When it turns out to be okay after all

Or better than okay.

7 a.m. on a dark and stormy Monday, I pulled into the full-service gas station in my neighborhood. Normally I avoid this gas station when I’m feeling stressed and can’t handle social interaction. While this is partly due to garden-variety social anxiety, I also once received a proposal of marriage at this gas station, and once had to set a boundary that I did not wish to be hugged at this gas station. So you can understand my hesitation.

But in the downpour that morning, with my gas tank almost on empty, I decided to chance it. The gas station attendant was a middle-aged Dominican man in a thick raincoat who greeted me warmly (in a good way) and assured me he didn’t mind the weather. “We can always find something to complain about,” he said, laughing. “Yesterday, it was drought. Today, it’s rain. We just accept it all and thank God.”

Even though I’m not religious, talking to him changed my morning. On the way to work, I sang along with “Put a Little Love in Your Heart.” (Incidentally, among the many people who sang that song — Al Green, Dolly Parton, Ella Fitzgerald — is Leonard Nimoy with an oddly march-like version.)

If you’ve read this newsletter for a while, you know I can draw a negotiation point out of virtually any story (try me!). Here’s my takeaway from this one.

I almost didn’t go to the gas station because I was braced for an uncomfortable encounter. Instead, it was a moment of connection that lightened my mood.

My negotiation coaching clients often worry about their own uncomfortable encounters. “I can’t,” they tell me. They can’t advocate for themselves. They can’t be direct. They can’t disagree.

I have a lot of sympathy for that “I can’t,” because I’ve been there — in situations where I expect to be shut down, denied, or disrespected. “I can’t” is based on our past experiences of getting in trouble for expressing our needs. But sometimes we extrapolate too much from harmful past experiences, and feel that we can’t speak up even in safer situations. In a future newsletter we’ll interrogate “I can’t,” and learn techniques for deciding when and how to push ourselves past it.

For now, it’s a busy time of year and we’re tired, so let’s focus on just one reassuring truth: Sometimes we anticipate the worst, and end up better off than we could have expected.

If you find yourself avoiding conflict because you’re imagining all the bad things that could happen — you’ll get yelled at, insulted, fired — give yourself a moment to imagine the opposite. What if you could walk away feeling better? More secure in your relationship with someone who was willing to listen; proud of yourself for speaking up; with new ideas that you hadn’t considered before.

In 2025, I’m rooting for us all to have healthier conflicts, where we find the connection and growth that comes from engaging constructively with other people.