It’s time to stop fighting the good fight

Fresh off the plane from the US, Steve Ray reflects on the combative language of politics

“People don’t resist change. They resist being changed.”

– Peter Senge, The Fifth Discipline

 “The light of America’s promise will always burn bright as long as we never give up and as long as we keep fighting.”

“United by love of country with enthusiasm and joy in our fight for America’s future.  And we did it with the knowledge that we all have so much more in common than what separates us.”

– Kamala Harris, concession speech

     Kamala Harris

So here’s the thing: If we are united, and we all have so much more in common than what separates us, why are we still fighting?

 Fighting pits us against an adversary. Fighting involves violence. Always. It keeps us in a paradigm of winners and losers destined to keep rejoining in battle because of some difference, even if it’s in our minds. Us and Them loom large. There are sides. Which one are you on? Even as the language about unity is spoken, it is undone by the use of the word “fighting”.

 The idea that we should never give up in our efforts to try to achieve a better world makes sense. But when we use THAT word, we stay in the binary of winners and losers. If we truly believe in the idea that we can be unified, whether as a team or country, we have to understand how our language affects the direction of the conversation.

What a difference could be created if we switched to “stand by” (as one alternative) instead. Standing by what we believe in captures the motivating energy of the cause while giving opportunity for others to join. We are not deserting the holy grail of what we believe in but neither are we saying “are you with us or against us?”

When people are not put in the position of having to defend themselves and what they believe in, they can shift ground. Indeed, this is the essential dynamic we create in collaborative decision-making. When we acknowledge what someone believes in as being relevant (because at the very least it’s relevant to them) people feel seen and valued. From that place they are open to hearing others and moving ground.

More than anything we want to know that we matter in the world. Our ideas, beliefs and opinions are an extension of our all-important identity. When we contest someone’s idea, without first acknowledging the right of that idea to exist, we directly challenge the person themselves.

Peter Senge blew up the idea that people don’t like change by digging deeper.  He discovered that it’s the feeling of being changed that causes resistance.  Whatever change looks like, if it affects us and we are not in control of our destiny, we will fight.

When we validate people, we give them the space, the freedom, to step away from what THEY believe in and to explore other options, without demands or the need to change. It’s then that people CAN change. Because they had the freedom to change themselves.

What a blind spot for America! “The land of the free”. 

FIGHTING = You had better believe in what we believe in because we are fighting for it and we’ll be taking down whatever you believe in in the process. 

Given that challenge, who’s going to walk away from what they believe in, no matter how obliquely the challenge is made? Is it any wonder people double down on positions that are manifestly indefensible? It's not about the quality of what’s believed in, it’s about winning the fight.

Let’s speak about unity and love in every dimension of our conversation. Let’s stand by what we believe in so we can stand together. Let’s understand that we need to evolve towards a place where the person matters more than their opinion so that we can discover that the person is not their opinion after all. We can all change.

It no doubt feels good to say passionately “let's keep fighting until we win” (and “they” lose). But that good feeling, that applause, is just the voice of the mob wanting to beat the other mob, waiting for next time. We need to appeal to the better part of our collective human nature and be aware of how we can so easily sabotage our intent for something better if we are not careful about our age-old habits that have kept us fighting for so long.