COMMUNICATION: TO HEAR AND BE HEARD

As a married man and a counselor who works with couples, I am reminded daily about the importance of healthy communication.  It is considered one of the foundational building blocks necessary in any relationship.  Our openness as well as skill in communicating varies from person to person and is influenced by many factors including our temperament, personality and what we saw modeled in our family of origin growing up.  In some families, there is a poverty of communication where family members are left to guess or make assumptions about the needs and expectations of others.  In other homes, communication may not be safe and words are used to harm and attack one another creating a destructive environment. 

Dr. Mark Lasser of Faithful and True Ministries, writes in his book The Seven Desires of Every Heart, that the need to be “heard and understood “ is a universal human desire.  He writes:
 
   Think back for a minute to a time when you felt someone was truly listening to you.  Maybe it was your mother, listening to you when you were seven as you described being teased on the playground.  Maybe it was your new girlfriend, hanging in wrapped attention as you talked about your family. Maybe it was your best friend, listening as you shared your fears about having a baby. Whoever it was, didn’t you feel that he or she truly cared about you?         
   We have so many things to say. We are born to communicate. And yet so often we feel that we are not being truly heard. You know the feeling – you’re trying for the umpteenth time to tell your husband about some frustration or need or desire, and he just doesn’t seem to be listening. He just doesn’t get it.
   For many of us, our assumptions about being hurt or being ignored are rooted from childhood. Think back to kindergarten or fifth grade, or your junior year of high school. What was your experience of being hurt – or of not being heard, your parents may have been the greatest and most loving of people, yet perhaps they were often stressed, busy and didn’t have the time to listen. Did you hear words like “Later or don’t bother me”?  Maybe you heard, “that’s a stupid thing to think” or “ it’s not Christian to talk like that”.  Many children have adults in their lives who talk to them – give advice, admonish them, teach them. But they don’t have adults that want to listen to their feelings, needs, struggles, or opinions.
   If you had a childhood in which people talked to you – or worse, at you – but never really listened, you may have given up on talking. Now, as an adult, you find that you can talk about superficial matters, but you may be unpracticed at talking about what is really going on inside of you. When your sibling or spouse says, “you never talk to me,” you have no clue what they mean. You have no practice in talking, much less in being heard.  (CH.1. THE Seven Desires of Every Heart,  Dr. Mark Lasser)
 
Dr. Lasser goes on in this chapter to talk about some of the other effects of not being heard and understood. In my work with couples, I structure the communication in counseling sessions to provide a foundation to more effectively communicate. Here are a few tips:

1. Decide to go out of your comfort zone and communicate your needs and desires.

2. Formulate what you want to say then assertively and lovingly sharing needs and       requests using I statements.   For example:  “I would feel much more connected if we could spend a little more quality time together during the week”.  

3. As a listener, make your primary goal to make your partner feel heard.  You can do this        by repeating back what you hear your partner saying. (Note.This is not your interpretation of what you hear them saying)
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4.  Invite more information and summarize again.
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5. Ask permission, to share your perspective and do so if permission is granted.
 
Practicing new and unfamiliar skills can be hard.  But it’s worth the work!