Commuincation and Mutual Problem Solving

This week in my class, the topic we talked about was “Communication and Mutual Problem Solving.” I have never been in a serious relationship, but I believe that effective communication is extremely important in any relationship; romantic or other. I have learned this just with living with roommates up here at school. Slowly but surely as the semesters have gone on, I have learned how good communication can make or break an apartment and your relationship with you roommates. I almost lost one of the best friends I have ever had because I hadn’t learned how to effectively communicate my feelings to her. I don’t think good communication comes super naturally to some people. For me, I never liked talking about my feelings to anyone so it is something that I have really forced myself to do and learn while here at school. It is okay if you are not good at communicating right now! The important thing is that you do your best to get out of your comfort zone and start making those changes. It will benefit your marriage, future marriage, friendships, and family relationships.

 An important thing that we noted was that YOUR SPOUSE ( or other person in your life) CAN’T READ YOUR MIND! Just because they are not getting the “hints” you are dropping doesn’t mean that they don’t love you. Sorry men, but sometimes you are just oblivious. But at the same time, women, we should be better about just being open and not having to drop about things! It’s like playing a game with our spouse, but the catch is that they don’t know hints the rules, or even that they are playing! How unfair is that?

In general, women have much better communication than men. Women can pick up subtle cues that oftentimes men can’t. That is nothing against men, it’s just in a woman’s blood I think haha

I saw this quote the other day on Twitter that said

“ It’s so weird how girls just know…I don’t know how they know. Half the time they don’t even know what they know but they know.”

It’s kind of funny but pretty true!

High Level Communication consists of three things

1.      Empathy

2.      Assertiveness

3.      Respect

We also discussed on the board the Three Empathy Skills

1.      The Disarming Technique- this is a method of helping to drop defensiveness. It is essentially you deciding to set your weapons down first. The moment you get defensive you force the other person to get defensive and argue with you. Find the Kernel of Truth. This is a small truth that you can gather from what a person is saying. Be open about it.

2.      Express Empathy- repeat back thoughts they have shared. Feelings and emotions.

3.      Inquiry- talk more, be interested in what they are saying.

My professor gave us a model for communicating with someone. He used this with his clients in therapy.

When_______ (client situation)

Feel/Felt ______(emotion)

because_______(thoughts)

I want you to _______(your hope)

When communicating, your

Words 14%

Tone 35%

Non-Verbal 51%

You can be trying to say all the right things but if your body language and the tone you are using contradicts what you are telling the person they are not going to take what you are saying seriously.

The final thing I want to talk about is the phrase “pruning in the wrong season discourages growth.” How does this apply to communication? If you try to talk about a hard or sensitive topic with someone when the time is not right, all that will do is cause more conflict and shut them down from future talking. If you try to prune a tree when the season is not right, it won’t bear fruit and it will just kind of become stagnant. You don’t want that to happen in your relationships!

What are your thoughts on communication?