The topic this week is communication! I'm sure everyone of us has had a time in our life where we have tried to communicate with someone and the message was just not received the way we intended and how we wanted.
THOUGHT/FEELING--ENCODE--MEDIA--DECODE--THOUGHT/FEELING
As above, we have this thought or feeling that we have that we wish to convey to another person and we try to voice this thought in a way that we think the other person will be able to decode. This is the struggle with communication, is that the other individual may decode the message differently than you intended and this can create conflict. In class we used an example of a married couple taking a road trip and they were having good conversations and everything was running smoothly when the wife asked the husband if he was thirsty. Girls, we understand what that ultimately means right? Guys if you're unsure, here's what it means! When a girl asks if you want a drink, or if you have to use the washroom she's not asking to know, she's asking because she wants either something to drink or has to use the washroom! Crazy right! Well her husband did not decode this message correctly and so replied back saying, "No I'm good!" Because her husband did not decode the message that she was putting out there, she was upset by it. We can not always know how a person will decode what we are trying to tell them and we must be patient with those around we have relationships with and try to work through and understand the different methods of communication each individual has.
My parents are not the greatest communicators and I have witnessed this throughout my childhood and witnessing how my parents engaged with one another when conflict would arise. Certain things I witnessed were that when a huge conflict or trial would arise, they would converse with each other frequently and constantly want to be on the same page with everything and would communicate this with each other. However, it was the little things that would happen on a regular basis that they did not communicate well with each other. They would often use the silent treatment with each other and just ignore the issue and not talk about it and in the end nothing would be resolved and there are hurt feelings for the remainder of the day. My parents have a great relationship with each other, but this is something I have learned from them to not ignore the little things because your marriage will be that much stronger and have that great communication between each other.
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