The Polyamorous Misanthrope

Polyamory is about love and intimacy, right?  So poly people are the lovingest, mostest intimate cuddlemuffins out there.  If you find someone wants to keep the slightest bit of themselves to themselves, they’re not really poly.  People that need space cannot possibly be polyamorous.  They’re sneaky monsters with an agenda to torture the poor loving cuddlemuffins.

Okay, I can’t go on with this without laughing so hard I burn my sinuses with hot coffee.

Love certainly does have an intimate component.  You’re not going to be able to have a loving relationship without a strong degree of intimate communication and interaction.  Cranky misanthrope I might be, but even I know you can’t love in a box.  It’s a two-way street, and you really do have to open yourself up to give and receive love.  But sometimes you’ll object to a behavior only to hear, “But I thought we were poly!”

The problem comes in when people confuse loving intimacy with stomping on personal boundaries.   Intimacy is closeness, but look out for some warning signs that say that what you’re experiencing is a boundary violation rather than intimacy:

• Emotional Blackmail

Emotional blackmail is use of negative emotions, especially guilt, to control behavior.

You probably won’t notice it the first time you experience it.

You’ll be approached, possibly hesitantly, and your love will say that something you did or didn’t do hurt.  You’ll feel bad and try to correct your behavior.  Now, ya know, in good relationships, sometimes you do screw up.  It happens!  You get called on it, and will get an explanation about how to avoid it in the future.  That’s not emotional blackmail.  That’s human.  Don’t chalk every single time someone doesn’t like your behavior up to emotional blackmail.  We’re none of us perfect.

It’ll be the second or third time within a relatively short period when you notice that it’s emotional blackmail.  You’ll experience strong attempts to make you feel guilty.  They might even work, if you don’t have a clear vision of good boundaries in place.

Luckily, you are in control of this.  Take the time to make sure you have a good sense of what you’re okay with, how you want to behave and the person you want to be.  When you’re solid and grounded in yourself and your own sense of who you want to be, it’s a lot harder to use guilt to manipulate you.

• Creeping Concessions

You know old canard that if you put a frog in a pan of cool water, then gradually heat it, the frog will not notice when the temperature rises to a dangerous degree and will boil to death?

While the literal story is false, the moral of the story has a point.  You can agree to one small concession, right?  That’s okay.  Now if that small concession is treated as a precedent rather than a single exception,[1] someone who is ignoring boundaries is likely to ask for another oh, so small concession that’ll become a precedent, until you’ve found you conceded way the devil more than you ever intended.

You can’t blame this one on the other person, though.  You’re responsible for your own boundaries.  You’re in control of this one.  If you give a concession, be clear whether it’s a precedent or a one-time deal!  You’re responsible for communicating your intention, so you can handle this pretty easily when you get into the habit.

• Confusing intimacy with intrusiveness

Intimacy is voluntary.  Intrusiveness involves a demand, sometimes combined with emotional blackmail.  You get to decide what you’re okay with sharing or not.  The other person doesn’t.  Sure certain sorts of info can be dealbreakers,[2] but the person who owns the info is the person who gets to make the final call on this.

Do you get frequent calls at work?  Do you find when you are not in the person’s physical presence that you get contacted more than you want?  If you’re on vacation, are you called more often than you’d like, interrupting your free time[3]?

If you object to these things, do you get a tearful reproach about love and poly?  Remember, even poly people are allowed to set boundaries about how they want to spend their time.

• Attempts to tell you how you are allowed to live

If you’re poly, ever had a new love tell you that you needed to change how you associate with an old love?  Big time boundary violation.   There are many others to choose from, but keep in mind that just because you have a romantic relationship with someone doesn’t mean you’re allowed to tell them what to do[4].

Good relationships require good boundaries, no matter what the relationship form.   Far from separating loves from each other, a respect for a person’s individuality and free choice is a wonderful way to promote loving relationships –even with yourself.   You’ll find that a careful respect of the other person’s free choice causes you to treasure the unique individuality of that person, allowing for even greater opportunities for love.

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[1] But you agreed you had to bow to the North in respect for our relationship before you got in bed with your other partner, last time!

[2] Not wishing to share STD history leaps to mind.

[3] Notice the “more than you want to” caveat.  You wanna spend your life on the phone with a love who isn’t physically present, enjoy.  Free choice and all.  This is about what you WANT.

[4] As an aside and slightly off topic, I’ve often found it amusing and confusing that sleeping with someone is perceived in our culture as granting the other person rights over you.  You see it in sitcoms, where once a girl is sleeping with her love, she gets to “straighten him out” and reorder his life.  The plot usually presents this as a good thing.  I think it stinks.

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Not too long ago, I was in the living room working idly on some material.   The Prince was in his room on a teleconference with a client.  Our son was wandering through the house as he often does, waving a blue-painted wooden sword and speaking dialog that will be turned into his latest movie.

He wandered into The Prince’s room already speaking to him.  The Prince, who was otherwise engaged, said, “I’m on a teleconference right now.  Could we talk later?”

Muscle Boy apologized and The Prince said, “Don’t sweat it.  You didn’t know.”

So, how does this relate to poly?

Well, it’s not poly-specific, but it’s a great relationship tool.  It’s a great example of good, respectful communication on both sides.   Muscle Boy often goes into his father’s room to speak to him, so the expectation that he could just start talking had already been set up.  But, when he learned he was wrong, he apologized.  Fortunately, he got an understanding response that made that apology an easy and natural thing to do.  There are plenty of households where a the busy person would speak sharply,  “Can’t you see I’m on the phone?” or worse.   It’s easy to do in the heat of the moment, especially if we’re concentrating on something else involving business or money.

But it’s also easy to do in the heat of the moment when our tender and vulnerable emotions are engaged.  I think all of us have been irritated when someone close to us has not automagically known to perform an action, avoid a subject, bring up a subject or whatever.  We often want to be interacted with without exerting ourselves, or making ourselves vulnerable by asking for what we want or how we want to be treated.  Worse, romantic literature praises the lover who instinctively knows what and how to give.  Pick up any woman’s romance you can lay hands on, and you’ll not find one with a partner who asks directly for anything.

Looking at it, it’s a terrible way to treat someone you love.   People can’t read minds.¹ Sure, sometimes we get lucky and guess right. That’s cool and it’s fun to get a neat surprise from a love who does. I’m not running that down. But while delighting in the surprise, for goodness sake don’t punish it when someone gets it wrong.

Here are some keys to good, respectful communication:

• In the future, I would like it if you would…

This is one of the first and best ways to ask for something, especially on the heels of inadvertently getting something you didn’t want.  You can’t “shoulda” anything.  The past is done and you can’t change it.  If you preface your request as something in the future, you’re letting go of the past and looking to the possibilities of the future.

• If you’re willing, I’d like it if you would…

I admit this one looks wimpy as hell in print. Here’s the funny part. It’s not. Respecting freedom of choice is an amazingly powerful act of love and respect. While I’ve been told “no” in the face of it, I do not get bad behavior or disrespect back when I do so.

I often re-iterate that there’s little about poly that’s really all that polyamory specific. The reason it’s not is because communication, respect and relationships all have basic principles that are not rooted in romance. Rooted in love? Sure. I’ll buy that. When you hold on to the deep love and respect that you have for the people in your life, you’ll find you’ll be behaving in ways that really promote deep bonds and intimacy. It works for family members and community as well as lovers, so it’s something you can practice almost constantly.

And the payoffs in your romantic relationships are amazing. So keep practicing, mah little poly chillun.  Mama Java wants you to be happy.

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¹Yeah, I know, there are some special snowflakes who claim they can. Unless they have a track record of great, long-term, harmonious relationships, and most I know who claim this do not, I’m disinclined to believe them.

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I’m a big fan of the online strip Questionable Content.

One of the more recent strips has a couple of characters have a discussion about sex and relationships that I found interesting.

For those poor souls who have not yet had the opportunity to become fans, the two characters are friends with benefits.  The male… well, he sleeps around a lot but has never made any real bones about it to the female character.  For the record, yes, Sven is a big jerk if he isn’t up front before he gets involved about his desires and his expectations.  He’s always been clear with Faye.

But I wanna focus on Faye a minute.  She wants something — to know that she’s the only one Sven is gonna be sleeping with.  Does anyone think this is a good way to go about it?  Even though (in the context of the story), Faye saying, “I’d like us to be exclusive even if it’s not ’serious,’” would be about as likely to get a “Yes” as Dick Cheney would be likely to apologize for lying to the citizens of the US about weapons of mass destruction Iraq, she’s still allowed to ask for what she wants.

She’s also allowed to set boundaries.  It would even be okay to say, “I’m comfortable sleeping with you as friends, but if and when you have another partner, I’m not going to want to sleep with you any more.”  It wouldn’t be attempting to tell Sven what he could or couldn’t do, but would be setting a boundary that’s important to her.  In fact, it’s relevant information that might effect Sven’s choices.

Obviously, neither of these characters are great at communication.  Learn from their bad example!

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My wife and I have been looking for a long time to find a person or couple we could date.  Not too long ago, we did start going out with a couple.  The problem is, while I like them, I don’t like them in *that* way.  What do I do?  My wife is really excited and I don’t want to disappoint her.  Also, the couple are nice people.  I’d really like being friends with them, but I’m just not interested otherwise?

Yow, rough situation.

First off, you’re gonna tell the truth, right?  You don’t have to be mean about it, but you really do want to be honest here.  You said you like these people, so you can certainly say that.  But explaining that you really aren’t interested romantically is the honest thing to do.

But I’ll go even further.  It’s ultimately the kindest thing to do as well.  I know it doesn’t feel great to disappoint people you like or love.   I don’t blame you for finding it difficult or painful.  Thing is, if you did get involved with these people when you weren’t into it, it’s only going to get worse.  Imagine people getting attached and then finding that no, you were just humoring everyone all along.  Talk about painful!

One thing you might want to consider, in having this talk, is whether or not dating as a unit is really working out for you and your wife.  Maybe it would work out that if she’s quite interested in the couple that she could date them.  You don’t specify whether or not you have a “date as a unit” agreement or not but the way your letter reads sort of implies it.  If it is, maybe renegotiation would be in order here.  If I’m wrong, there’s no problem.  She’s free to date ‘em and you’re all good from being honest about how you were feeling.

Ultimately, being straight about what you’re thinking or feeling will work out better for everyone.

Good luck!

If you find this site useful, consider buying the Goddess of Java a libation of that greatest of elixirs. The Goddess of Java disdains latte heresy and only imbibes the Java purity, so it's a mere $1.50.

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“Honey, we’ve got to talk.”

Do you hear this phrase often enough to make your blood run cold?  Do most of your relationship talks start this way?  Does this usually preface a several-hour discussion?  If your relationships’ communication styles rely on a series of “Come to Jesus” chats, you’re not really communicating. Someone’s lecturing and someone’s resisting. That’s not communicating.

In a relationship where communication lines are open, there’s a much more fluid sense to it. You might have a partner ask, “Hey, just checkin’ in. How are you feeling relationship-wise between us?” If you feel ice in your guts when something like that is asked, you have a large and dramatic problem. If you find yourself relaxed and glad of the opportunity to bring up a little point such as, “Well, feeling okay about it, but I wanted to mention that the weasel porn isn’t really my kink, so could we do some other stuff instead? ” and the discussion is done in five or ten minutes, you’re all good.

In a healthy relationship, large and dramatic problems are rare¹. Why? Because they’re usually dealt with casually and calmly when they’re small. It’s rather like cleaning as you go in your kitchen and washing the dishes before they get crusty.  Dealing with little things as they come up isn’t as exciting, maybe, as the big, dramatic blowups and discussions.  But, it’s probably better to save your desire for an adrenalin rush for jumping out of airplanes or something and take care of your relationships a bit more smoothly.

To do this well, you have to be willing to do several things.  You need to be willing to ask your partners what they’re thinking and feeling, you need to listen carefully to what they’re saying, and you need to be able to volunteer what you’re thinking or feeling on a regular basis.  Don’t let things fester.

However, there’s a difference between not letting things fester and feeling like you have to deal with the issue the very second you think it, too!   You don’t need to meet partners at the door with it, interrupt their work with it, wake ‘em up in the middle of the night with it or any of that.  If it doesn’t involve blood or fire, any of these things can wait 48 hours or so².  If you’re dealing with it on a regular basis, it probably isn’t so urgent it can’t wait a day, anyway.

To make it work, be open with your partner.  If you partner asks how things are going, but you’re in the middle of a project that has a deadline, you can and should say so! “Sugar, I do wanna let you know, but I’m so busy until Thursday that I can’t think about anything but but finishing this project for the Evil Overlord.”  Come Thursday, though, you’d better be ready to cough up what you’re thinking!  If you’re not wanting to communicate and are looking for ways not to, you definitely have some self-examination to do about your relationship.

Rather like getting in the habit of decluttering regularly, you’ll find your relationships will be less messy and far more relaxed.

Oh, and more fun, too!  I know you want that, so enjoy.

And for those of you who celebrate it, Happy Hobbit Day!

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¹Rare doesn’t mean never, m’kay? Yes, of course a good relationship can have rocky spots sometimes!

²If your partner isn’t willing to talk at all, then you have a different problem. It does take two people to communicate, and what can’t we force other people to do boys and girls? Right.

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One of the big things that often becomes a serious Talking Point in polyamorous relationships is the nature and detail of personal and emotional disclosure — most specifically, disclosure of actions/feelings between your, your loves and your loves’ loves.

This is an area where people often make assumptions that wind up biting them in the butt later. You’ll think that of course your love is going to volunteer comments about romantic feelings she may be having for someone else, and she’s thinking that she doesn’t need to bring it up until she’s contemplating physical action. You feel hurt, she feels intruded upon and WHAM! you’ve got yourself a Relationship Situation.

Allow me to offer an end-run around this nonsense.

A lot of times, though, when you start examining your desires for disclosure, you’ll find a pattern. What you’re really looking for is self-protection – be it from an STD, being abandoned, being surprised out of nowhere with an emotional shock. Not all self-protection in a relationship is bad, but make sure you’re owning your own responsibility for yourself, your wants, your emotions and your needs before you start asking for stuff.

Be specific with what you want. For the love of Anoia[1], please don’t say, “Of course I want full disclosure!” and leave it at that. It’s non-specific, and way the hell too open to interpretation, confusion and irritation. Since we love our partners and the goal is communication rather than brow-beating, give ‘em an easy chance to understand what it is you really want in terms of disclosure.

Ferinstance:

• I want to be told if you or one of your partners gets an STD.[2]
• Please tell me if you’re having sex with someone new. For the purposes of this discussion, I’m defining “sex” as “intent for someone involved to have an orgasm.”
• If you’re considering sleeping with someone new, I’d like to know about it before it happens.

Yes, the last two reflect somewhat different approaches to the way multiple relationships can be handled. It’ll depend very much on what you and your partner(s) mutually agree upon.

There are dozens of others, but we don’t have to get into detail. The point is, what do you want to be told? Think about it carefully, and then ask for that. Sure, you might realize that you didn’t completely envision the ramifications of exactly what you asked for and need to refine. And yes, of course you can ask for something different at a later time. But as a Real Grownup, you are responsible for stepping up to the plate and admitting that your self-knowledge was incomplete and that’s your own problem.

You won’t always be told yes. That might be a dealbreaker. If I had a partner who said, “I want to know about every person about whom you’ve had a sexual fantasy,” chances are good I’d decline. There’s no real way I could honestly commit to doing that. I might have a fantasy I forget about an hour later, ya know? That could be a deal-breaker in some relationships. It’s better to get that out on the table immediately so no-one’s time is wasted.

Does this require self-knowledge? You betcha. In fact, successful relationships in general do. Will you make mistakes and ask for what you thought you wanted in terms of disclosure only to find that’s not quite right? Oh very yes! Welcome to the Human Club.

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[1] The Goddess of Things Stuck in Drawers.

[2] I choose only to take it to that level. I’m not the CDC here and feel that tracking down three or four levels is not worth my time. You might feel differently and that’s your call.

If you find this site useful, consider buying the Goddess of Java a libation of that greatest of elixirs. The Goddess of Java disdains latte heresy and only imbibes the Java purity, so it's a mere $1.50.

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This guest column is by Edward Martin, III.

I’m tired of the whole “communicate, communicate, communicate” mantra. Oh sure, I’m all for making sure you communicate with your partners, but it just doesn’t have to be some long and torturous ritual that goes on forever under the guise of “well, this must be what it’s like to be poly.”

I’ve found that only about 5% of the time spent “talking” is spent finding a mutually satisfying solution.

95% is spent trying to figure out what everybody really wants, instead of what they’re trying to angle obliquely toward. It’s like spending time placing all the pieces on the board in some kind of conversational game.

Think about that one for a moment — when many of us tell someone else what we want, we’re really telling them what we think they’ll be willing to give us such that we can get what we really want without incurring some sort of egregious social debt. (it’s okay — you don’t have to admit it in public)

So, since half of that 95% is mine (and I don’t have to be oblique with myself, thank goodness), it became a lot easier to say “Okay, this is what I want out of the solution. As long as that’s satisfied, you can do it however you like.”

It’s tricky, because I have to make sure that I stick to my actual words, and I have to release an interest in all parameters that I haven’t mentioned. This requires a lot of bright-light looking at my needs. And if I miss something, it’s my own damn fault. I can mention it later, of course, but I have to realize that I’m bringing it to the table late, and act accordingly.

It also requires I know the difference between a  need and a preference, and that I do my homework before coming to the discussion table. But, as a good partner, it’s my job to make sure I’m doing the best I can, and that means, sometimes, homework.

It’s been a long haul, but the results so far have been great.

And even better — when other partners see how easy it is to do that, they start doing it, too. Rewards are great learning tools and short conversations with mutually satisfying solutions are great rewards.

And then you can get back to actually living a life together.

Process Percentage © 2008, Edward Martin, III

Used by permission

All Rights Reserved

Edward Martin III is a writer and filmmaker (http://www.Guerrilla-Productions.org) in the Pacific Northwest. In other parts of the country, his roles are secret, if not downright mysterious. Today he got soaked on a motorcycle ride by a surprise storm, designed a one-man bicycle-powered submersible, and learned more about Lent than any decent human being should know. Tomorrow — hard to tell.

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In reading on polyamory boards and in discussions about relationships, it seems that a lot of issues come up that could be more effectively solved with assertive communication skills.

Take this example. While this might look familiar, I didn’t copy it directly from any polyamory discussion board. It’s just that you see it so very often.

Hi, guys. I’m worried about my marriage. My wife has a new love and while I’m really happy for her, I’m feeling like maybe she doesn’t care about me any more. She’ll be on a date, and then come home tired. I want to talk to her and reconnect, but all she wants to do is sleep. I think that after she’s been out, she owes me some time if she really cares about me and I’ve told her that.

What should I do?

Assertive communication is about telling people what you think/feel/want/need without making the other person responsible for your thoughts/feelings/wants/needs. So there’s a bit of a formula to the phrasing.

The formula for assertive communication runs like this:

When X happens, I feel Y. I would like you to Z.

First you’ll describe the situation in which you’re thinking or feeling something. Ferinstance in this case, the husband could begin with,“When I don’t have a lot of time to talk to someone I care about”

Notice how this avoids finger pointing. It’s less likely to put someone on the defensive. When a person is on the defensive, the open flow of good communication pretty much stops. While you cannot control how someone reacts, you can try to set up the situation to offer the person an easy chance not to be defensive.

Then you can go on to how you feel about it, “I feel distant and unloved.”

It’s very important to note that you’re not saying anything that even smells like, “You make me feel” anything. Owning your own feelings is very important for this to work. Yes, yes, yes, you can have negative feelings in certain situations. But ultimately, it’s your responsibility to decide how you want to cope.

After you’ve explained how you feel, ask for what you want. “When you come home from a date, I’d like it if we could have ten minutes to talk. It doesn’t have to be about your date, but I’d like just to reconnect a little with you because I love you and want to feel close to you.”

In this case, you’re not accusing your wife of being a jerk. You’re not throwing a lot of baggage into the conversation, but dealing with this one direct issue. Assertive communication works best when you do your best to chuck the baggage and deal with each individual issue on its own.

Of course, the person is not obligated to say “yes”. This isn’t some kind of advanced spell they teach at Hogwarts or something. But if the person you’re talking to isn’t willing to give you what you want, you have an opportunity to find out why. Be willing to listen. You might agree with the why if you listen long enough.

Sure, you might not, too. Then you have some future decisions to make, but don’t jump the gun on that one! Give it a chance and give it some time.

If you find this site useful, consider buying the Goddess of Java a libation of that greatest of elixirs. The Goddess of Java disdains latte heresy and only imbibes the Java purity, so it's a mere $1.50.

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One of the issues that often arise in poly situations — especially in group living is who decides what gets done.

Sure, sure, a consensus model works. But have you ever gotten more than two people to happily agree on more than 50% of decisions? (The “happily” part is important in the long run. Just going along without being happy means that you’re gonna have some resentment along the line).

When the consensus model won’t work, there’s another option: The Designated Control Freak.

I found out about the whole concept of the DCF from a good friend of mine, and thought it was funny and cute and a nifty way to solve decision issues. I told my roommate about it, who also thought it was cute, so we jokingly implemented it.

It was at least six months before we internalized the awesome power of the system.

Here’s the way it works. When the person becomes the Designated Control Freak (DCF) the dialog will be in italics.

Albert: Let’s go out to eat.

Betty: Great! Where shall we go?

Carl: I don’t want to go to a vegetarian restaurant.

Albert: Okay, where are we going then?

Carl: Let’s go to the Outback Steak House.

Betty: No, I hate chain restaurants.

Carl: Okay, Betty, where are we going?

Betty: There’s the new Thai place.

<silent pause>

Betty: Okay, I’ll call them and see if they take reservations.

The way the one becomes the DCF is to express a dissenting opinion when trying to come to a decision. If you have a dissenting opinion, you become responsible for the outcome and have to solve the problem. (i.e. what restaurant to go to for an outing). If you have a strong opinion about where to go and speak up, it’s up to you to organize it. Notice that in the course of a few sentances, the DCF changed several times. It wasn’t an argument (and usually when you agree to the DCF system there won’t be).

If you speak up, if you express an opinion, you’re the DCF until someone else speaks up with a different solution.

You’d think it would be a way for people to railroad through their decisions. But it isn’t. Sometimes you recognize that what you really want is not to be the leader, and shut up. Sometimes you want something badly enough to take the reigns.

Part of the beauty of this system is that it is impossible to be a Puppeteer and try to be the Hindmost¹. If you have an opinion, you’re in charge.

This model reduces fights in a lot of areas. You have a specific way you want the bathroom cleaned? Then you’re the Bathroom DCF. Go for it. It gets cleaned your way. You think the trash has to be emptied before you have to tamp trash down in the kitchen garbage bin, huzzah! You’re the DCF and get to do it.

Does this mean a lazy person could slack in the house and never have to do anything because he never speaks up? In theory, I suppose it could. In practice, I’ve noticed that even the most housework-phobic and disorganized have their own tweaks and twitches for which they will become the DCF and not so lazy as all that.

The thing is, this model really also works well because no-one is willing to work that hard to get his way about everything when he’s responsible for the outcome. You’ll usually find that if someone is trying to bully to get their way on everything, they’re seeing the other person as their “hands” to accomplish what they want. Puppeteering, if you will. This removes the strings nicely.

¹For those of you who are not science fiction geeks, in the Ringworld series, there is a culture of creatures who lead from behind — their morality is more-or-less based on cowardice: the ruling class is known as they-who-lead-from-behind, and the supreme leader is called the Hindmost. Their leader is called the Hindmost.

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We talk about communication being important between polyamorous people all the time, and with good reason. It is important.

I got to thinking about ways to ensure good communication and came up with the following:

• Tell the truth

This seems really basic and you know, it isn’t. I’m not talking “Brutal Honesty” here. That’s usually more often an excuse for bullying than it is being genuinely honest. What I mean is that it’s a good idea to make sure that you’re first being honest with yourself, and knowing your motives, then being honest with the person you’re talking to. You can do this kindly.

When you’re communicating with a partner, make sure you’re letting him in on what you’re really thinking and feeling. Your partner has to have accurate information to work with. If you’re not comfortable telling your partner what you’re thinking or feeling, either you’ve got a problem being honest, or you’ve got a problem with your partner that goes a lot deeper than “communication”. A good way to know which it is is to check out how close you tend to play your cards to your chest with intimate friends. If you have a problem telling them the truth about what you’re thinking and feeling, too, take a look at your driver’s license. There will be a pic of the person at fault right there.

• If you have a choice, presume benevolent motives.

You and your partner(s) love each other, right? Of all the people in the world that want your good, surely this person or these people will be them. Sure, people can be thoughtless and hurt feelings, but you can say your feelings are hurt and give a person a chance to explain. “I statements” ¹ are great for this. If you say “I feel X”, you’re owning your own feelings without making the other person responsible for them. It’ll also give the person a chance to elaborate on what’s going on in his or her head, and you’ll have more information to work with. Sometimes you’ll get an “Oops, my bad” or “I didn’t mean X quite that way. Lemme ‘esplain”.

If your partner is actually out to get you (or at least if you have such a deep belief), chances are good you’ve got something more than communication going wrong. For the record, punishment doesn’t belong in any adult relationship outside of the fantasy of a BSDM scene, ‘kay?

• Avoid sarcasm.

I was discussing this article with a friend of mine and she wisely pointed out that the allure of sarcasm is rather like the allure of almost all humor. It’s about pain and the reaction to it. The thing is, while sarcasm may be a reaction to pain, far too often it is often an attempt to cause it as a punishment to someone for being wrong somehow². I don’t need to point out that good communication comes from benevolent motives. If you’re using sarcasm, maybe your motives aren’t as benevolent as all that and your partner(s) are right to feel as if they need to back off and defend themselves.

• Ask questions to try to understand. Then listen carefully to the answer!
  

When you don’t understand something, ask a question. Listen to the answer. It’s a simple, yet powerful technique. Far too often when people are talking, they’re just flapping their tongues. Don’t blow your partner off by asking a question and then wait to find something you can jump on to prove your point. Listen to what they’re saying.

These habits are relatively simple, yet very powerful in relationships. Though, like many good habits, do you practice them? Have you made it a priority to learn good communication skills?

If you haven’t, that’s okay. You really can change how you behave. Don’t expect people in your life to fall all over you accepting the change all at once, though. If you’ve made it a habit not to listen, to use a lot of sarcasm or presume malevolent motives, you may have to go through a trust building period — and I don’t mean just a couple of weeks here. People who’ve needed to protect themselves might be slow to open up. But just be patient and practice your good habits.

The results are really fun!
¹When used properly. I’ve seen some sneaky and passive aggressive uses of “i statements” that would curdle the blood of any person whose goal was actual communication.
²We who have the character flaw of being judgmental can be just awfully sarcastic!

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