All throughout my life, I have been viewed as the “non-confrontational” one out of the group. The one that lets herself get walked all over, and never speaks out.

Recently, I was required to take a test called a “StrengthsQuest”, which pulled your top five strengths from a series of questions you answered. I received strengths such as discipline (organized), input (resourceful), developer (teamwork), and even restorative (problem solver), but the fifth one really stuck out to me; harmony.

In my meeting, we sat down and reviewed my results. We talked about what I thought suited me, and this was by far the first one. Not only because of what I think of myself, but because of how I have been viewed throughout my life.

As you can imagine, harmony basically means that I seek areas of agreement. I love peacefulness.

One thing that really caught my eye in the description is this; “In your view we are all in the same boat, and we need this boat to get where we are going. It is a good boat. There is no need to rock it just to show that you can.”

I have always been one who is against the conflict in the world; jealousy, anger, bullying, mistreatment, etc. While I know that not every little thing can be avoided, I believe that it can most definitely be limited.

The downfalls of the harmony strength were described as “weak, indecisive, non-confrontational, avoids conflict” which are all words that have been used to describe me, but harmony does not have to be a negative thing. My seeking areas of agreement is needed in today’s world, just as your confrontation skills may be.

On the bright side, people with the harmony trait can be described as negotiators, people who can see both sides of a situation, people who are great at asking questions and able to arrive at consensus, and great facilitators.

While I know that it may not always be the best for me to avoid conflict, it is not always a bad thing. It means I can hear people out when others cannot. It means that I can steer others away from conflict and more towards areas of agreement. It means I do not have as much conflict with the people around me. It does not mean that I have bad relationships with my friends and family or that I let people walk all over me.

There is a bright side to every situation, and there can be a bright side to every trait of a person as well.

I always considered my non-confrontational trait to be negative.

I would have never thought in a million years that it would be viewed as a strength, but it just means that I can look at a part of me that everyone else looked down on me for, and be thankful for it, because we need people focused on harmony in the world just as much as we need anyone else.