“Love is as necessary to human beings as food and shelter;but without intelligence love is impotent, and freedom unattainable.” Aldous Leonard Huxley
How many times have we quarreled with a friend or family member and repeated the words, “That’s not what I mean.” We get so frustrated trying to think of a way to phrase what we wanted or meant to say that we at times lose our train of thought or worse we blurt out words that make it all worse. Trying to take back what we said is not as easy as it was to voice the words originally spoken.
I would venture to say we have all been in this situation at least once but probably many times. Maybe people enjoy catching us in such a harrowing situation. They at times set us up and enjoy seeing us squirm our way out. Of course the harder we try squirming, the guiltier we appear. It really becomes more aggravating when the other party refuses to give us a break and back off. Instead they continue their shocked and hurt look which adds to our misery, drains our effort, confuses our thinking, enhances our guilt regardless of the truth. many times our energy depletes forces us to give up and accept our losses.
Those of us who plod forward step in it so to speak and then wish we had cut our losses. How do we fix such problems? Connections to friends and relatives is important to us. Full of adrenalin due to the encounter, we retreat but our day is ruined and until the other person forgives us for what we didn’t do, our life ends up on hold. Personally I think if we venture a call on them our first words might be, “I’m sorry if you misunderstood what I said. Knowing me so well I assumed you would understand I would never want to deliberately hurt you.” Surprisingly if the combative person retorts with “I know, it’s okay.” You may have to reply with, “It’s not okay if you believe a falsehood.”
Otherwise our relative or friend thinks they caught us in some weird truth but they forgave us. I know depending on our disposition, we may cause another argument. If we are prepared we will possibly avoid any traps. In this way our opponent at this current time will be prompted to accept some blame in the situation. We may modify the course of a similar happening for misconception in a future exchange of words. Thinking like a chess player may save us from an imminent transgression. The key in all of this is to keep your voice calm, your tone non-judgmental and your heart and thoughts sincere.
We do have differing states of mind in any given moment and just maybe what is said one day may be totally acceptable by another person but on a separate day that person has an altered reaction. We all experience days of insecurity and sensitivity. refraining from any controversial topic may be the order of the day.
If we step into the mistake of giving a false impression UNINTENTIONALLY, then patience on that day and possibly a future day may be required. But you need to ask yourself isn’t that person worth it in the end? I believe so and that means more time patience and effort but they are worth it and so are you when the roles get reversed which they most likely will.
“The degree of one’s emotion varies inversely with one’s knowledge of the facts. The less you know the hotter you get.” Anonymous
Author’s website: www.pamreynolds.me
