I’m someone who dislikes conflict. I can handle it well. I’ve had training. I understand de-escalation and all the techniques involved in fighting-fair. I’m just someone who prefers harmony. I’m careful when I go into a conflict situation where I need to confront someone. I pray. I try to figure out what part I played in the situation. I challenge my motivation: Do I really want what’s best for the other person in resolving this?

I try not to let anger or resentment fester. The challenge comes when the issue is not mine to solve. Oh, but I’d sure like to go and make it happen! Speak up on behalf of someone else and let them know that what they did to that person was WRONG!

That is called triangulation and it’s not a good thing. It’s not my job to help mend the relationship between two other people. Now if they ask for my help or assistance I can go with them to do that, but I cannot intervene on their behalf.

Obviously, there are exceptions. If my husband or child is unable to speak up for themselves in a medical situation and they’ve given me the right to speak for them, you can bet I’ll advocate for them! An attorney does a similar thing in mediating a conflict.

But person to person – it needs to be between those two people.

I lost sleep over an issue with this. I was ruminating over the a situation between two people I care about and how they can’t seem to work things out. The one has reached out to the other but there’s been no reply. When the issue first surfaced I asked if the one I’m closest to if they wanted me to helpe mediate a resolution so there could be peace. (I like harmony) but that individual wanted to handle it on their own so I had to step back and wait. Several months have gone by with no resolution. It’s not a relationship that is geographically close but had been good up until one point, and then the other person shut down. Argh! Can you sense my frustration? This has caused a rift in my relationship with another individual as well who is associated with the one who shut down. Oh, what a tangled web.

Until the other person is ready to deal with this, there’s nothing that can be done. So I pray and I wait and… I grieve the loss of the close relationship we all had.

God is the only One who could bring that individual back to the table to talk, or text, or call, or zoom… but the wounds left by their abrupt rejection has hurt more than the person they rejected.  That saddens me. It even clouds some decisions I will eventually need to make.

Maybe it’s a blessing in disquise that those relationships are strained. I doesn’t feel like a blessing. I’ve learned things and became aware of issues along the way that might have made the close relationships we thought we had seem more like smoke and mirrors. Maybe it was just wishful thinking. At some point we all just need to move on past it but there is no relationship if there’s no communication and that has been strained on more than one front.

God sees and knows. It’s hard when friendships have to slide into the “acquaintance” catagory. It feels like a personal failure yet it doesn’t even involve me directly.

Life is hard and friends do come and go. I don’t like that so much. Yet there are friendships I’ve had to walk away from or just not go deeper with for my own health. Maybe that’s the situation with this person. Maybe instead of a crash that the attempt to mend things would have caused, we’ve veered away from a cliff that would have harmed me and my friend further. I don’t know, but I do believe God understands my heart and my desire for peace in those relationships. All I can do is leave it in His capable hands and move on with my life knowing that God has it handled. Thankfully there are other friendships that have grown closer in the vacancy left so I will instead cherish those and work to be as healthy with those as I can be in resolving the challenge that can arise.

Have you been tempted to triangulate on behalf of someone you care for? If so, how did you handle it?