Challenges in Communication

When babies are born, they don't understand the language but the more they hear the people around them speak, the more their vocabulary grows.  They learn mama and dada to start with and as the weeks and months pass, they pick up more and more words.  I believe that animals are the same way and that the more we speak to them, the more they understand.

Because of this, I have always spoken to my animals in full sentences, told them what was going on and have given them choices too.  I continue to marvel at what they can understand.  For instance, when I am planning to run an errand, I tell Kino where I am going and let him know he has a choice to go with me or stay home.  When I pick up my wallet and keys, if he would prefer to stay home, he goes into his crate. If he wants to go with me, he stands next to the drawer where I keep his leash.  On the rare occasion that the temperature is too high for him to go with me, all I have to do is explain that it will be too hot in the car and he will go to his crate.

I have always enjoyed the more "conversational" approach that I have with my animals and most days I feel pretty good about my ability to communicate.  However, there are some days where our communication is not quite as clear and on those days, my boy has me wondering about my communication skills.  LOL

It happened just last weekend.  One of my best friends had been going through a stressful process of buying a house. She had finally found the perfect house but there were multiple bidders and the process had stretched out for days as counter bids came in and the home seller evaluated their options.  She was anxious to get news and I was anxious for her.

On Saturday, I heard my phone ping and walked into the kitchen to see who had texted me.  Much to my excitement, it was an update from Lori and after reading her text, I turned to Kino and said "Woo Hoo! Lori got the house!!" With that, he ran to the front door and stood expectantly, waiting for her to come in.  I don't know if he thought I said "Lori's AT the house" or if he just heard "Lori" and "house" but it seemed the more I tried to clarify, the more insistent he was that she would walk through the door any minute.

I sent Lori a congratulations text and told her about Kino.  A half hour later, Kino was still standing at the front door waiting for her, regardless of my attempts to explain the difference between a visit and a home purchase. I sent her pictures because I wasn't sure she'd believe that he was still waiting at the front door for her.  Obviously, Lori is one of his favorite people and any time I tell him she is coming over, he excitedly runs circles around the family room as he waits for her arrival.  But this was different because his reaction was based on a miscommunication that I couldn't seem to undo.  Lori and I felt bad for him but we also couldn't stop giggling about it.  I continued to sent her periodic pictures of him planted there, occasionally whining and sniffing the door.

I don't know how long it was before he finally gave up on her arrival but I was relieved when he finally stepped away from the front door.  It might be time to come up with a nickname for Lori - either that or I need to educate him a little more about the home buying process.

Match or Mis-match?

Back when I was a corporate trainer, I taught a lot of courses on personality and operating styles.  One course in particular had participants look at their own operating styles to better understand themselves and then look at the operating style of someone they were wanting to partner with in the workplace.  Based on style differences and similarities, they could come up with an approach that would allow them to work more easily together.

One of the elements of this particular tool I taught that seemed the most difficult for folks to navigate was the concept of "matching" vs. "mismatching."  Some people are natural matchers. They are the person who listens to another person speak and looks for things they might have in common - ways they "match" . . . this is the person who might say "oh you grew up in Arkansas?  I have relatives who live there" or "oh wow, one of my best friends also went to University of the Pacific"

Mismatchers, on the other hand, look for where they don't match.  They might say, "I'd never want to live in Arkansas" or "I don't think you get a really good education from small schools like that" - they in affect are often looking for where they can "disagree" with what someone else has said.  Mind you, these folks are great to have on a project team, because they can help identify possible pitfalls to solutions and implementation plans.  They can however be difficult to find common ground and a sense of ease with.

I remember one draining workshop I taught where I had a mismatcher in class . . . if I said "here's a tool you can use in these types of situations" he would say, "I can think of a situation where that wouldn't work."  It took a lot of energy on my part to keep shifting things back to the positive because each time he "mismatched" what I said, more of the participants began to get on board with him and feel less hopeful that the course material would help them improve particular work relationships.  A mismatcher's energy can spread like wildfire, which is why it can be so problematic.

I decided to write about this because of the huge increase I have seen in mismatchers lately.  It used to be they were a very small percentage of the population but that seems to have changed in recent years.  Get on any social media and you will find yourself saturated in mismatchers . . . people looking for where others are wrong, where what is being said is contrary to their own beliefs, etc.

The thing is that I believe we have control over whether we match or mismatch.  It is a choice we can make every time we go into an interaction with another person, whether it is in person or on line.  We can choose to listen with an ear towards where we agree or we can choose to listen with an ear towards where we don't agree.  It is up to us.  And in those cases where we can't "match" what someone else is saying, we also have the choice to not say anything.  (I'm in a group for Empaths that is supposed to be for support, to help each other navigate the world a little easier and I am shocked by how many mismatchers are in that group too.  If someone says, "I am having "x" experience with how I absorb energy and I'm looking for tips for how to better manage these situations," it is shocking to me how many people reply with "I don't have that experience." My feeling is, if you don't have that experience, keep scrolling and let the folks who CAN relate offer some suggestions.

I obviously have a bias here or I wouldn't be writing about it. (smile)  It is no secret that I would prefer to see people look for commonality and points of agreement and I would like to share why.

It is because it allows conversations to be constructive, which can be lead to people working together, lead to identification of a next step and to a next step after that, they can open the door to more conversations, solution generation, and problem resolution.  The only outcome I see of mismatch conversations is anger, frustration and someone being shut down.

We are at a time now in our world where we are in dire need to solutions, resolutions, new ways of doing things . . . and mismatching is just not going to get us there.  Would you be willing to look at yourself and observe if you are going into conversations as a "matcher" or a "mismatcher?"  If you are "mismatching" do you know why? and Would you be willing to try going into conversations with the mindset of "matching?" You might be surprised at how dramatically it can shift the content and the outcome of the interactions you have with others.