Bring Back Peace in Household Systems in Communities of Color
Kongit Farrell is a therapist and a 2021 AC4 Graduate Fellow and a CMM Learning Exchange Fellow. She is currently pursuing a Master of Science in Negotiation and Conflict Resolution.
As a therapist of 13 years with a private practice serving primarily people of color, I became conscious of a 3rd, unmentioned, pandemic that swept throughout our neighborhood during the COVID-19 lockdown; the dispute pandemic amongst families. With many families sharing close quarters without any respite for 24 hours a day, it ended up being clear that the prolonged time together integrated with the inability to leave, restricted communication abilities, and still-emerging mental and conflict literacy taxed their bio-psycho-socio-emotional tanks, and regretfully, in many cases, resulted in physical and emotional violence. As overwhelming as it was to work through the pandemic as a clinician, I picture that it fades in contrast to needing to discover how to browse chaotic psychological surface without the suitable knowledge or abilities.
Neck deep in this experience with customers, I looked for an intervention that could assist them scale the learning curve– and rapidly. The intervention needed to be something that might lower the capacity for “hot systems activation” (this is the part of the brain that responds in battle or flight), and that would be simple to implement and intellectually accessible for many people. It would need to modify cognitive processing in a manner that would make customers pause at defining moments so that they could make a mindful (and ideally de-escalating, non-violent) option about how to interpret the situation. My clinical resources on conflict management failed me. I discovered the intervention I needed for my patients in some of the coordinated management of meaning (CMM) ideas in Fundamentals of Cooperation and Conflict Resolution, a course taught by Peter Coleman, director of Columbia Universitys Advanced Consortium on Cooperation, Conflict and Complexity (AC4).
CMM is a method of understanding and transforming communication practices by looking beyond its function as a way for exchanging concepts and seeing it as a way of constructing truth. Working within the CMM framework assisted me to evaluate and see dispute in a different way– by taking a look at the communication patterns of the dispute, in addition to the words being spoken, biological actions and emotional reactions. I was able to recognize that the idea of bifurcation points, and the instructions that one takes in conflict after reaching one, was going to be basic to my clients intervention.
Even with this understanding and the CMM ideas offered to me, I understood that I needed a lot more assistance with its development. I made an application for a CMM Learning Exchange Fellowship in the hopes of receiving mentorship and assistance with this project and thankfully, I was accepted. I am halfway through the experience and the fellowship has actually exceeded my expectations. The assistance has been warm and nurturing from scholars in the field and colleagues who are dealing with their own particular CMM based jobs. Bouncing ideas off of peers in a “conversational jazz setting” was the partnership I didnt know I needed but has been most handy. Finding out about their jobs and how they are using CMM ideas to establish them opened brand-new doors for understanding and using the material that we are all processing. Its likewise fascinating to discover how applicable CMM concepts are for nearly every field, since communication is the structure for all human interaction. This fellowship has actually also given me the opportunity to support coworkers in their work by sharing insights that Ive gleaned over lots of years as a therapist, and to be able to contribute because way has actually been a meaningful experience.
While I have not yet develop the accurate intervention since yet, I have substantially improved the core concepts that I will utilize for its building. In addition to utilizing bifurcation points, I will likewise utilize the principles of crucial moments and browsing for communication patterns between the communicators as well as analysis patterns to seek ways to interrupt and introduce new and more adaptive (read: de-escalating) sequences.
When the intervention is expanded, I intend to have the opportunity to evaluate it in Colemans Dynamical Conversations Lab and fine-tune it till I have an effective intervention that is also easy to understand and teach. I realize that this might be an enthusiastic objective, however it is a worthwhile one, and I cant think of a better place to be dealing with it than here at Columbia.
Kongit Farrell is 2021 AC4 Graduate Fellow and a CMM Learning Exchange Fellow. Kongits interests sit at the intersection of interaction, clinical psychology, marriage and household neuroscience, treatment, and dispute resolution as she explores mental mechanisms and relational dynamics that lower maladaptive dispute.
by
Kongit Farrell|January 21, 2022
With lots of households sharing close quarters with no reprieve for 24 hours a day, it became clear that the prolonged time together combined with the failure to leave, limited communication abilities, and still-emerging psychological and conflict literacy taxed their bio-psycho-socio-emotional reservoirs, and sadly, in some cases, resulted in psychological and physical violence. I found the intervention I needed for my patients in some of the collaborated management of meaning (CMM) concepts in Fundamentals of Cooperation and Conflict Resolution, a course taught by Peter Coleman, director of Columbia Universitys Advanced Consortium on Cooperation, Conflict and Complexity (AC4).
Working within the CMM framework assisted me to view and analyze dispute in a different method– by looking at the interaction patterns of the dispute, in addition to the words being spoken, emotional reactions and biological responses. I was able to identify that the principle of bifurcation points, and the direction that one takes in dispute after reaching one, was going to be basic to my patients intervention.
Kongits interests sit at the crossway of interaction, medical psychology, marital relationship and family conflict, treatment, and neuroscience resolution as she checks out psychological systems and relational dynamics that minimize maladaptive dispute.
