He Said, She Said: A Guide To Conflict Resolution

I don't know about you...but I've never been a confrontational person and I still don't think I really am tbh, but also...I don't really find myself in too many conflicts just cuz of the nature of my personality...I just don't care LOL. No but really, I feel like I'm pretty calm and don't really get rattled too easily lol. So anyways, I had a situation where I wasn't sure if a friend was mad at me or not...why did I think this? Well the person usually like says hi to me, daps me up and we chat a bit...I saw the person again later that day and they didn't even bat an eye to me...so I was like oh, maybe they're mad at me for something. After talking to another friend, my initial reaction was whatever...just leave it be. The more I thought about it, the more I was like you know what...I'm gonna approach him and just see what's up and how he's doing. Turns out he wasn't mad at me at all, just having a really bad day and was really out of it. We had a good talk and it was a real load off my chest. It kinda led me to this topic right now...how if I had not approached him and confronted the situation in my head, I probably would've went my way, ignored him thinking he was mad at me and then suddenly it gets weird between us for no reason. Whereas when I approached him, asked him what was up, realized nothing was actually wrong and everything went back to normal. It just reinforced to me that when it comes to really stupid beef, weird/awkward tensions and petty shit, you gotta be a grown up and confront it face first. That stuff doesn't go away, it lingers and it just makes things worse. Like I said, if I didn't appraoch him, things just would've gotten more weird cuz then I would've ignored him then he might start thinking well why's he ignoring me then it kinda snowballs, you feel? It made me start thinking about all the people we choose not to deal with and face because it's hard...bad exes, fake friends, annoying people, whatever it may be...sometimes you just really gotta grow up, suck it up, take a deep breath and face that shit head on. I think back to when I was younger...high school, heck even university...how scared and unwilling I was to tackle problems head on...nah let's let a mutual friend handle it, oh maybe I'll message them online, I'll shoot them a text and see how they're doing...nah, you gotta look at that person face to face and hash whatever it is out. I think that\s why I've grown to hate texting and talking on the phone, I feel like I've always been like that to a certain extent, but now that I'm grown...I really dislike it and much prefer face to face interaction because it's more real and it's more genuine imo. In the same way with conflicts...it's just more real and genuine when you do all that stuff face to face...because it takes a lot of courage to take that step and to stand in front of someone you may not be on good terms with. Trust me when I say I've done it all...I've broken up with an ex through text, I've quit a job through the phone, I've apologized for stupid stuff through text and stuff...that shit's just immature and the easy way out. If you wanna be mature, the bigger person and a straight up grown ass real individual...you'll face whatever it is head on, because even tho it's not the easy thing to do, it's the right thing. I can say that with confidence because I've been that dude who'd rather have conversations online to hash things out than talking to someone face to face...I've been that dude who broke up with a girl over text cuz I was scared to say it to her face...I've been that dude who quit a job over the phone cuz I didn't wanna look at my supervisor in the eye for fear of awkwardness and judgement. But part of being an adult is owning up to your mistakes and facing it head on, that's just something I'm learning...through experiences, through mistakes and through living. I wouldn't be here today typing this out to you if I hadn't gone through it myself...otherwise I'd be hella suss telling you all this without having at least experienced something like it myself...anyways, hope you enjoyed it...see you soon.