What is Mediation?
With changing social and professional circumstances and increasingly high pressure lifestyles, scope for conflict increases. This can start with small skirmishes and end in intense rivalry, culminating even in court battles.
Often, when people look back, they realise that the root cause of friction was often not as serious in the beginning, and that what began as a root cause, was frequently no longer the fighting point towards the end. It is just that the true reason for the dispute was not addressed at the right time in the right way, which lead to increasing ill will and spillover of intense emotions, often negative. Even at a much later stage, with third party interventions and court proceedings, the undercurrents of ill-will often remain.
It is here that mediation and counseling come in handy. Mediation is a fast emerging conflict resolution method around the world, which picked up traction in the 1980s in the United States. Today, it is popularly adopted around the world, particularly in South East Asia and Australia.
Mediation helps parties settle their issues in a mutually agreeable way. It gives both participants control over the process of looking for a solution and facilitates a solution acceptable to both. Confidentiality is maintained throughout. Mediation therefore ends up being a less expensive, less time-consuming way of resolving conflicts, as it relies on facilitation of communication between the two warring participants.
Often, communication lines break down between parties on opposite sides due to the conflict. Once communication is restored, the true reason for the conflict emerges, which can then be addressed mutually. Mediators encourage participants to share their version of the story and assist participants to identify the problem from their perspective. The focus of mediation is therefore on solving the problem as well as building relationships.
It is here that counseling comes in. Through counseling, venting of strong emotions such as hatred, anger, grief etc. happens and the true reason for conflict and the solution to the problem surfaces. Often, this brings about healing and forgiveness.
About Snehi
As facilitators of the process of mediation and counseling, our centre is called Snehi. Snehi in Hindi means “friend”. The Snehi Centre for Mediation and Counseling is an initiative to reach out, facilitate friendship and assist with looking for solutions to difficult problems.