Neighboring Tip of the Week - Participate in conflict transformation with a neighbor.

Hello friends!

We’re diving in headlong today and presenting a tip that’s perhaps on the more challenging end of the neighboring tip spectrum. The tip for today is this: Participate in conflict transformation with a neighbor.

Let’s start with the ideas of “conflict” and “transformation”. We would propose that conflict, in and of itself, isn’t necessarily a bad thing. And actually, we would say that conflict can be a really good thing! Oddly enough, the fact that people have, or at least perceive themselves to have, different interests than other people, seems to be part of what makes our world such a diverse and beautiful place! The key to whether we experience positive or negative outcomes from conflict seems to lie within what we do when we experience the conflict itself, and that’s where transformation comes in. Can we take our conflicts and respond to them in a way that fosters healthier and more harmonious relationships, that brings about a greater sense of togetherness, of oneness? Adam, on our Neighboring Movement team, teaches all about the conflict and likes to say that “conflict is energy”. In other words, conflict is a force that can propel us forward, individually and collectively. As odd as it may seem, and as awkward and difficult it may be in the midst of the transformation, we believe that, together with our neighbors, we can transform the conflicts between us in order to foster healthier and more harmonious relationships and bring about a greater sense of togetherness and oneness on our blocks.

So, how do we do this? How do we start transforming conflict with our neighbors?…