Using words & stories to find common ground & progress towards a better future together
As mentioned previously, finding common ground is indispensable to our progress, especially if we are to move forward as communities and solve the most pressing issues we have to deal with as humans inhabiting an abundant but vulnerable and finite planet.
In this article we explore how words, language and the stories we tell can help us find common ground or tear us apart, and look at some examples to demonstrate how things can go either way.
Have you ever shared a story or anecdote that sounded perfectly reasonable to you and made a lot of sense but it came across to others as highly threatening, completely irrelevant, boring, or as the best thing they have ever heard and potentially all at once in the same audience? Who hasn’t?
This is a very more common problem that affects all sorts of relationships and progress.
In the search for what connects us and what tears us apart, we can’t underestimate the role that language and the stories we tell have on making people:
- more open and receptive to discussing challenging situations or new opportunities, old wounds and grievances, or new ideas and ways of thinking and acting in order to progress to a better future, or conversely,
- more alienated, aggrieved and unhappy, leading them to do nothing, create more arguments or stand-offs, or do the opposite of what we intended as an outcome
Which is why is so important that before we seek to find common ground we do our research and identify how the other person or group of people is currently thinking and/or feeling about whatever it is we want to talk to them about. This relates to the concepts of ‘Being Otherish’ and ‘Theory of Mind’.
Where are they at on the topic in question?
Are they highly experienced and well informed or completely naive or ignorant (usually through no fault of their own) or somewhere in between?
How open and receptive are they to looking at this topic? What have they been engaging with beforehand? How are their views, opinions and beliefs formed? Are these based on sound well thought out arguments, or on opinions, hearsay, falsities or fear?
You can see where I am going with this. It’s a potential minefield.
In short, whether we ask them directly before presenting what we have or we read up about them and see them in action first, and then prepare our choice of words, language, stories and anecdotes appropriately calibrated and curated to them and their priorities, doing our research can make a huge difference when setting up the right conditions for finding common ground particularly when our interlocutor* may not agree with us in the first instance.
Disagreements
People often shy away from disagreement. Most of us don’t like person-on-person confrontation. But disagreement isn’t the issue here.
The important thing is to focus on setting up the conditions for decent and respectful conversations to happen whether we agree with each other or not. There must be some context that is relevant to both sides from where we can start a dialogue.
From here what we do want is for people to engage in a contest of ideas, because this is how we explore possibility and find ways to progress for the common good.
There’s nothing like having a vested interest.
Where it all turns to a big mess is when we try to enforce our ways onto others expecting them to accept the new way without any contest.
We can’t wave our finger and tell people that what they are doing is wrong and that they would be better off doing it ‘our way’. That is a sure fire way to disengagement and ‘us versus them’ scenario even if ‘our’ way is the best way forward for them and us.
So how do we persuade someone to try something different to what they know and feel safe with?
When people are in distress and worried about their livelihoods or when they feel powerless in a given situation, or even when they know they should do something different but it’s all too hard by themselves, the messages we deliver and how they are received by others can make all the difference for all of us and the common good.
Here are some scenarios and stories to consider:
Situation 1: “It’s too big. It’s too hard. What difference can I make? I’m just one person”
Answer: Every step is better than none. Every action counts.
Think about the mountains of waste we are being confronted with every day in the media, whether it’s our household ‘recyclable’ waste being returned to us from China or Indonesia or the mounting e-waste, disposable coffee cups and fast fashion waste. We can feel overwhelmed about how we as individuals can possibly make difference; that is until programs, like ABC’s War on Waste show us how we can make a real practical difference – showing us how people, schools and businesses are finding ways to do their bit for the common good. These are practical examples we can see ourselves implementing.
Also, many more people are now hyper aware of what they buy (packaging, components), how they re-use, and recycle or dispose of items. Nobody is perfect, but every little act helps make a difference. When it spreads from one person acting to 10 people then to thousands and then millions of people acting (even ‘imperfectly’) locally then we have a movement and real change happens.
So when these acts are being publically shamed or criticised for being ‘trivial’, or not making an impact it affect our self-confidence and slow down or prevent real meaningful progress. Which is why we need to keep sharing positive practical stories that are making a difference. We need to talk about them and modelling the right behaviours that do make a real tangible difference.
Even if our actions are not perfect, millions of people, schools, communities and business reducing their waste, reducing their use of plastic, properly disposing of their e-waste and so on is real progress. These little actions advance the common good.
What the world doesn’t need more of are cyber critics pointing fingers at everyone who is doing their bit and manufacture ‘Recreational Outrage’ to try and shame us via their Twitter and Facebook accounts.
Instead of demanding perfection from everyone, why not celebrate and share our progress towards better outcomes and find common ground to build on what we are doing and move forward.
Situation 2: “Why do I need to bother turning the heating down a degree, the cooling system up, or using my car less, etc. if the big corporations and big nations are the worst polluters and they are not doing their part? My ‘sacrifice’ won’t render any benefits.”
Answer: Millions of small changes or sacrifices stave off disaster and instead become huge benefits in the short and long term for everyone
True, one person’s act in that sense doesn’t make a difference, but one by one through sharing stories become hundreds and thousands and that escalates to millions. Millions of people turning down the heaters by one degree and putting on a jumper instead, or holding off putting on their AC and instead closing curtains and pulling down their awnings to keep the heat at bay, or people using public transport or walking instead of driving their car, can have a dramatic impact that changes the big picture – very quickly. It makes our little individual sacrifices worth it. We can see we are contributing to a better outcome for the common good and that includes us.
Situation 3: “I won’t risk my livelihood”
Answer: Here’s a real, viable alternative that will secure your livelihood for the longer term.
Let’s say you’ve been out of work for a while. Now someone comes in and tells you they are starting a great new business where you and others like you will get a job. 100% guaranteed. They just need to organise a few things to make sure they have. They might need help setting this up before they can start the business and give you the job.
Then someone else comes in and tells you (and the others) that this new business is a bad idea and shouldn’t happen at all and advises you not to help them because it will have a negative effect in your future. Obviously there’s not much future to think about if you can’t support yourself and your family in the short term.
Now, what if the second person that came instead of ‘advising’ you what to do, would have told you that they too could give you a job 100% guaranteed, and others like you would get a job as well, in a different type of business, one that would not harm your future? One that would have long term prospects for better job security. It might mean you would need to re-skill in some areas and you would get help in that too. Wouldn’t that be a much better way to go about it? You would be solving your immediate problem and also your ‘future’ potential problem.
Scenarios like this happen all the time, all around us. And they can become better situations for everyone involved and for the common good if we are aware and know how to approach them. We all need to do our part in helping each other understand our options, risks and opportunities, without judgement and with kindness and compassion.
Definitions
Finding Common Ground: is about exploring shared interests, beliefs, or opinions between two people or groups of people who may disagree about most other subjects.
Common Good:
Our common ground in Social Foundations: Water, food, housing energy, health, education, income and work, peace and justice, networks, gender equality, social equity, political voice
Our common ground in Ecology: climate change, ozone layer depletion, air pollution, biodiversity loss, land conversion, freshwater withdrawals, nitrogen and phosphorus overloading, chemical pollution and ocean acidification
* interlocutor – one who takes part in dialogue or conversation
Remember everybody lives by selling something.
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