the root cause of misunderstandings
In all truth, we DON’T understand each other when we simply TALK to each other (and that’s the most common misunderstanding, the belief that words alone can communicate something). Communicating doesn’t equal understanding, although it may be the first step. We understand each other when the understanding lands too, because we can listen or explain all we want but that doesn’t mean nor assures that it will be received. It’s not that the person listening doesn’t want to understand (there may be cases when they don't want to understand), it’s just about them lacking that specific type of experience and they cannot relate to it in any way possible… that’s a trick of the mind, somehow when the mind goes through a new concept, or something that is too abstract, it won’t fully get it until it has absorbed it through experience. Or maybe people just have a different language for it, they picture it differently.
Sometimes when we are communicating, we aren’t fully aware of what we’re saying too. We may say one thing and mean another, especially when we are expressing our needs – we have a tendency to avoid being straightforward so that we don’t experience rejection (or some other combination similar to that) or because our fears are playing in the background making us hesitant, insecure, etc.
And this is the part we often forget about while communicating: first we have to understand ourselves and what we’re expressing behind the words, what intentions are moving us. We have to become self-aware of the inner dialogue, the unchecked thoughts running wild like a forgotten record playing in the living room all day long. It’s important to know that it can make decisions for us, when we’re burnout, or on autopilot, on survival mode. That’s why we say things we wouldn’t normally say if we were doing well. How many times were we tired, exhausted or stressed and ended up saying something we didn’t mean just because we weren’t checking in with our own selves? Maybe all we wanted was to sit down/rest/cry even and we ended up being unpleasant, grumpy or even screaming because life seemed too much to handle.
So, I’d call this part: self-awareness or communication with our own selves. Once we do that, we are stable enough to communicate to others – I feel like getting what’s really going on within ourselves is one of the most overlook things and it’s the key to live life consciously. It’s good to pause and ask questions like these: what was my inner reaction about when I did “that thing earlier” or was I triggered when “that thing happened”, what do I truly need and what do I have capacity for, etc. Once we know where we’re standing within ourselves, that's when we can talk to the other person.
Will we be able to listen to what a person is saying if we are wearing metaphorical headphones? The headphones represent the unchecked thoughts that are often a residue of past experiences, unprocessed emotions and (false) beliefs we have unconsciously collected throughout our life from family, friends, society. And if they’re running in our minds, they are kinda real only because we are letting them define our words and our actions (and our personalities). Another simple way to look at the earphones is to know that they’re just our own fears and insecurities.
We will be able to listen once we drop the earphones that were blocking our ability to hear, to listen, both to ourselves and others. And we will be able to see what the other person is truly saying and be open to receive it, without making it personal, without making it about us getting attacked, without making it depend on the idea we have of ourselves that we need others to have too.
This is when we can bring transformation in ourselves and in the conversation, because we have transformed our own perception, we have cleared away the noise, we have dismissed the old beliefs and truly looked at what was behind them (cause those beliefs are walls and we’ve kept them with so long with us that we can barely see how they’re affecting us in a negative way). Opening up to ourselves to open up to others.
So, listening to the other person isn’t just about being willing to, but also understanding what gets in the way and knowing it may happen on the other side as well. The other person may join you in that transformation OR NOT - and that’s their choice. They can also keep going with whatever misconception, battle, emotional wound or playback they have on their own ears.
This is what being human means, it means messing up and at the same time learning to understand ourselves, to have compassion for ourselves and then extending it to others. Sometimes we will offer our hand to bring someone up and they may see the hand and take it gratefully, but they may also interpret that hand as an attack. So whether the person understands in the moment, understands later when they have had the chance to process it all or doesn’t understand at all doesn’t matter. It’s really important to avoid being attached to what the other person will do or how they’ll react. We respond authentically and we let them do the same. Offering that hand means we’re offering that freedom and in that freedom we’re choosing not to judge them or ourselves for misunderstanding, for having a different perception of things without being respectful about it, for not handling things well.
Sometimes all that is really happening is being on a different radio station, we hear something the other doesn’t. Meeting each other in the middle is a choice and we can be free when we no longer expect others to offer the hand or turn back. If they do, that’s good; if they don’t, that’s good too. Maybe they’re not ready to join yet and that’s fine because this is a journey we have to walk on our own. The love within our hearts doesn’t ask to be joined at all costs, it doesn’t ask to be reciprocated. It simply says: “I’m here.”