Anastasia Volkova
The Hidden Gift in Hostile Negotiations
You are at your desk, staring at an email from opposing counsel that is so needlessly aggressive it makes your teeth grind. And here you are, exhausted, drafting a response you know you shouldn’t send.
Every litigator knows the feeling: opposing counsel makes a snide remark about you or your client engages in grandstanding that makes your blood boil. Your heart races, your jaw clenches, and suddenly you’re reacting in a way you may regret.
But what if these triggering moments were a good thing? ‘’Good thing’’ you ask? ‘’Are you out of your mind?!’’. Yes, a good thing – stay with me.
The Mirror Principle
Consider this. That opposing counsel who’s so needlessly aggressive – why does it bother you that much? Sure, they’re objectively being difficult. But hundreds of lawyers deal with difficult opposing counsel without losing sleep. So why are you lying awake rehearsing comebacks at 2 AM?
Here’s where it gets interesting. That lawyer whose condescension drives you crazy? Ask yourself: where am I condescending? The answer often surfaces in unexpected places. Maybe not to opposing counsel, but to the paralegal who asked a “stupid question.” To your kid who interrupted your prep time. Or perhaps to yourself, in that brutal internal voice that never lets up. The pattern repeats with other triggers. The aggressive opponent who bulldozes boundaries? They’re mirroring something familiar. Consider where you bulldoze your own boundaries – answering emails at midnight, skipping lunch, saying yes when you mean no.
Psychological research increasingly confirms that people who trigger us often invite us to reflect upon our own pain points. Let me explain how.
In psychology, this is called the “mirror principle”- people reflect back to us what already exists within ourselves. When someone triggers an intense emotional response, they’re not creating something new in you; they’re activating something already present.
What a gift. Why is this in my movie?
I would like to share a powerful reframing practice you can use for triggering moments. When that opposing counsel sends an infuriating email or makes snide comments in a meeting, pause and ask yourself, “What a gift. Why is this in my movie?”
I know, it sounds absurd in the moment. But this deceptively simple question activates deep psychological mechanisms.
The phrase “my movie” invokes what psychologists call self-distancing – viewing your life from a third-person perspective (“This is happening in my story”) rather than being immersed in first-person emotional reactivity (“They’re attacking me!”). Research shows that this shift in perspective dramatically reduces emotional intensity and improves decision-making. You become the observer of your experience, not just the experiencer.
The question “Why is this in my movie?” also assumes intentionality and meaning. Nothing appears or should appear in your narrative by accident. This echoes logotherapy, which establishes that humans can endure almost anything when they find meaning in it. By asking why this difficult opposing counsel appears in your narrative, you shift from passive victim to a protagonist.
The expression “What a gift” also plays an important role in this reframing technique. This expression is a radical act of cognitive reappraisal – changing your emotional response by reinterpreting the situation’s meaning. This isn’t toxic positivity; it’s recognizing that challenges forge growth. The neuroscience explains: when we reframe adversity as opportunity, we shift from threat-state (cortisol, tunnel vision, fight-or-flight) to challenge-state (optimal arousal, creative problem-solving, resilience).
Let’s clarify an important point though
Sometimes opposing counsel is genuinely awful and your reaction is calibrated to reality, I am not saying it’s not. Here’s what matters for your effectiveness: whether they’re activating something within you or just being objectively unreasonable, the reframing technique serves you. When you maintain observer-mode instead of reactive-mode, you preserve your strategic clarity. You stop the emotional flooding that clouds judgment and leads to responses you’ll regret. The technique isn’t about excusing bad behaviour or finding false silver linings, it’s about preventing them from controlling your nervous system and letting their tactics compromise your performance.
Practical application in negotiations
The next time opposing counsel triggers you during a contentious mediation or deposition:
Pause physically. Take a breath. Step away if needed.
Reframe internally: “What a gift. Why is this person in my movie?” Feel the shift from defence to curiosity.
Investigate: What quality in them bothers me most? Where do I exhibit that quality, however subtly?
Respond strategically, not reactively. You’ve transformed their attempted manipulation into your professional development.
The competitive edge of self-awareness
The lawyers who dominate hostile negotiations aren’t those who never get triggered, they are those who have done the inner work to understand their triggers. When you’re no longer controlled by emotional reactivity, you negotiate from clarity and power. Your adversary can’t manipulate you because you’ve already done the internal work they’re attempting to exploit.
The next time opposing counsel triggers you, pause and ask: What is this moment trying to teach me? The answer might be your greatest professional development opportunity, delivered gift-wrapped in hostility.
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