There is no clean end to war once you are in a war mentality. Winners in one war become losers the next, and combat runs into a quagmire in which it is obvious that neither side will be able to claim victory, war thinking keeps stubbornly drilling home the same metaphor of war. As history teaches us from World War I to Vietnam and now Russia, wars are at once pointless, relentless, and endless. War heroes on one side are war criminals on the other.
In the face of so much blood and death, it seems strange to root war in a misguided concept. What William Blake called our “mind-forg’d manacles” are a form of self-imprisonment. Change your concepts, and only then will the manacles fall off. Here are some of the replacements for the whole concept of war.
De-escalate the concept of enemy. An enemy can be reframed, in progressive order, as an adversary, competitor, partner, teacher, and finally your equal.
Treat the other side with respect. Otherwise you lose them before you start.
Recognize that there is the perception of injustice on both sides. This is a point of agreement adversaries can join in.
Be prepared to forgive and ask for forgiveness. Here forgiveness means letting go of your desire for retribution and revenge. This is an act of true courage. Even if you believe that the other side doesn’t deserve forgiveness, you deserve peace.
Refrain from belligerence. It will be taken as bullying and arouses renewed antagonism.
Use emotional intelligence, which means understanding the other side’s feelings, giving them value, and making them equal to your feelings.
Reach out to understand the other side’s values, both personal and cultural. The fog of war descends when two adversaries know nothing about one another. The result is a war based on projections and prejudice. The goal is mutual acceptance. At the deepest level we all want the same things.
Refrain from ideological rhetoric over politics and religion.
Recognize that there is fear on both sides. Don’t be afraid to express your anxieties and to ask the other side what they are afraid of.
Do not insist on being right and proving the other side wrong. Give up the need to be right allows you to focus on what you actually want.