I am not good at certain aspects of communication and for the sake of this newsletter, I am talking about conflict and/or confrontation. I do not do confrontation well - and I even though I can confidently say I better now than I have been, I could still be better. My relationships suffer for it. I am specifically talking about being able to tell someone “when you do/say xyz, it hurts my feelings”, “I don’t agree with that because of xyz” etc.
I think even as a community, as people living in this world, we struggle to deal with conflict (and my continuing hypothesis on how we struggle with communication in general). Often times we act as follows: conflict = disagreement = arguing = end of relationship. That shouldn’t always be the case and if we were to look at relationships that have ended, there are some that shouldn’t have if we are being re, and thus can be attributed to our inability to handle conflict (and also what happens when we conflict or choosing not to confront). And even …. EVEN we sometimes confuse arguments and discussions; yes they are different.
I think for me, I question myself a lot “is it absolutely necessary to say this thing someone said or did or didn’t do hurt me? is it worth the energy? Am I being unreasonable? Had I ever expressed this expectation? Will the relationship be better or worse if I say anything?”. And I often choose not to bring anything up and what happens after is usually that my behaviour changes. If at all I feel offended and it is someone I consider close, I will pull away or sometimes I stop doing things that I would otherwise have easily done for and with them, I retreat. It's all quite immature I am aware but truly I am better. I have made amends, had difficult and uncomfortable conversations, I have called in people and vice versa… progress.
I at times wonder whether for people who we were once close but aren't anymore whether they needed to improve their communication as well. Am I hard to talk to? I can only wonder though.
Clarity saves relationships
Nedra Glover Tawwab
Don't get me wrong, I know relationships ebb and flow and sometimes changes are inevitable. I have relationships where we have legitimately drifted apart because life happens and I am not talking about those ones obviously.
We are having conversations, but are we communicating?
People think the absence of conflict means peace. It doesn’t. It just means absence.
From the podcast above
You may think you did your best but the truth is that we always want to think we've done the best for the people in my life. And it's interesting because when something happens in relationships often we view our actions with rose coloured glasses, we often see ourselves as victims, as if we didn't err. I know I sometimes do. Just because you believe yourself to be nice kind - doesn’t mean your actions reflect that.
Final Thoughts
I think in our families of origin, we aren’t taught how to handle disagreements, conflicts well.
You remember how I said that knowing how to be better vs taking up the action to be better are not aligned? The same can be said about communication - we can read all the books and watch all the videos but what needs to be done is change in behaviour.
I think ghosting is symptomatic of our inability to communicate effectively.
I am pondering about how we grew up without social media and continual access to people like we do now and how communication would look. Because this thing where people (falsely) think talking/texting people constantly, all through the day is communicating.
All the messaging happening on self care (which is really individualism masked as self care) are not helping our communication. “I am often struck by the dangerous narcissism fostered by spiritual rhetoric that pays so much attention to individual self-improvement and so little to the practice of love within the context of community. bell hooks, All About Love: New Visions”
I have so many things to say about this so I will probably write more later.
I think some one the things I’ve faced is trying to end a friendship after communicating effectively that we ar won’t fronds anymore and many people telling me not to end the friendship and not to confront the issue which is think is immature. Face the issue and move on either still in the relationship or end it.