It can seem weird to many of us why some people are stuck in their negative spirals of conflicts, unwilling to rise above them and find a solution. Sounds familiar, right? Chances are, we spend long years in such debilitating connections, only robbing ourselves off of connecting more healthily with others. Or allowing ourselves to turn inward instead, and spend quality time alone. Because it is more valuable to be on your own than in a contact sipping away your life force.
Why don’t some people want to resolve conflicts? Because as twisted as this world sometimes gets, these individuals intentionally do so for a reason. The sad reality is that they can benefit from ongoing disputes more than peace. And they do not have to enjoy conflicts to do so… They could even feel it not only hurts their target person but themselves as well. But still not stopping doing so, because it serves a higher need.
It is time to face our dark side in this age and time when human intuition is rising at a fast pace. The shades of our emotional formulae are complex, such as value connections, feeling important, getting and giving attention, your place in the societal hierarchy, compassion, and empathy, being heard and seen, feeling a sense of belonging, confidence, power, getting your needs met, feeling good about yourself, feeling in control, acknowledged, and encouraged…
How Ongoing Conflict Serves Some People?
Some of us think that conflicts are a key element to maintaining a connection, and there’s no other way. The source of this can be, only feeling close to someone, if you both dislike the same thing. Or when someone needs to feel like the good guy, and above others, so they will put down others, or make them the subject of a victim by their behavior. In this way, they get to feel positive about themselves. Unfortunately, these are quite common relationship dynamics.
Another need is craving attention, and feeling important by someone else. As this type of person usually lacks a healthy sense of self-worth, they feel the only way they can get such attention is through creating controversy. A good example of this is when someone does something unexpected, and you know you can lose them. All of a sudden, you get your act together, because you know you hurt them, even if unintentionally, and don’t want to lose the connection.
When someone starts arguing intentionally, chances are, in time you can sense it serves them in some way. It comes hand in hand with a specific weird feeling that they have a background agenda. You should listen to your intuition! It is sending you those red flag alarms for a reason!
Even if this person creates drama in a hidden way repeatedly. I think most of us have met such a person.
Seeking Problems versus Solutions
When these people create issues, the attention goes there for good, and this is their way of meeting their needs. Instead of seeking solutions, for which they aren’t yet ready. We can only hope for the best for them. It is one of the best manipulation techniques. It can happen because we care deeply about someone, like or love a person, or depend on our connection in some way. We need to wake up to the fact that such trauma-based connections can be very abusive.
The biggest problem in our current society is that we see such traumatic scenarios when people divorce. They couldn’t adjust to their differences in many years, because their pain was so deeply ingrained, it hurt them more than being able to overcome it through loving acceptance. Conflict can also serve a person’s need to be in control, and feel powerful. We all want to feel powerful, that’s okay. But when we repeatedly feel like we aren’t in control, we feel powerless.
We can then also switch it by not giving the conflict or the source of its power anymore. Or feeling like we want to take revenge on the person that hurt us, which is a strangely natural human response. It comes from our unconscious need to show the other person the way we want them to treat us, or needing them to be more empathetic toward us. So we tend to hurt others or voice our emotions when we are getting fed up. Because we want to rekindle our contact.
Being Hurt Without Consequences
If we keep getting hurt repeatedly by someone, we either feel bad about it and keep suppressing it, hoping for things to get better, or we generally take it for a while before asking the person to stop hurting our feelings. Because we don’t want a hurting person to abuse our connection as they please, without consequences. No healthy-minded person can take such a huge imbalance. On the other hand, forgiving can feel like being weak.
When someone harbors resentment, chances are they have been offended. It is okay if you are more cautious with the person who hurt you, however holding on to grudges long-term is unhealthy as well. It can be dysfunctional for both parties in the relationship, therefore a different resolution is needed. Our contacts should not be about who is the good, or the bad guy. We should mutually bring our best into it, for the sake of growing together and benefiting this world.
It is also a good thing to recognize that holding a grudge can make you feel more powerful than feeling powerless. On the other hand, the person who has clearly shown signs that he or she doesn’t want to align with you is because they don’t want a win-win situation. The sad reality is that you need to be careful with people, and recognize early if instead of resolving issues, creating conflicts is in their best interest!
People With Bad Intentions
You must have also come across people who almost seem like they enjoy causing you pain. How can you notice them? Their source of giving you pain seems endless. No matter what you do, you cannot please them. They will always hurt you because they are hurt. It will always get painful after a while. There can be many repeated patterns of ups and downs in such a connection. Eventually, it boils down to this: emotional abuse.
In physical forms this looks like ignoring your basic needs and your being, disappearing or ghosting you, any forms of blame or aggression toward you often without a good reason, coldness, ruthlessness, causing you sorrow all the time. The biggest insanity is if you surrender to constant criticisms and belittlement, which makes you feel less than you are. Many people can fall into this trap. You should know your worth, and that you are capable alone!
One of the worst manipulation strategies is when the manipulating person plays the scenarios ahead, and leaves no room for you to meet your needs, as they make your needs work against you. Some people actually will make you choose between your work and them, for instance. Sadly, many of us still deal with our unresolved childhood traumas in our adult relationships, choosing to stay stuck, instead of healing them! Because it feels familiar.
Why Do We Recreate Childhood Patterns
We do so by choosing to bond with partners similar to our parents because we subconsciously want to change those dynamics in adulthood. Provided we haven’t dealt with them earlier. When we operate from such a deep layer of shameful past, it can even make us have narcissistic tendencies as a coping mechanism. By then, we don’t consider how much pain we cause to others through conflict, we act in that way to relieve our pain.
Conflict can also make us feel something, which is at times better than nothing. It can help those people who have been feeling numb for a while. You could also associate love with arguments if you grew up in a similar environment. No matter if your family members quarreled with each other or with you. You could think conflict equals love, connecting, and family.
Also, some of us can never feel safe, no matter how well a relationship works. Out of fear of losing balance, we sometimes tend to create unnecessary conflicts. It can sometimes feel safer to be alone, taking care of your needs than assisting in someone else’s drama. Especially if you still have a lot of childhood issues to resolve. Lastly, people who had problems developing boundaries growing up can feel they need to disagree or over-explain themselves.
When Someone Wants to Improve
You could recognize when someone wants to improve from their acts. Words don’t count!! They usually initiate resolution and take the conflict seriously. They don’t just say sorry, but also make you feel like they regretted what they have done. They can learn from their mistakes and want to become better people, not to hurt others anymore. Everyone needs some change.
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