Stop Calling It A Communication Problem.
If you’re adults and speak the same language fluently, “communication” isn’t the problem—it’s only an issue because you’ve made it one.
Here are some examples of what people mislabel “communication problems”:
1. Being evasive — lying, avoiding, omitting; basically anything other than being honest, candid, transparent and forthcoming.
2. Being manipulative — saying what you think will get the other person to do what you want.
3. Being vindictive — spiteful, vengeful, deliberately hurtful.
4. Not understanding or feeling your own emotions (“Emotional Intelligence”) —your words and your emotions don’t match.
5. Extortion — withholding something your partner wants, or threatening something they don’t want, to get what you want.
6. Projection — your presumptions about the other person are too loud in your head to see and hear the truth about them.
The list could go on, but the point is that identifying the behavior gets you a heck of a lot closer to changing the patterns that are sabotaging the relationship. “Communication problems” doesn’t move things forward in any useful or actionable way.
But it’s worse than that. By suggesting some kind of innocuous technical issue that might be resolved with Google Translate or a good dictionary, you’re obscuring the fact that the refusal to communicate is often deliberate. Just take a look at that list again.
This is one of those uncomfortable truths that can sting to have to face! And it’s tempting to just say “We’re having communication problems” to avoid the discomfort of what’s really going on.
Mind you, the goal here isn’t to label, demonize, find fault, or punish. People have motives for not communicating. For example, someone might be evasive because they’re wracked with shame. Or guilt. Or fear.
Even someone’s manipulative or spiteful behavior has an origin story to it. People don’t resort to ill-adapted coping strategies for no reason.
And all of this, too, is worth communicating about. It’s hard to change a behavior without understanding the purpose the old behavior was meant to serve.
If you know your partner becomes evasive when fear comes up, you’re a step closer to knowing how to address it.
If you know you develop a sharp tongue when you get hurt or feel threatened, you’re a step closer to learning to handle the situation in other ways.
See, now you’re actually getting somewhere! But first you had to leave the nebulous comfort zone of “communication problems.”
Copyright © 2019–2020 by Ken Blackman. All rights reserved.
About the author:
Ken’s passion topic these days is how women’s empowerment intersects with intimate coupledom. A former Apple software engineer turned international sex and intimacy educator turned relationship coach, Ken is in his 20th year helping couples co-create, bond, have great sex, thrive, and live happily ever after. His work has garnered mentions in Business Insider, Playboy, Cosmo, Tim Ferriss’s 4-Hour series and elsewhere. Find out more at kenblackman.com.
