Cooperation and Conflict: The Two Sides of Being Human

We’re wired to connect and wired to fight. The challenge is learning when to do which.

Last week, I wrote about cooperation and how connection, collaboration, and shared purpose have shaped who we are as humans.

But along with co-operation, another exchange has shaped our shared ancestry - something equally human, and just as old.

Conflict.

Because as much as we’re wired to connect, we’re also wired to compete.

Our history has not only been one of teamwork and trust - it’s one of tension, dominance, and defence.

For as long as we’ve lived in tribes, we’ve had to manage both: the pull to belong and the instinct to fight.

Cooperation vs. Conflict

In my job, my focus is safety.

As a psychologist, I spend my days lowering threat and helping someone feel calm enough, safe enough, to explore their inner world.

That’s the work: creating the conditions where discomfort can be felt without danger.

But outside of work, I step into something completely different - martial arts.

And in that world, the goal flips.

You’re no longer trying to make someone comfortable - you’re trying to make them uncomfortable.

Every move is about creating pressure, controlling space, limiting their options.

The first time I trained in Brazilian Jiu Jitsu, it was deeply unsettling.

It’s one thing to read about fight-or-flight - it’s another to feel it flood your body as someone pins you down and tried to submit you.

But over time, what surprised me most wasn’t how it felt to be dominated - it was how uncomfortable I felt being the one to dominate.

To assert pressure.
To take control.

I’d spent years cultivating the opposite instinct: to ease, soothe, reassure.
And suddenly I was learning the value of controlled aggression.

The Lesson Beneath the Mat

It got me thinking about how we treat conflict in daily life.

Somewhere along the way, I got taught - like so many of us - that aggression is bad.
That anger should be suppressed.
That asserting yourself risks being “too much.”

But not all aggression is violence.
Sometimes it’s simply the energy that says:
This matters.
This isn’t fair.
This is my space.

When we lose touch with that energy, we also lose touch with boundaries, direction, and strength.

We mistake passivity for peace.

The Integration

What Jiu-Jitsu taught me - and what I keep learning in life - is that the goal isn’t to eliminate conflict.

It’s to get comfortable enough with it that it doesn’t control you.

To know when to yield, and when to push.
To know when cooperation serves you and when conflict does.

Both are part of being human.
The art is learning when to switch between them.

Why This Matters

In my work - whether it’s with leaders, teams, or individuals - I see the same challenge appear in different forms.

People who avoid conflict lose clarity.
People who overuse it lose connection.

The real advantage lies in balance - learning to work with your natural instincts rather than against them.

If you want to explore that balance in your own life or team, my support, workshops and programmes are designed to help you do exactly that.