common miscommunication
Communication with me goes sideways sometimes. A selection of reasons/situations:
- You attempt to read between the lines of what I am saying, or try to extract what I truly mean. Because I don’t communicate with this kind of subtext and say what I mean directly, you come to wrong conclusions.
- I forget that almost everyone around me is communicating with subtext and take what they say literally, not only occasionally not detecting jokes, sarcasm, irony etc. but also missing that something is worse or less bad than they said. So if you say something was okay but your tone is supposed to convey it was bad, I will take you for your word.
- You don’t want to ask anything directly, so you package it up in a little text repeating what I said or telling me about what you’re going to do. I don’t take the hint and I’m confused why you’re telling me this.
- You tell me very obvious things, so we can talk and connect (“bid for connection”). I feel confused because I don’t detect that intention and I forget communication is not just for data transfer and reply “Okay.” You think I don’t want to talk. I think you’re a little confused.
- I correct something you say that is wrong. To me, this is like telling you your shoe is untied or your zipper is down. To you, this is embarrassing and feels like I’m trying to expose you or one-up you. I don’t understand why you’re suddenly insulted, I was just trying to help.
- While we talk, I start looking around or doing other things or even leave the room. I forget it’s coming across like I’m not paying attention or like I don’t wanna talk, when I actually want to and am still listening.
- When you interrupt an activity of mine, especially writing a post or coding, I have a hard time listening to you. I can seem disinterested, but you’re getting drowned out between everything else that’s going on inside. It’s not you or the topic, it’s the situation. When I’m done, I’m ready to listen.
- I think I talk in a neutral, matter-of-factly tone in real life or online, but it actually comes across as rude. I don’t mean to do that.
- I may not register when you don't wanna talk about a specific topic or hear about a specific thing. I've seen people casually refer to this as "infotoxicity" - yours might be low or high, and depends on specific topics. It means that even if something is true, you don't want to hear about it because it causes you a lot of distress. I don't really experience that (at least I cannot think of anything that would cause me this), because I want to hear about true things even if they hurt, so I forget other people do.
- When I explain things, I tend to be very thorough, in extreme detail, assuming the other person knows nothing about it. I don't usually think they know nothing, I just want them to have all the tools they could need, and revisit information they already know. I also want them to be able to avoid asking followup questions, because some people are afraid to ask or afraid to seem stupid, so I try to preemptively answer them already. That may make you feel like I think you are a stupid little baby, but I'm just trying to be forthcoming and not put you into an uncomfortable situation. Also, I often need more thorough explanations of things, so I take that as kind of a baseline.
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