolution

[Sharon Villines (sharon]

> On Mar 28, 2024, at 6:46 AM, Patti Lentz <ptpattilentz [at] gmail.com> wrote:
> 
> We, at Cohousing Abq, are seeking feedback from other communities about your 
> policies for resolving conflict.  If you’re willing to attach your policies, 
> I would appreciate those.  In addition, please let me know if you are willing 
> to share about challenges you’ve had, where your policies “failed”, and how 
> you handled these challenges.  We can set up a phone conversation if you’re 
> open to talk about those challenges to your plans.

There are many responses to this question in the archives. Some of the key 
points that have been made over the years are:

1. Elevate the discussion. We tend to reduce conflicts to personal conflicts. 
Conflicts in communities are community conflicts. They are the result of a 
different understanding of community rules or expectations. They continue 
because the community won’t resolve them. If some people (or one person) enjoy 
quiet meals and another or some enjoy chaos, how do you arrange meals to 
provide both kinds? There is no rule that meals should be quiet or chaotic. It 
is not anti-child to expect children to sit at the table quietly if it is a 
quiet meal. But you do need to try to meet the needs of everyone. Sometimes 
just trying is enough to resolve the need.

2. Don’t forget to do rounds. Conflict isn’t a secret and isn’t about people 
doing something wrong. It isn’t about blaming or identifying guiilt. Listen to 
each other. Look at things from all sides. Not everyone will know or understand 
what everyone else knows or understands. Try to get on the same page with what 
happened (if anything) and what people were expecting to happen. Sort it out.

3. Sometimes all that is needed is time and space for all parties to calm their 
fears. The conflict may be about what “might” happen, not what is happening. 
Sometimes the community doesn’t have enough experience with each other to 
figure out what will work best. As my granddaughter said when I asked how she 
understood so many things on the iPhone, she said, “Nana, you just have to try 
things."

4. Sometimes conflicts involve personal feelings and can be resolved with the 
help of a friend. My first thought is usually “who can talk to this person" or 
these people. After a tumultuous meeting, someone often volunteers to go talk 
to someone who has left in anger or frustration or tears.

5. Smoothing things out is not smoothing them over. As long as there are 
conflicting expectations about using the kitchen or the living room or the 
discipline of children, there will be continuing conflict whether it is 
acknowledged or not. But sometimes the best solution is to take some time to 
figure out what is workable. We’ve had many discussions about whether this 
should be done this way or that way. In the end, one way seems to be the most 
workable. The hypotheticals never happened.

6. There are times when professional help is needed to deal with people who are 
mentally ill, physically ill, or have ill will. Being honest about this is 
necessary to protect the well-being of other members of the community. 
Cohousing is not a treatment center or a hospital. Physical violence is 
violence. Love is not enough to keep everyone safe. Vegetables won’t fix major 
depression or schizophrenia.

7. Teenagers grow up. So do fearsome five-year-olds.

I’m sure there are other things I’ve forgotten, but in the end, every situation 
is so individual that no one response or process will be the best to address 
all of them.

NVC is a formal technique designed to resolve conflict by sorting out all the 
druthers and possible solutions but for some, it is too plodding and 
controlling.

After 25 years, many of us have experience with each other and “know how to fix 
things.” But there are always new people moving in and we discover that they 
have as many conflicting expectations as we had when we moved in.

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