My son, Ethan, he’s in college, and we kind of have this running joke because for years, he and I will be in a conversation, and it’s like we’re not getting each other. He’s often maybe like, “Mom, I don’t understand what you’re saying,” and we might end up in this circular conversation. And most people would be quick to say, “Oh, he’s been a teenager! He’s not getting it because he’s not listening to you. Teenagers never listen.”
Oh, no, no. That is a myth. Not that teenagers don’t listen. I’m not going to say that’s a myth, to each his own situation, but what IS a myth is that saying, somebody doesn’t understand you, it’s because they’re not listening. Absolutely not. Somebody not understanding you may have nothing to do with them not listening. In fact, I can tell you in every circumstance where Ethan and I have not been on the same page, and because it’s not just him not understanding me, there are times I don’t understand him, and we are actively listening to each other, we are both participating in the conversation.
It is because we’re missing some sort of context, we’re missing some sort of background. I can completely recall many conversations where Ethan’s telling me a story, I’m not getting it, and it’s because I didn’t understand the background of what they were talking about in his class, and now he’s telling me a story about that. I’m like, “Oh, wait a minute. Let’s pause, back up. Educate me on this. Share the back story.”
So the next time that you are sitting there in some sort of dialogue or communication with someone and they don’t understand you, please do not jump to conclusions and think that it’s because they’re not listening to you, that it’s because they’re not smart enough. In fact, it could be you. It could be how you are choosing to communicate it. It is most likely that you have not been able to provide the background, the context.
Each person in a dialogue, let’s say, are coming from their own unique experiences, their own feelings, their own perspectives.
So even if you are giving background context, you’re like, Colleen, I gave them all the history. I don’t know what else I could share. It could be that even the background, their perspective based upon their past experiences is just different than yours. That even if you presented the facts of the situation, they may not understand or translate those facts in the same way because they might’ve gone through the same facts, the same background, but they had a different feeling about it.
There was something different about it, and now the two of you are coming together trying to communicate, and it’s just still not working. So we want to pause, we want to ask questions, we want to open up that communication. And the more that you’re asking questions as to why the person may not be understanding – not saying, why don’t you understand, but asking more questions about the conversation, and, “Hey, tell me more about when you went through this. Oh, got it. Now I see, now I see what’s missing here.”
Again, we’re not jumping to conclusions, and imagine how this could change your interaction with people. Imagine if you were to stop assuming, start asking questions, engage in the dialogue, how that could change the path forward, how it could mitigate potential conflict, how it could create better solutions, how it could even become eventually more efficient.
So again, stop assuming, start asking. Bring that conversation together, know that you’re dealing with another human being with their own thoughts, feelings, perspectives, and that you may just need to be re-thinking through your communication and not expecting the other person to translate everything for you.