The Way of Conflict, Part 1

     According to "The Way of Conflict Style Inventory" I am an Earth personality. However, the differences were very small; I tallied 18 A's, 15 B's, 12 C's, and 15 D's. As I read the Earth description, I have no scruples and am comfortable identifying myself this way - overall, it is pretty accurate. But I can also see myself in each of the other descriptions, which brings me to the sentence on page 27, "We cannot judge a person's elemental conflict personality by how they are currently acting," and a similar statement on page 41, "No one can be put into a box, let alone ever be fully summarized in a table." I hold stock in the idea of elemental personalities, but it is rife to say that any person is all and only one of them. I am an Earth personality, but almost equally a Water and an Air personality with a very close comparison to Fire. After all, doesn't everyone want questions to be asked of them, humility shown to them, acknowledgement, and honesty in life let alone in a transformer?
     After reading through the entirety of Part 1 I can agree that identifying personalities is an important part of conflict resolution, but it becomes muddled in terms of the individual; it's not as easy as Amy is Air, Blaze is Fire, Gene is Water, and Edina is Earth. Every individual is different amounts of each element and no individual is all one. In terms of team identification though, elemental personalities function much better and more easy to identify. I structured my answers in "Way of Conflict Team Personality Inventory" off of the Sophomore Council of my social club, Chi Alpha Kappa. When I read the description of a Fire Team to my fellow council members we all laughed; it was hilariously accurate. It seems that as a team we can better find a balance and agree on a definition; ironically, it is more difficult to find balance as an individual.

We don't accomplish anything in this world alone...

and whatever happens is the result of the whole tapestry of one's life

and all the weavings of individual threads from one

to another that creates something.

-Sandra Day O'Connor, quoted in Chapter 2 "Identifying the Team's Personality"