Copyright 2002
Wilderness Drum, Inc.
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Wilderness Peacemaking
Steve Beyer

Introduction The Peacemaking Perspective Sacred Gifts The Role of Stress Controlling Your Own Stress Preventing Loss of Control The Ways We Communicate Nonthreatening Approach The Stress Trajectory Appropriate Responses Signs of Distress Verbal Aggression Physical Attack Collapse and Reintegration Conclusion References

Nonthreatening Approach

It is tempting to try to physically intimidate a disruptive person – to tower over the person, or get in his face by maintaining eye contact at close range. Such approaches only serve to increase stress, and thus are likely to make the problem worse rather than resolve it. Physical or emotional invasiveness or intrusiveness can itself provoke assaultive behaviors. Equally important, attempts to intimidate abandon the peacemaking approach of respecting the autonomy of the disruptive individual. Instead, when dealing with a disruptive or out-of-control person, you should approach in a nonthreatening manner: stay far enough away to be well outside any personal space; stand slightly to one side; do not face the person directly; keep both hands in plain sight. This nonthreatening approach has three benefits in dealing with a crisis:

• It helps assure the safety of the peacemaker. If the person in crisis attacks, the peacemaker is out of kicking or striking distance, and the attacker must move forward to close the space, giving the peacemaker a chance to back away.
   
• It is nonthreatening, nonconfrontational, and nonchallenging. The peacemaker is not squarely facing the person in crisis, does not appear to be hiding anything in the hands, and – most important – offers the person under stress a visible escape route directly ahead.
   
• It communicates respect by honoring personal space.

It is probably worth noting that, in one study (Distasio, 1994), staff at a mental health facility who said they would hit back if assaulted were assualted more than twice as often as staff who described themselves as “nonfighers.”

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