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Fighting Words
When your ex
makes you "fighting mad," it can be hard to resist the
impulse to engage in verbal battle. But a fight just
leads to a revenge attack, and then another and another.
Here's how to get out of this vicious circle and resolve
your dispute.
By Karen Vagiste
We
"gun" someone down each time we shoot our mouths off in
anger; vicious verbal snipes, subtle sarcastic slurs,
cynical jabs, and issuing blame are just some examples
of our verbal artillery. There are people who should
register their tongue as a dangerous weapon! Non-verbal
messages can be equally powerful; a certain look, a
gesture, or an intonation can strike a deadly blow at
someone's pride, intelligence, judgment, and
self-respect. Such negative encounters slow down the
progress towards peace because they keep people in the
heat of the battle. Even if you're on a low simmer, it's
best to turn the heat off. A cool mind can click into
neutral gear, which will make traveling over the "hot
spots" easier.
The
Talmud says, "with a weapon you can kill up
close, with a word from across the world." Voice-mail,
e-mail, and faxes can be used as tools of electronic
weaponry. E-mail was created to encourage instantaneous
communication and thus lead to increased productivity.
Yet the angry words that often race across the screen
act as blocks to communication.
Some
people have developed very sophisticated ways of
unleashing their anger; they smile while their velvet
hammer slowly pounds out a message designed to strike a
person down. Such classy people don't stoop to using
those common little dirty words. In the end, it doesn't
matter whether you're a highbrow or lowbrow fighter, the
sad truth that emerges is that our human instinct to
fight is stronger than our will to make peace. Yet we
all dream of world peace, even though we may have some
difficulty keeping the peace in our own kitchens.
We
aren't born knowing how to negotiate peaceful solutions,
so it's easy for the fighting instinct to prevail.
Whether you're the one being gunned down or the one
holding the smoking gun, there are no winners, and the
dispute still remains to be solved. A fight just leads
to a revenge attack, and then another and another. This
circle of retaliation can spin relentlessly! Unresolved
conflicts elevate the body's stress to levels that can
be dangerous.
Is your gun pointed at your heart?
Topping the list of illnesses that stress-triggered
bullets cause is heart disease, which has become the
number one killer in western countries. Your own family
doctor could tell you that the stress of being angry, or
even thinking spiteful thoughts, will make you more
vulnerable to heart disease in several ways.
Heart disease begins very slowly when stress thickens
blood, increases blood pressure, releases cortisone
which weakens the immune system, and increases
cholesterol in the blood; if you overindulge in
processed snack foods to calm your edgy nerves, then
you'll have more fatty deposits in your arteries.
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