In general, communication is challenging because each person has a different perspective about many aspects of the very subject of communication.  For instance, how one’s family of origin communicated when we grew up impacts how we will communicate our wants and needs to those close to us.  Some have learned to avoid communication altogether because in the past (usually family of origin) the needs of the individual were not allowed to be expressed, let alone met.  This leads to a dysfunctional way of communicating as an adult.  I have lots of examples of this, but today one example sticks out in my mind as follows:  We recently bought a new vacuum cleaner.  My SO sees the vacuum sitting on a rug in our tv room all assembled of course.  He then starts asking me if it works, etc. Of course, it works..I say.  He pontificates more about how it must not work…so I then ask him..is this where I go and start vacuuming…isn’t this a crazy way to ask someone if they can (or are planning on) vacuuming the rug..or better yet, how about if the other person who is bothered by this  does the work themselves, a novel idea!  This example may not make sense to you because you have perfect communication with your SO..however, the subject is worthy of our thought  because I believe that communication can be fine tuned no matter how great it is.  In this respect, my SO and I have adopted a method to communicate from a book we have been reading called, “Fighting for Your Marriage”.  The method is the speaker-listener technique which implies the two of you are a team when it comes to communicating.  In this technique, the speaker has the floor, represented by an object.  The speaker finishes speaking and then the listener paraphrases what is heard, including feelings, etc.  The speaker then clarifies.  Then the reverse is done.  This method is nothing more than what I learned in formal counseling classes during college, yet it is worth taking another look at because it is easy to get lazy in our communication with each other and cause much unnecessary misunderstanding, anxiety, possible anger and resentments, etc. if we do not attend to our communication with those close to us.

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