I spent the last little while, a few weeks, tripping over my own feet while I accidentally fell ass over tea kettle (and not head over heals, like you are supposed to). It has been fun. I have been enjoying it, enjoying conversation and enjoying remembering that the right person makes it all worth it. I haven't been blogging, so of course that has been nibbling away at me. I like to keep up with blogs, and not post too many. The balance of reminding myself to reflect and take the time to meditate on things in an attempt to understand them from all angles. I have a few in progress, but none of them capture where I am right now. But this one does!
Communication... Is that really it?
This is everywhere. "Communication is key". I have adapted that, I have echoed it, I have tried not to preach it, but I likely have along with the choir. Until recently.
I am a very transparent person. I deal with my emotions so that they can go away, so they don't prolong suffering or excitement or a whole roller coaster of things that usually just off set a relationship and make things awkward. I communicate. Still, I am not happy. This has not 'fixed' this gap inside me like it was supposed to. It actually has made me find issue with people who can't communicate. Worse yet, it has made me find issue with people who can!
So if I have found someone I can communicate with, who can communicate back. Why is that not the perfect rendition of "communication is everything"? If that were true... I would have it, in this moment. I would be telling you about that, instead of about this... it is not turning out to be all it is cracked up to be. I am going to say something controversial.
It was never communication that was lacking in most peoples relationships. Psychiatrist be damned!
Hmm. I just threw a wrench in something that I have been following and trying to find for a long time. Don't get me wrong. It is great. It has been wonderful to find someone who communicates first, who can express themselves before they have gotten frustrated. It is awesome! I have so much respect for that. But here we are. The only thing it set to do was highlight that there is still a gap around this glorified puzzle piece. That it is just too small of a component for the space it was supposed to fill. Because communication was never the top of the pyramid, it was never the foundational piece that other pieces are built upon. It is so beautiful and important, but it doesn't hold up the relationship. Something was still missing.
So allow me to substitute what I think the missing piece is, the larger piece that communication clings to, to survive. More important even that communication.
Consideration
Almost the same. I mean... if you look at it phonetically, linguistically. But not the same. I think communication is a facet of consideration. Without consideration, your communication falls flat. It fails. Not popular opinion, but it does. Much like communication, you need to look outside your own self to understand why it is important. Take this aspect out of communication and it doesn't survive. It becomes cold, demanding, point blank and insensitive. Yet, take communication out of consideration and it is still warm, comforting, anticipating. It survives on its own. It is not the best that it can be, but it can still have positive impact. Communication cannot. That is what I had been going through when this question came to my mind.
I have been talking with someone who has gotten (and was already) great at communicating. It is so wonderful to have discussions with someone who is engaged and excited to adapt new techniques for success. He is doing it because he is considerate. His communication is adapting because he wants it to, for my benefit, for his benefit. Only... once he has those techniques down pact, the communication looses the consideration. Now I get what I need. The need to know, the routine I crave, the acknowledgment that I am a part of their life in some way. But what about when the consideration stops? When they are fully transparent about being gone for the next day or so. Amazing!... except, they did not stop to consider if I had plans for us, if I was hoping, anticipating, looking forward to their presence, what their absence would do to me; because they communicated. They did their #1 thing they had to do. So they could leave for however long they needed to. They didn't need to care how my day had been, what I had been through, if I had spent the day getting insulted by internet trolls or didn't have power to my entire neighborhood, or was alone on a holiday when nothing was open. I accepted it, what else could I do. Communicate? Communicate what? That I need consideration. That this person should care about all these things that happened to me while he needed time alone because that is his prerogative? Sure, I could have communicated that to him, been transparent. But that is not what communication is, it is not a call to action for someone to do something for you. To put themselves out, or put their agenda to the side in favor of yours; which is what would have been, had I "communicated" back. It was only that, communication. Cold and impersonal.
So shouldn't we be developing consideration for one another first? Just seems to me consideration leads to communication, but communication just stands alone and does nobody any good on its own.
Until my next random question.
~Oracle
