I have been thinking about this picture lately... A while ago, when I first started college and I was just 17 years old I had to make a presentation for Speech class. My presentation was about what made relationships work and last a long time. Everyone was baffled when I said that it was not the amount of love that people had for each other but how well they worked on communicating with each other. By this time I have seen relationships fail because of the lack of communication. My biological father's first wife and him would always argue and throw things to each other, eventually they would physically fight and hurt each other. During high school, I had had two different relationships. The first one ended because he was jealous and instead of telling me how he felt he would just react. I would try to talk about it without arguing but it was pointless. I couldn't stand it, so I broke it off. The second one ended up kissing someone else, talked to everyone about it except me... I remember not hearing from him for a few days until someone else told me what everyone was talking about. I was more upset at the fact that he didn't come to talk to me first. We used to talk for hours him and I and in a way I expected to be told, not be kept in the dark.
Those were my high school relationship experiences, neither of them lasted too long. I had tried it again with the second boyfriend, but it ended when there was an issue with mutual friends and instead of asking about my side of the story, I was told off. On each instance, there was no effective communication. It was either only one person talking or both not talking at all. It didn't matter that I loved both of these guys, I truly did, because in the end love was not enough. As I grew older and I kept seeing how my biological father behaved, this communication thing became of utmost importance to me. You see, my biological father is an abuser (I think I gave that out earlier when I pointed out how he fought with his second wife); one of the things abusers do is that they will use words to hurt you, they will physically hurt you, and then they will gaslight you. An abuser will hurt you one day and then come back the next day pretending nothing happened. They will act completely different and not ever want to talk about what happened before. Then later on IF you bring it up, they will either tell you that it never happened or they will blame you for it. Back when I was younger and around this individual, I did not know that was it. But still, I despised that he did that too many times and because of that, I made it a point that when I got into a relationship the person I was with would be someone with whom I could communicate effectively. It could even be someone who didn't know how to communicate effectively but who was open to learning and growing with me in that regard.
During the first serious relationship, we were great at communicating with each other at first and everything worked out great. We would talk about what bothered each of us and we never really fought. As the relationship progressed we started to not say to each other what was bothering us and so the communication stopped. Instead of coming to each other to communicate what we needed from one another, he started to go to his parents and I would just keep it all to myself. Until one day he was ready to leave and didn't tell me. At that point we actually talked, but because he had spoken to his parents about what he didn't like about me, now his parents didn't think we should be together. That put a strain in the relationship and after that it was just all downhill from there. Once again, lack of effective communication ruined that one. I loved him and we tried to work on it, but the communication factor was pretty much gone and that made things extremely difficult. We ended up as good friends, who eventually drifted apart but I always left the door open if he ever needed someone to talk to.
Relationships, any kind of relationships, whether they are romantic relationships or friendships, require people to communicate. There is no relationship, it does not matter how much love there is for one another, that will work without two people knowing how to effectively communicate with each other. Today I was wondering why it is that we stop communicating effectively with another person. I know in my experience it has been because I was hurt and couldn't find the right words to say to the other person in a way that I would not hurt them in return. Sometimes it was fear of how they would react to what I said and that was just me remembering the relationship I had with my biological father, who would always lash out and get defensive when you told him you felt something he did was not right. That ended up being the same with the guy I ended up marrying, he is also an abuser and while I had learned to communicate more effectively even without really having good role models, I took a few steps backwards with that marriage. Of course, I knew that would end because there was a lot that was hidden and a lot that was never said.
As far as other people go, I think it's similar reasons... Some of them feel like they would be ashamed of saying something they feel, or telling someone about an experience that might explain their reaction because someone else reacted back at them and so now they want to avoid it. It is trying to avoid confrontation, avoiding a fight, avoiding doing things that might make things worse. And so instead of communicating, they withdraw, they stay quiet and then all those feelings just get bottled up and shaken around like a soda bottle... until eventually someone opens the bottle up and everything comes out bursting...
So how is it that one can change this? By being aware... In your relationships, any of the ones you have, you have to be aware of how you feel and you have to make time to speak about it. Both people need to be receptive to the other, and not take things being said as an attack because as soon as you do that, you will stop being receptive and start being defensive. Both have to be open to growing and set fear aside, and talk from a place of love. It seems something that is very easy to do, but I have found many times it is not. There can be an extreme amount of love between two people and instead of using that love as a driver to continue what made the love grow in the first place, they use that love as the only basis to the relationship and they forget that is not what made it work to begin with. I have lost many relationships in the past, and they have all been lost because of that lack of communication, I know some of them could have been saved if communication was opened but I also found myself in a place where there was only one person willing to do so... And so I realized it would not work. Some of them have hurt losing more than others but, in the end I think I have learned from each of them and I have taken comfort in that. They have helped me grow in many different ways and understand myself a little better, and for that all I can do is say thanks.
Effective communication is to a relationship like a good balance between water and sunlight are to a plant. They are needed in order fora plant to grow, just like it is needed in order for a relationship to flourish.
