One of the hardest lessons I’ve learned is that people can love each other deeply and still experience the same relationship completely differently.
For years, I believed that loyalty looked a certain way.
If someone I cared about was hurting, I would step in. I would ask questions. I would have the difficult conversation. I would try to build a bridge.
To me, that was loyalty.
What I have come to understand is that not everyone defines loyalty in the same way.
For some people, loyalty means protecting the peace. Avoiding conflict. Not interfering. Respecting boundaries. Staying out of situations that are not theirs to fix.
Neither approach is necessarily right or wrong.
But when two people operate from different definitions without realising it, hurt often follows.
I see this all the time in my coaching work.
Leaders who believe they are being supportive are experienced as absent.
Managers who think they are empowering others are experienced as disengaged.
Colleagues who believe they are being respectful are experienced as uncaring.
Partners who believe they are protecting a relationship are experienced as withholding the truth.
What fascinates me is that beneath many conflicts there is often not a lack of care.
There is a lack of shared meaning.
We assume words like trust, commitment, accountability, respect, support and loyalty mean the same thing to everyone.
They don’t.
The most powerful conversations often begin when we stop asking:
“Who is right?”
and start asking:
“What does this mean to you?”
As a coach, I have learned that some of the deepest breakthroughs happen when people discover they are not arguing about the same thing at all. They are operating from different values, assumptions and definitions.
And once those become visible, understanding becomes possible.
I’m curious:
Have you ever discovered that a word such as loyalty, trust, respect or support meant something completely different to you than it did to someone else?
If you’re navigating a leadership challenge, a difficult stakeholder relationship, a career transition or a conflict that seems impossible to resolve, I’d be happy to explore it with you.
