Toward More Effective Communication

A friend of mine was describing an argument he'd had. He admitted using some pretty bad language but justified this as being due to someone else's condescending attitude. This other friend of mine said she'd learned how to use the "when you talk to me in a condescending manner it makes me feel..." system of communication to great effect. She allowed that it was difficult to master but said it kept arguments from getting too heated and prevented her and her significant other from saying things they wound up regretting. It got me to thinking.

We are all familiar with this style of arguing I think. I mean therapists have been advocating this "When you..., I feel" stuff for decades right? Still hardly anybody has actually adopted it (actually the above mentioned friend is the only person I have ever heard who admits to arguing this way). I think I know why.

Suppose someone treats you in a really condescending manner and you say, "When you treat me in a condescending manner I feel as if you are devaluing my feelings, would please refrain from condescension when speaking to me?" They respond, "What kind of weenie are you?" So you say, "When you call me a weenie it makes me feel..." Clearly this won't do.

I think I have a solution! Suppose someone talks to you in a condescending manner. So you say, "When you treat me in a condescending manner I feel blah blah blah..." (you know the above). And they respond with more condescension, so now you say, "I'm serious when you behave condescendingly it makes me feel like responding in a less than healthy manner." Of course they insult you again. So now you say, "Honestly your condescending manner is stimulating some potentially dangerous hormone flows in my autonomic nervous system." Again they pop off with an insult. You respond, "Oh dear your insulting behavior has resulted in an almost overwhelming urge to kill."

I think this method of communication just might work. I can imagine using it in lots of different circumstances. For instance imagine someone ignores you, you could respond, "When you ignore me I feel like having sex with your friends in order to get your attention." If somebody is angrily staring at you, you could say, "When you glare at me I wonder where my grapefruit spoons are and if I could scoop your eyes out with one." If you work in a restaurant and some customer is demanding and rude you could say, "I am sorry you are dissatisfied but you know what, It's funny how often dissatisfied customers wind up with intestinal problems."

Learning to communicate clearly and effectively is so important, it truly deserves all our attention.





Russell