If I had a dollar for every person who has said to me in the counselling session, “we need help with our communication, we are not listening to each other” well… let’s just say I could possibly retire early!
Finding the right words when trying to express how you feel at any given moment can place a great deal of stress and strain on you. It can affect your confidence and your ability to express your emotions and feelings freely and effectively with your partner and others.
Learning how to express your feelings and emotions constructively is an integral part in keeping your relationship with your partner healthy and strong.
Using the wrong words or context to communicate your needs can not only make your message unclear but they can also be perceived as disrespectful or insensitive.
One of the activities we do in the relationship recovery process is we focus on using the right language, tone, & dialogue so your interactions don’t get lost in translation.
We begin with awareness:
- What your current communication styles are
- Why you communicate the way you do
- The emotions that are attached to your current communication style
- How you both want to communicate with each other in future interactions
Learning the ‘I feel… when… because…’ strategy is a great starting point to communicating your needs effectively.
The ‘I’ message or ‘I’ statement is a style of communication that focuses on the feelings or thoughts of the speaker rather than the ‘YOU’ statement or message, which can be perceived as an accusation, a form of wrongdoing, guilt or blame.
When we primarily focus on the ‘YOU’ statement instead of ‘I’ statement in our communication we often encourage a negative automatic reactive response from the other person. When this occurs, we unfortunately discourage active listening which helps us feel connected through feeling heard, cared for and accepted.
So, the next time you need to express something start with ‘I feel’ and share the importance of your feelings, and give yourself a greater chance of influencing a favourable outcome.
