The “too hard basket” gets full awfully quickly. Tricky conflicts. Knotty problems. Longstanding feuds. Some things simply defy solutions, and it’s tempting to give up. 

Consider this

In the 1990s, Northern Ireland was still gripped by violence, locked into a decades-long conflict between Catholic nationalists and Protestant unionists that had claimed thousands of lives.

Then George Mitchell was appointed U.S. Special Envoy to Northern Ireland by President Clinton.

A former U.S. senator with no stake in the fight, Mitchell was accepted by both parties, and invited to chair peace talks. He arrived quietly, with little fanfare, and ended up helping to win the peace.

But it took years. Years during which he listened, built relationships, and built trust. It wasn’t smooth sailing; there were bombings and breakdowns, walkouts and shouting matches, but he continued. And then one day, in April 1998, after three years of working towards peace, the Good Friday Agreement was signed. It was a power-sharing accord that set the stage for lasting peace. 

Mitchell called his work “700 days of failure, and one day of success.”

Putting it into play

Problems take a long time to develop and just as long, if not longer, to resolve. Patience is needed, along with listening and tolerance. 

Mitchel created the conditions for peace to emerge by using the soft power of listening, respect, and understanding. It took an enormous amount of patience. But it gives us pause to consider, just how much time do you give your problems to resolve? How easy is it for you to sit without a solution, without a direction, but just show up, day after day, and give it your best? We see the victories and defeats, but rarely do we see what happens in between. And rarely do we give credit to soft power, to the strength to stay at it, to stick with it, even when everyone else walks out.