articulating disagreement

welcome to introspection ft. harsehaj! ⭐️ i’m harsehaj, a 19 y/o always up to something in social good x tech.

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onto today’s topic: articulating disagreement 😬 

throughout my life, i’ve just generally avoided disagreement because i thought they killed relationships and/or conversations. there’s a huge difference between being argumentative and having a conversation disputing each others’ points.

i hate it when someone says “why are you arguing with me?” when i disagree with a point.

i’m not arguing. i firmly believe disagreements enrich perspective.

perhaps i just need to articulate my disagreement better, and that’s something i’m working on. 🔨 

one way i’ve found to be especially effective has been communicating my disagreement through questioning. rather than outright overriding someone else’s opinion, i’ll probe at their stance and kind of wind those questions to frame my own point.

for example if someone is talking about how time blocking isn’t an effective time management strategy, i’ll ask “what strategies do you use?” which will turn into a discussion about experimenting with productivity hacks and i’ll eventually bring up the fact that different strategies work for different kinds of people. 🤷‍♀️ 

i’ve realized that disagreement must translate through a discussion with multiple insights, rather than a statement being shot down by another.

a bad way to articulate that seemingly trivial disagreement would have been simply replying with a “it works perfectly for me.” it’s dismissive and veers the edge of becoming argumentative. there’s a proper way to disagree if you value sustaining the relationship. even if you don’t really enjoy someone’s company, it’s a good thing to disagree with grace.

if you’d consider yourself open-minded, appropriately articulating disagreement is a huge requirement for that characteristic. (:

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