When Feedback Becomes a War

Imagine offering someone genuine feedback, only to watch it spiral into a quarrel. The conversation veers off course. The original point is lost. Now the topic is no longer the feedback but the two of you, and how each of you is always treated. It becomes a matter of ego, where each wants to prevail over the other. You realise you only wanted to give feedback, and now it's a full-blown war. You grow resentful of the person. Frustrated, too. If this happens often enough, you lose the inclination to share anything meaningful. The relationship soon becomes a pretence, with both people concealing things from each other to avoid the next quarrel. We conclude that they are insecure, that they perceive everything as an attack. This is partly true, but there is also a risk of being overconfident and missing the genuine point being made. When two people argue, it is important to isolate the point of conflict. Which part of the argument is actually fuelling it? A useful exercise is to inhabit…