Conflict Doesn’t Change With Age
By Jana N. Yost
Sometimes the most important lessons about friendship do not come from books or advice. They come from watching our children walk through something hard.
I recently had dinner with my tween daughter over the weekend. The previous week she had some peer conflict that escalated. She sat in ruins and despair until there was an intervention with administration. After everything settled, she walked away with her friend group back together and a better understanding of herself and how to stand her ground. The group chose forgiveness and a clean slate.
Lesson learned: avoidance never works when it comes to conflict and resolution.
I am sure we have all been there at some point in life. A disagreement with family, friends, or coworkers. We get so caught up in proving a point that we lose the ability to set pride aside and meet in what I call the messy middle.
Meeting in the messy middle means letting our guard down. It requires humility. It means listening to the other person without preparing our defense while they speak. It takes courage and strength to do that.
If you look at relationships like an equation, every person brings their own experiences and feelings into the conflict. Those things shape how we respond. Because of that, conflict is rarely about right or wrong. It is about understanding, resolution, forgiveness, and growth.
The messy middle is the uncomfortable space between being right and being reconciled. It shows up everywhere. In friendships, in marriage, in leadership, and in families. Every healthy relationship eventually requires us to step into that space.
Most of us try to avoid it. But that uncomfortable middle is often where relationships grow stronger.
Working through the messy middle requires a few things:
• Pause before reacting
• Listen to understand, not to win
• Set pride aside
• Own your part
• Focus on the relationship, not the argument
• Choose forgiveness so growth can happen
Just as important as knowing what to do is recognizing what not to do.
Avoidance may feel easier in the moment, but it rarely resolves anything. Ghosting someone, talking about the situation with everyone except the person involved, or letting resentment quietly build only deepens the divide.
Blaming the other person without taking time to examine our own role in the conflict also keeps relationships stuck. Growth requires honesty with ourselves first.
What not to do in the messy middle:
• Ghost the relationship
• Avoid the conversation
• Gossip about the conflict with others
• Let resentment quietly grow
• Focus only on the other person’s faults
• Refuse to reflect on your own part in the situation
Most relationships are not damaged by one disagreement. They are damaged when people choose distance, silence, or pride instead of working through the hard parts together.
When my daughter and I sat down for dinner, I could tell something had shifted in her. The conflict had been hard, but she worked through it. She stood up for herself, reconciled with her friends, and chose forgiveness, walking away knowing more about who she is and the kind of friend she wants to be. What meant the most to me was that she chose to confide in me and talk it through. My role was not to fix it, but to listen and give her the space to process what she had already worked through. In stepping into that uncomfortable middle on her own, she gained something more valuable than winning an argument. She gained confidence in herself. Growth rarely happens when everything is easy. More often, it happens right in the middle of the mess.
