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The Clashes arising from differences in most relationships can be managed satisfactorily by this Method. Some conflicts, however, lack certain requirements necessary for success.

Personality Factors

When involved in ‘personality clashes’, we often conclude that the conflict is irresolvable due to the Other’s personality — the Bad-Person Illusion. In truth, certain personality factors can indeed impinge on the Method, making it less effective. So, some relevant personality factors will be mentioned as we list the eight prerequisites.

The 4-Step Method is designed for use when all of the following are true:

Prerequisite #1: It is a Two-Person Conflict

Some of the components of the Method are used in team- building, family consultation, intergroup problem solving, and labour contract negotiations, to name a few occasions where conflicts need resolution. However, when there are several conflicting parties, or when a party to the conflict consists of more than one person, a more complex resolution strategy is usually necessary.

Prerequisite #2: The Two People Have an Ongoing, Interdependent Relationship

The participants must be in an important relationship that is not expected to end in the near future. You may be annoyed by the rudeness of a bank teller or the impatience of a telephone operator, but these relationships are not ongoing. Nor do you and he depend on each other for satisfaction of needs, except in very limited or infrequent transactions.

The 4-Step Method is normally inappropriate and unnecessary when a relationship exists only for the negotiation of one or a few issues, such as the purchase price of an item.

When there is no need to interact, there is no problem. Examples: A divorced couple with no children, and employees whose jobs do not require that they work together. The individuals may not like each other, but their conflicts can best be managed by avoiding contact. Here, there is little consequence to using Wrong Reflex #1 — Non-communication. Dislike between people who have no needs that the other must satisfy is not an interpersonal conflict.

If a specific situation has come to mind while reading this section that you wish were resolved, but that does not seem to meet this prerequisite, then I suspect you are in fact interdependent. The needs you have of the Other may just be undefined.

Prerequisite #3: Both People Are Present and Involved in the Dialogue

It takes two hands to clap. An interpersonal conflict is a dyadic, or two-person process. One person can solve a personal problem; it takes two to solve an interpersonal problem. Without both parts of the dyad involved, the problem cannot be solved — the clapping makes no sound. The amount of interest each of you has in resolving the conflict may be unequal, and your levels of enthusiasm for talking about it may differ. If you question your Other’s willingness to be involved, review the minimum requirements of your partner. Surprisingly little commitment is expected of her to make the Method work.

Personality factor: Schizoid Compromise

Some people’s experience in early childhood taught them that relationships are dangerous. They learned that being vulnerable to others carries a high risk of being hurt. Trusting brought abuse. Wanting love brought rejection.

The hurt that relationships can cause children is of two types: Invasion (being emotionally suffocated, humiliated, battered) and abandonment (being left needy, unloved without emotional contact with others). Adults who suffered as children in these ways unconsciously keep emotionally distant from others as a protection against more hurt.

Of course, all of us keep a certain distance, fearing vulnerability, yet needing interpersonal contact. By the time we reach adulthood, we have usually found a comfortable compromise between emotional contact and withdrawal in our relationships. In psychotherapy, this comfort level is called the ‘schizoid compromise‘.

Due to having suffered painful invasion or abandonment as children, some people are unable to tolerate the anxiety aroused by sustained face-to-face contact with their Other, as required in the Dialogue. Being confronted with the Other’s anger, and having the comfortingly familiar Wrong Reflexes outlawed by the Cardinal Rules, can arouse intolerable fears. The primitive anxiety of being invaded and destroyed by the Other’s anger, or of being abandoned and losing the relationship, can be too much to bear. Although Dialogues are tense encounters for everyone, some people find it impossible to remain engaged in uninterrupted issue-focused conversation. The more emotionally distant is one’s schizoid compromise, the less able is the person to stay in the Essential Process, and therefore the effectiveness of the 4-Step Method is diminished.

The schizoid compromise doesn’t influence only intimate and family relationships. This anxiety-regulating mechanism controls our behaviour during conflicts in the workplace just as it does in marriages.

Prerequisite #4: Each Person Is Able to Refrain from Physical Violence

The Dialogue calls for participants to join in verbal, not physical, confrontation. Verbal aggression is permissible, and can even be helpful. Physical aggression, however, is neither. Not only is violent assault destructive to relationships, it is also illegal. Each person must be able to participate in discussion without fear that the Other’s anger may erupt in physical attack.

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