HOW TO OVERCOME A HEATED ARGUMENT

Dealing with someone else's emotions is always hard, and often it just involves letting someone blow off steam. 

When you find yourself in a heated argument, clinical psychologist with 40 years of experience Dr. Albert J. Bernstein says, as people often argue with adults rationally, no matter how upset they are, trying to talk them out of being angry rarely works however, treating them like you would a screaming child doesn't have to mean being condescending:

People say to me all the time, "You mean I have to treat a grown-up like a three-year-old?" I say, "Yes, absolutely." If you're a parent, what do you do with a tantrum? You ignore it, or at least you try to ignore it. But with an adult you try and talk them out of it, and it never works.

Here is a summary of Al’s 7 tips for turning difficult conversations into easy ones:

1. Keep calm. 
2. Treat’em like a child. You can’t talk them out of emotional outbursts and getting angry over it does nothing good.
3. Say “Please speak more slowly. I’d like to help.” Slow it down. Don’t come off like you’re fighting back.
4. Ask “What would you like me to do?” You gotta make’em start thinking in order turn off the rage machine.
5. Don’t make statements. Ask questions. Explaining is veiled dominance. Questions get them thinking.
6. Start sentences with “I’d like…” not “You are…” If you start with “I” it’s hard to be seen as attacking.
7. Let them have the last word. Don’t let your ego blow it at the last minute.

So what does Al say is the single most important thing to do when dealing with people?

If you want to get along well with people and understand what’s going on in situations, whenever somebody says something to you, ask yourself, “Why is he saying this to me? What’s going on with him?” That is a doorway to understanding, a doorway to getting what you want, and also a doorway to compassion. Rather than judging the person, try and understand them.