How are Your Communications?
Sometimes it takes so little for a conversation to go sideways but it’s as easy as asking for clarification as to how you’ve heard something to determine someone’s intention. Your own awareness in maintaining a level of control over your emotions will help to keep your levels from rising during conversations that have the potential of becoming heated. Perception is Reality!
Anger serves no purpose except to upset and hurt those involved and if you let it, it will keep you stuck in that place of misery until you let go of it.
The best communication is listening, acknowledging and validating what you’ve heard. Verify back how you’re receiving things, not everyone interprets input the same way but you also need to be able to maintain some level of empathy and compassion to truly honor the communications so that resolution can be found, of course if that is the goal. Nasty verbal ping pong isn’t fair play but can be so easy to get dragged into if your emotions get away from you. I think it’s impossible not to have your emotions invested during open and honest communication but with determination it is possible to keep them respectful.
If you tune out during conversation to what someone is saying instead of really hearing and understanding them then you are sending them the wrong message but if you’re at a loss for words because you feel like you are in over your head and that you’re supposed to be helping them through an issue, the best thing you can do is to communicate that honestly. You don’t always need to fix someone’s world and you’re not meant to, sometimes all one needs is acknowledgement and validation that they’ve been heard to help direct them toward the road of self-healing.
If someone is or has treated you badly for whatever reason it likely has more to do with them than it does with you. People strike out at others for many reasons and usually it’s connected to their own emotional imbalances (eg: jealousy, inadequacy or defensiveness), to name a few. Alternatively it could be something that is going on or isn’t going on in their life that they are hurt by. Even though it’s not right that doesn’t make it any easier to take when you happen to be the punching bag in their immediate vicinity who is affected and sometimes it isn’t as easy to brush it off as we’d like it to be but again, awareness is key. Knowing you’re okay, validating your own self-worth and letting it go through whatever process works for you is the best solution and in the long run less damaging to your inner spirit. Any damage to your inner spirit that has the chance to continually cycle eventually has a consequential manifestation in your physical health and the longer it festers, the more the damage grows.
You can’t allow someone to take away from your personal power or to determine your level of worth, it’s their opinion, albeit an inconsiderate one but still just their opinion. Regardless of what someone else may think that opinion isn’t the truth of you, even if what they say hurts, you know who you really are!
Your true circle of friends and family should be your resource for honesty and comfort and it is through them that validation of who you are is affirmed.
Always try to keep things real with yourself, be aware of what you’re saying and of how others’ are perceiving what you’re saying and that awareness creates a foundation that will enhance all your communications in a very positive way!
Shelley Hallmark 