Every once in a while I get intense deja vu about a podcast topic and I convince myself that I've done it before even though there's no record of it ever happening.
That's happening with this topic like I really am convinced that I've done it before but I can't find any record of it anywhere so I guess I haven't.
I'm very anxious about this.
You know when you've been doing a podcast for as many years as I have it's like almost five years at this point.
This starts to happen more and more.
The deja vu gets worse because I've made so many hundreds of episodes I'm like I don't even know what the fuck I've talked about before.
So if I have talked about this before I'm sorry but we're going to do it anyway because I think it's an important topic.
Today we're going to be talking about agreeing to disagree.
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It's very common to disagree.
Right?
And most of the time it doesn't really matter.
It's like not a big deal.
Like disagreeing about music or movies or fashion or sort of mundane inconsequential things.
It's no big deal.
For the most part that's not ruining a relationship.
But when it comes to more serious topics such as religion, politics, morals, values, things that have more gravity to them.
Disagreeing can sometimes be detrimental to relationships, to social life.
Taboo sort of topics.
Disagreeing on those gets messy quick.
Right?
And I remember growing up hearing, you know, my elders say never talk about politics, religion or wait, what is it?
It's like there's three things.
Oh, okay.
Yeah.
Sorry.
I had to Google it.
The three things you must never discuss.
Politics, religion and money.
Actually, yeah.
Money is another controversial one.
We're not controversial, but sort of polarizing.
Many people disagree on it.
And something that I've realized as I've grown up is that being able to handle disagreements properly is an incredibly useful tool.
We're not always going to agree with each other, especially on these polarizing topics.
Right?
It is inevitable that we are going to run into people who disagree with us on things that are so fundamental to our belief system.
It is inevitable.
I would say that there are two ways to deal with that.
Right?
There's a productive way.
There's a healthy way.
And then there's an unhealthy way in an unproductive way.
And I would say when I was younger, I dealt with disagreements in a far less productive, healthy way.
I was much more emotional, much more extreme, much less empathetic.
And I will say that that did not serve me in my life at all.
Now, obviously I was younger.
So I think the things that I was disagreeing on were far, far less serious.
Right?
The older you get, the more serious topics come into your life.
Right?
But I think what really taught me about learning to agree to disagree was disagreeing with family members on certain things, anything, anything remotely serious.
And watching that wedge sort of, I don't know, impact our relationship in a way that was negative.
And through having conversations with my parents, I very quickly realized that the way I was handling disagreements or differing opinions was not going to fly.
It just wasn't going to fly.
I needed to figure out a healthier, more productive way to deal with disagreements.
I think that the lessons that I've learned over the years since sort of coming to the conclusion that I needed to sort of make a change have been so impactful that I must share with you.
As always, take it with a grain of salt.
This is just my personal experience and I'm still immature.
I don't have an incredible amount of life experience.
I still feel like a fucking teenager half the time.
I'm like, I forget I'm in my twenties now.
I'm like, I'm just a 19 year old.
It's like, no, you're not.
Anyway, to start, let's sort of dig into what the unhealthy way of dealing with disagreements is.
I would say when I think of an unproductive disagreement, I think of snappy, angry, overly emotional responses, which some might disagree with me there and say, if somebody proposes an idea that is horrible in one's opinion, right?
Dumb, potentially even harmful, it's totally valid to get upset, to yell, to scream, to get snappy, to get angry.
And I totally understand that.
However, I am truly of the belief that being snappy, being angry, being over emotional will never, ever help anything.
Even if somebody comes to you with a fucking horrific opinion, okay, to then respond to them in a way that attacks them will never get anyone anywhere.
It stops a conversation in its tracks.
It puts both parties on defense mode.
And now, now the environment is no longer safe to learn.
Okay, that just sounded like I farted, but it was my cat scratching my chair.
I promise.
If you heard that, that was not me farting, which I, by the way, I'm not a cat.
By the way, if I did fart, I would say it and I wouldn't even cut it out.
I would just let it be a part of the episode, but that was not me farting.
That was my cat.
Just from what I've experienced, overly emotional conversation in a bad, angry, hateful sort of way.
It usually only prevents a positive outcome.
And in theory, when there's a disagreement, what would be ideal is that both parties can come to a positive conclusion in one way or another.
Okay.
Is that always going to happen?
No, but that is ideal.
I don't know.
I just think overly emotional, angry, snappy, whatever.
That just prevents that from ever even happening.
Shuts down all potential.
It can be tempting, especially if somebody really has an idea or an opinion that really bothers you.
It can be super tempting to just attack, but I think that that is not the right way to handle it.
When I think of an unhealthy disagreement, I also think of the ego being threatened.
When it comes to strong beliefs that we have in our life, whether it's about religion or it's about politics or it's about our morals or it's about our values.
A lot of us tend to take those beliefs and allow those beliefs to be this sort of pedestal for us to stand on.
It's a huge part of our sense of self and it's very easy for ego to get wrapped up in our beliefs.
Sometimes we're even praised for our beliefs.
If we have certain religious beliefs in the church, we might be praised for abiding by the rules strongly.
If we have certain political beliefs, we might be rewarded socially for having those beliefs.
If we have strong moral or value beliefs, if those are societally admirable beliefs, we might be rewarded for those.
A lot of our beliefs impact our sense of self and at times even our ego.
If somebody disagrees with those beliefs, we can feel threatened.
Don't threaten my sense of self by threatening one of my beliefs.
You are in turn threatening me.
It's natural, I would say, for us to hold these things close and even have them inflate our ego in a way.
That's a very hard thing to avoid.
But I think that having our ego tied up into certain beliefs too heavily can actually be a negative thing.
I'll dig more into that later.
But I think when one's ego is threatened through a disagreement, that is a sign that their ego is in their beliefs too much.
I think when ego is involved, it can get tricky.
Again, I'll explain that more in a minute.
And last but not least, I think lacking open-mindedness.
And by open-mindedness, I can mean a lot of things.
Open-mindedness about the potential that one's own opinion could be wrong for one.
Lacking open-mindedness when it comes to why the other person has the opinion that they do.
Immediately coming to conclusions about who this other person is because they have a certain belief about something.
Let's say they're very religious and you are not very religious and you disagree heavily on religion.
Instead of understanding like, well, this person grew up in the church and this is their entire foundation for their life.
If you were to put yourself in their shoes, you would have the same beliefs as them.
To put yourself in the other person's shoes is to be open-minded.
And when there's a disagreement, you must put yourself in the other person's shoes.
And understand why they believe what they do.
That allows you to see the human in them and not just come to negative conclusions about who they are as a person.
Whether or not their opinions are right.
You have to put yourself in their shoes.
You have to hear them out.
You have to be open-minded.
And it can be really challenging when somebody presents an idea that to you seems absolutely ridiculous to say, you know what?
Let me take a step back and put myself in their shoes for a minute.
Even though I'm probably never going to even agree with them.
I'm probably never going to see eye to eye with them.
Let me just put myself in their shoes for a minute and understand why they believe what they do.
To refuse to hear the other person out is again, preventing the conversation from going in a positive direction.
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One skill everyone can benefit from is learning how to take time for themselves.
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I think that this is an important topic and I'm motivated to discuss it because I think it's really relevant today.
I think that this immature, close-minded way of handling disagreements is particularly popular right now.
And here I go sounding like a fucking schoolteacher or something or your parents or something, but I think it's because of the internet.
I think because of the internet, many of us are emotionally stunted.
And that's for obvious reasons.
Number one, we lack face-to-face interaction.
So much of our face-to-face interaction has been replaced by internet interaction.
And we lack real-life social skills because those social skills take a lot of practice.
Let's say 40% of our social interaction has been replaced by internet interaction.
We're now 40% worse in theory.
This is a hypothesis.
This is something that this is not a study.
This is something that I'm just hypothesizing on.
We're basically 40% worse at handling social interaction in my own theory, right?
And I can say personally that I struggle with this.
Like I lack social skills that my elders have in my family, for example.
It's far easier for them to handle uncomfortable social situations than it is for me.
And I do not think that that is because I'm younger.
I think that that is because I grew up on the internet.
I think that they would be able to handle social situations at my age better than me
because they did not grow up in the age of the internet.
I am fully aware of that.
And that is something that I'm actively working on improving because I hear stories about my elders in my life
handling confrontation with friends, with loved ones, with their teachers when they were my age.
And they had the courage to say things that I don't think I would.
And I really, truly do believe that that's because I grew up in the age of the internet.
Like for example, growing up when I wanted to tell a boy that I had a crush on them.
I didn't have to do that in person. I could do that on Snapchat.
You know what I'm saying?
And now it's really challenging for me to confess vulnerable emotions to boys.
Like I'm getting better at it and I think I'm decent enough at it, but I would be far better at it
if I didn't grow up in the age of the internet and I wasn't telling boys that I like them on Snapchat.
I think that that, you know, plays a huge role in our stunted social skills, we're stunted emotionally.
I also think too that the age of the internet allows us to sort of say whatever we want online and we have protection.
Like we don't have to say it to anyone's face.
You have to be much more fair in person than you do in real life.
And I think a great example of that is something that I've experienced in my life where I'll go through phases where I'm getting a lot of hate comments online.
People really do not like me for whatever reason.
You know, there's internet hate cycles and I've been on the internet for a while now and, you know, there are phases when for the most part it feels like the internet doesn't like me.
They think I'm annoying or I've fallen out of favor.
You know, I've fallen in and out of favor as all public figures do.
And what's interesting about that is that never, never, ever translates into real life.
I never experienced that in person.
When I'm in a phase where I feel like maybe the internet likes me less, that doesn't mean that when I go to the grocery store and somebody comes up to me and says, oh my God, you're Emma, like nice to meet you.
Actually, I really don't like you anymore.
I used to like you, but now I don't.
That never happens.
It doesn't translate into real life.
Why?
Because nobody would ever say that to your face.
To leave a hate comment is fucking easy.
To come up to me in person and say that you don't like me, that is really uncomfortable.
Most people would never have the courage to do that.
We now feel more comfortable with disagreeing in an unhealthy way because we can do it online if we want and that protects us.
And I also think too that there's a chance that people have weirdly grown a fondness for disagreement because of the internet.
Because it's not face to face, because it's easy.
In a way, it's almost become a sport for some people.
There's something satisfying about a nasty argument through the screen.
People are excited by low stakes conflict.
And when it's online, there's no need to resolve it because it's usually with another stranger online who you never need to worry about interacting with again.
To sort of analyze it even further, I think at times it can even be rewarded.
If you can start a fight about a disagreement on Twitter and get a bunch of retweets for it or get a bunch of likes for it, you're going to want to do it again.
Because now subconsciously, maybe even consciously, you're being told by the likes, the retweets, the comments that are positive, whatever, that you disagreeing is a good thing in the way that you are.
You disagreeing in a nasty sort of way.
That's good.
The internet is moralists, right?
And you can get rewarded at times for handling things badly, doing the wrong thing.
The rules are different online than they are in person.
There's sort of no motivation to learn how to disagree healthily, you know?
Learning how to agree to disagree is challenging.
And I think the only thing that can motivate a person to learn how to do that is to have to do it in person.
When the stakes are higher and you're forced to look at the other human being in the face.
So that sort of adds this complicated layer to things where, number one, it's safer to do it online.
It's easier to do it online.
But then number two, that's all you know.
So then when you do have a disagreement in person, you're handling it the only way you know how, the way that you've been doing it on the internet, right?
I don't know.
That's not to say that the internet is the sole problem.
I think that this is something that everyone struggles with regardless of the presence of the internet.
I think our grandparents struggled with this as well.
But I think that it was easier for them probably to overcome that challenge and get better at agreeing to disagree because they had to do it only face to face.
And if you're doing it face to face all the time, I don't know.
Eventually you're like, this sucks.
I need to figure out a healthier way to do this.
I don't know.
I don't know.
Now let's discuss why being unable to disagree productively is detrimental to one's well-being.
To start, I think it can cause in extreme cases, alienation.
If you're somebody that really struggles with disagreeing with others, chances are you will really struggle to have people around you.
If every time you disagree with someone, it turns into this explosive sort of toxic conversation, you're not somebody who's fun to be around.
And again, I think it's inevitable that we're going to disagree with everyone on at least something.
And so if you don't know how to handle that properly, who's left?
You will become alienated.
On top of that, I think it prevents you from learning new things from others.
If you attack and get angry and get overly emotional every time you have a disagreement and you are closed-minded and it's your way or the highway, not only is it an unsafe space for you and this other person to share ideas and learn and maybe help each other become better people, but also, most importantly, I think you could prevent yourself from becoming a better person, because chances are you're not right on everything.
I can guarantee you, I'm not right on everything, you're not right on everything, and every single person that I know and love is not right on everything.
No one is.
So there's a good chance at any given moment that you could be wrong as well.
And to be open to that idea is to allow yourself to learn.
And last but not least, it causes unnecessary stress and upset.
Like, the last thing any of us need is any more stress and upset, and I would argue that when it comes to disagreements, there is a healthy way to handle it, even if it's the most intense disagreements, and you can avoid a lot of stress, upset, and pain by learning how to do it in a healthy way.
Stress and upset is not only just like bad because it sucks, right?
It's also bad for our health.
It fucks with our immune system and shit, it's not only is it emotionally unhealthy, but I would argue it's physically unhealthy as well.
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So let's discuss what I think the healthy way to disagree is.
And no, it's not like being agreeable and saying, yeah, you know what?
I actually think you're right.
Even when you don't agree, that's not healthy either.
It's not completely avoiding confrontation altogether.
I think it's a balance.
I think finding a way to have rational, level-headed, open-minded conversation is obviously the key.
I think even in heated moments, finding it in yourself to remain calm and collected and respectful.
Because again, even if somebody's saying something that's fucking ridiculous, it gets you nowhere.
It gets you nowhere and it gets them nowhere to explode and be loud and angry.
It gets no one anywhere.
So I think maintaining a level of healthy, calm conversation is important.
And if the other person starts to explode at you, say, I don't want to have a conversation like this.
I want to learn from you.
I want you to learn from me.
I want both of us to learn.
Can we please have a productive, healthy, level-headed, open-minded conversation here?
That is how we're both going to learn.
Trying to be diplomatic with it, I think, is so powerful.
But also, I think trying to remove your ego from your opinions is so impactful as well.
Because by removing your ego from your beliefs and your opinions, you allow yourself to be fluid in your beliefs.
Right?
If you're super rigid about your beliefs and you're like, these are my beliefs and they cannot change at all,
this is the way that the world works, this is the way things are, this is who I am as a person, and there's no its' ands or buts about it.
Some people would say that that's a good thing.
I actually don't think it is.
I think it's far healthier to say, these are my beliefs and I believe them for a reason.
But I'm open to building on my beliefs, improving my opinions, developing a stronger sense of self through evolving my beliefs.
I think that that's far healthier.
If you're fluid in your beliefs, it allows you to make the most of any sort of disagreement by either coming out of that conversation, even firmer in your beliefs,
or come out of that conversation with a new perspective that makes your beliefs even stronger, but different.
You can't clearly analyze what others are saying and edit your own beliefs if you're so rigid and so filled with ego that you're like a fucking brick.
Right?
Don't be a brick in a disagreement.
Be a river.
With that being said though, I do think it's important for you to be firm about what you think.
Don't let the other person walk all over you.
I'm not saying like be fluid, agree to everything that they say.
No, it's good to be open in that way, but also you should still stand firm in areas where it intuitively feels right to stand firm.
And it's very important for you to share your beliefs and listen to their beliefs and participate in a respectful debate.
Disagreement is an incredible thing if you ensure that it's respectful.
And listen, you both might share your opinions and you both might still disagree.
And that's fine too, but I think at that point you have to make a choice at the end of that conversation, how you choose to proceed.
In the moment, you can agree to disagree and say, you know what, this is something that we're just never going to see eye to eye on it seems.
And that's okay.
Let's let this go for right now.
And depending on the gravity of the disagreement, the next steps may vary.
You might decide to keep this person in your life and just avoid the topic that you disagree on.
And that's okay.
There are certain people in my life that I disagree with on shit, nothing too serious necessarily.
But you know, even things that are mundane like music or even like career, like how I make choices in my career and some people disagree with how I do that.
Or you know, I might disagree with their career values, whatever.
And when we have conversations about these certain things, it doesn't go as planned, right?
Because we don't tend to see eye to eye, but that's totally fine.
We don't need to talk about those things and we can still be friends.
We can still love each other if it's family.
Like I've learned that I don't need to see eye to eye on every single thing with every single person in my life.
But there also are going to be times where you disagree with a person and you decide, you know what, I think I need to respectfully distance myself from this person.
This disagreement is so detrimental to our relationship, the beliefs that we disagree on are so important to me that I can't have this person in my life anymore.
And that's fine too.
But I think that removing yourself from their life in a way that's respectful is the best way to handle it.
And maybe there's another conversation that happens that's like, listen, I just, I don't think that I can have you in my life and have this be a disagreement.
But I do think that that should be the worst case scenario.
I think for the most part, we should try our best to learn to agree to disagree and respect other people's ideas about things because I think for the most part, it's harmless, right?
Like if somebody is different, religious beliefs you, that's harmless.
Like there are so many things that we can agree to disagree on and I think that we should strive for it.
That's all I got.
Okay. That's all I got.
I'm just telling you, try to agree to disagree.
I think, I think it can be a really beautiful thing and I think we're all stubborn and we all want to be right because that feels good.
But I think that there's so much value in learning to agree to disagree that I encourage you and I also encourage myself constantly to be as thoughtful as I can about that.
Anyway, that's all I have for today.
Thank you all for listening and hanging out.
I hope you enjoyed this.
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Okay, I love you all.
Thank you all for listening.
It is always a pleasure hanging out and I can't wait to talk to you in a few days.
Okay, bye.
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