Recently I was looking to buy an apartment, it took some
time to find the perfect place for the best price at the nicest neighborhood.
But then I saw a lovely newly renovated garden apartment on a quiet street. My
partner Johnny, an engineer, started looking around studying the building, and
talked to the neighbor as well. In an informal but purposeful chat he
discovered that there were several disagreement between the neighbor and the
seller. Still at first those seemed like minor problems common among neighbors.
Yet, hearing about a possible conflict made me more
sensitive to what was going on in the building, and when my daughter and I went
to see it, we noticed a worker laying tiles in the footpath leading to the
house. We remarked to one another that it was a good sign that the conscientious
seller was taking care of the yard. But, later that day I was surprised to hear
that the neighbor called Johnny to complain. Apparently the seller, who had
previously broken the tiles in the footpath, failed to consult with him and
unilaterally replaced the expensive tiles with others of inferior quality.
At that point I decided to back away from the transaction,
there was much more to the story than I had realized.
As is often the case with miscommunications, each side
viewed the other with suspicion: gestures of [supposedly] good-will were
interpreted as manipulation, and every action was construed as intending to
offend. The opposing sides did not have
to look hard in order to find proofs or justifications for their beliefs.
The tiled footpath is another symbol of the impossibility of
seeing the whole picture, this is a topic which I explored in another post.
I was lucky to be able to walk away and not get involved in
the conflict over the apartment. However, when
relationships with loved ones deteriorate there is no where to go. I
could easily imagine myself in the role of the tiles layer, or as the one who
is furious over their inferior quality. With loss of trust nothing which I do
or say is understood in the way I intended it.
I have just completed a year-long course in NLP (Neuro
Linguistic Programming). One of the goals of that approach is to promote self
awareness and better communication through various sensory experiences. NLP has
a specific technique to deal with frustration, anger or helplessness which stem
from miscommunications. The technique: "Expanding the map of
reality," utilizes 3 presuppositions, out of the 11 articles of belief, in
NLP.
The first is: the map is not the territory, which means that
people act upon their own perception of reality-- their internal map of
reality. This statement may appear trivial but in times of conflict it is
easily forgotten. Thus, it is helpful to remember an instance when we realized
that our conclusions about reality were not necessarily the only truth.
The second is: the meaning of communication is the response
you get, which means that the success of my part in a dialogue is measured by
the reaction of the listener. Here it is
useful to remember a time when I was misunderstood by another person, and how, by adjusting the
message, I was able to turn it around and make myself clear.
The third is: every
behavior has a positive intent in some context, which means that even a negative pattern of behavior serves a
purpose. Here we should remember an example when that type of
behavior was helpful in some way.
NLP contends that revisiting those instances in the past
when I learnt the merit of those presuppositions could assist me in discovering
within myself ways to deal with the present conflict.
I find this technique effective, but even if it doesn't
always work it is far better than the old-fashioned "count to 10"
cool down. Moreover, spending time with different angles of the problem in hand
could bring about more creative and
satisfying solutions.
PS. NLP's
presuppositions:
http://nlp-mentor.com/presuppositions/
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