I heard you!!!

I HEARD YOU!

The other day, I went with my family for a music concert. The hall was not very big, and we had reached pretty much in time. We went in and found one row of empty seats, starting from the aisle. As I was about to sit down on the aisle seat, someone sitting behind pointed out that the seat was broken. Thanking him, I moved further and we settled down.
During the first half of the concert, I diligently took over the duty of the person who had warned me of the broken seat, and everytime someone would start to lower himself or herself on the seat, I would repeat the refrain: “excuse me, the seat is broken”. They would thank me and move on. One gentleman however, took objection to my telling him not to take the seat, presuming that I had reserved the place for someone and glaring at me said: “But there are seats further down the row right? Why can’t you ask them to sit there?” Before I could explain further, he walked away, muttering to himself about uncivilized audience! For a minute I was affronted, then humor took over and I could not help being amused! Well, he actually did not even listen to what I was saying right? He was somehow preprogrammed to the fact that I did not want him to sit there, as I had ‘reserved the seats’.
How often we tend to do this in various other situations too. We foresee an answer to some situation from someone, and we are already framing our response to the situation, without giving a thought to what is being actually being said… In other words, we are not listening; we are only busy preparing our counter to the response. And then it goes on... and the miscommunication then assumes gigantic proportions.
There is this game that I am reminded of, wherein you are supposed to give answer to a series of questions. What makes the game a test on your listening skills is, your answer should be not to the current question, but to the one asked just before. So, you need to listen to this question carefully, in addition to remembering the earlier one, and continue remembering the current one, to which you need to supply the answer once the next question is asked. Try it: it is tough! Simply because our listening skills are poor!
We tend to believe that what we say is what is understood; more often than not, what is understood is not what is conveyed, but what the other person infers the meaning as! If only all of us are able to understand this core message in the art of communication, life would be practically devoid of misunderstandings!

The flip and the flop!

Scene One: It was her daughter’s sixteenth birthday. It was right in the middle of her board exams, but the stress level was manageable. So she decided to host a party with a few friends. But her daughter’s best friend refused to come. The reason: she was prone to falling sick, and she did not want to take any chances. She offered to call her mother and ask that the friend be sent for just a while, but she was not allowed to. It is her decision and I need to respect it, she told her mother They have a right to decide, she told her mother.

Scene Two: It was her good friend’s fiftieth birthday. She was uncomfortable attending the party, as her friend’s family treated her like a pariah, and she no longer felt tolerant enough to accept this unwarranted treatment. She gave her honest reasons for not wanting to attend, expecting her friend to understand the indignity she suffered every time, and asked her to attend a party she wanted to throw for her at her place. The friend took first-hand offence! She was accused the mother of being self-centered, of not respecting her best friend’s wishes, of ‘punishing’ her for all the past misdeeds that had happened in the relationship! She was asked for proof of the relationship: attend the party…. So that I do not have my family gloating over your absence! She offered to clarify this issue with her family later (after being pushed to a corner? When she had not done it all this while??)

Whether she attended the party, or whether the daughter’s friends came over, is not the issue here. What comes to mind is the start difference in the attitude of respect of boundary and validation of feelings in the relationship. Here was a teenager, who chose to respect, albeit her disappointment, her friend’s decision not to attend an important day in her life, even though the reason given was something that could be worked around. And yet there was this matured, grown-up individual who took absolute offence, choosing to weigh her friend’s disturbing state of mind and feeling absolutely awkward, against her own feeling of happiness at ‘reaching a milestone’ in her life. To ice the cake, the proof of the friendship would be her presence at the get-together, swallowing the uncomfortable feeling of being treated like someone the cat brought it, with the one-liner: they do not matter–I do!

The nurturing of a relationship depends on the acceptance level of both the parties, in allowing space in the relationship. I hope this little girl maintains this respect in all her future relationships: after all what else is there in a relationship if respect for the other person is missing, if the hurt of the other is not validated?

Mohana narayananan
March,2009