In the past 39 days I’ve been talking, listening and biting my tongue, but not necessarily in that order. The biggest obstacle for me is to stop and breath before speaking. Sometimes, emotions tend to ignite the tongue and I end up saying something that is judgmental.
However, sometimes my words are misunderstood. When this happens, more often than not the person I am talking with will hear what I am saying with a negative connotation.
The misunderstandings doesn’t seem to be taken in a positive way, why is that? In fact, I never hear anyone say to me, “Are you saying that I’m a really great (fill in the blank)!” or “Are you saying I did a really great job on that project!” When an upset occurs it is normally because the person I am talking to “hears” what I am saying as being critical, unsupportive, and or accusatory. This is not restricted to the spoken word. Sometimes even my emails are misconstrued. It is frustrating to say the least.
Most people won’t come out and say how they are “hearing” what I’m saying. I have look for clues in their behavior. If they appear upset, quite, or dismissive, I know something is wrong. If I want to end the conflict I have to ask, “what is the matter, are you upset?” “Was it something I said?”
Often, what I say is nothing more than exactly what I mean. If I say, you left the juice out on the counter last night. It does not mean, you are careless, wasteful, absentminded. It just means you left the juice on the counter last night. There is no covert underling meaning that is meant to attack, hurt or ridicule.
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