What is poor communication? Why is it a major problem in relationships? Communication is at its most basic an exchange of thoughts, feelings, desires and all forms of data. This at its face seems understandable and achievable. But believe me it is not. Humans rely on words, tone, syntax, expressions, gestures, volume, and behavior to name a few to communicate. All these things and more combined are intended to communicate our data to others. We generally desire to exchange our data accurately and that is the problem. More often than we think we fail to exchange accurately, because of one simple problem. The other people don’t understand our communication tactics. Simply put if I said my favorite color was glorb would I be communicating effectively. Obviously the answer would be no. Now if you knew what glorb looked like you would certainly be more likely to understand, but it goes beyond even that fact. What is my understanding of favorite and what is yours. Does that mean I prefer that everything is glorb. Do I want a glorb house, a glorb car, do I think I look good in glorb clothes. it is obvious that I am over the top on this example somewhat, but the point is simple we don’t always understand what the other person sees. Stand up comedians stumble over more true things about human nature than most of us would probably like to admit. They often comment on how men and women communicate differently. They are pretty accurate with that observation. Unfortunately, every man and women also has his/her own subtle and maybe not so subtle differences. The classic example is when a wife ask her husband if he is going to wear that shirt? If he says yes, she can get upset. If a husband says to his wife are you going to wear that shirt? She can get upset. Why? Simple the stereotypical feminine communication tactic is more subtle. She is likely telling her husband “I don’t want you to wear that shirt”. Men tend to be direct and take communication as a very simple straight forward thing. Men hear a question and assume the wife just wants information. He then gives her the information. In the reverse scenario the wife thinks that her husband is not asking if she is going to wear the shirt. She thinks he is saying “You should not wear that shirt because it is ugly or not appropriate.” This is where communication goes horribly wrong we tend to think that others communicate just like us. This is disconnect that leads to poor communication.
How to fix poor communication. First the person desiring to communicate must understand it is their burden to verify that they have communicated accurately. This involves more words than we generally use. It requires asking questions of the other person to see if you can piece out what if anything they understood. The more a person is different than you the more effort it will take to verify accuracy of communication. Often when we actually take the time to really check the accuracy of our communication we find that we are in agreement and have a good understanding of each other. In the modern world more and more communication is strictly written. This blog itself is merely written. Written expression can be a wonderfully form when being used in an artistic sense. This allows individuals to interpret things through their own perspectives. But in interpersonal communication it frankly stinks. Text messages are awful, emails are bad, and post can be down right problematic. Most communication is actually not the words, but all the other things. Imagine a text that say’s “What are you doing” . Know think of the many different ways you could say that simple sentence. It could be a simple query, a playful invitation, a suspicious question, or a down right condemnation of your actions. Yea, think about how many disagreements you have had with someone because of a potential misunderstanding of what was written. In therapy people often have to exam how they communicate and how they perceive others communication. If you have communication with a significant person in your life you might want to start by checking to see what they think you meant when you said or did something. You might be surprised on how wrong they were in understanding you.
