Coummunication

Hey Bean, it's  your Dad,

I love when something happens during the day that gives me an idea for a post. I am a big time believer that the best lessons are learned from everyday life. I believe that if you stop and examine what went wrong with a day,  you can learn to do things differently in the future. This morning Mommy and I had a bit of a miscommunication over who was going to grab the car. This is a great example of how important communication is.

Last night Mommy and I had spoken about how she wanted me to get the car if I was awake before her. That is how I understood it and how I saw it. This morning I woke up a little after Mommy so my thought was that she was going to go get the car. However, her thinking on the matter was completely different. In her mind, the agreement was that I would go get the car if I was awake before all of you had to leave for school. Because we both had different ideas on who was getting the car, neither of us was ready to get the car when it was time to get it.

Mommy asked me if I was going to get the car. I responded she was supposed to get the car. We started arguing and both of us got upset with the other. I went and got the car, the battle wasn't important enough for me to win and Mommy can be stubborn, but I was still kind of mad that I felt like Mommy was changing the agreement without talking to me. Mommy felt like I wasn't honoring an agreement I had made. This whole situation could have been handled without the need for Mommy and me to get mad at each other if we had communicated better the night before. Even without communicating better the night before we both could have benefited from slowing down and communicating instead of yelling.

Parents are not perfect and this morning your mommy and I both showed that. However, that doesn't mean I should just shrug my shoulders and not look at the incident. I can't control what mommy does, but I can control what I do and how I react. Instead of yelling at mommy when it was obvious we were confused, I could have simply gone and gotten the car. It's what mommy wanted, it's not that far of a walk, I deal with the cold better than mommy, and I can use the reason to walk a bit. There really isn't a negative to going and getting the car other than I was feeling a bit lazy. However, instead of doing that, I argued with her and then went and got the car. Since I wound up getting the car in the end, did arguing gain me anything but stress?

I don' think it did. In fact, one of the primary reasons for communication is to reduce the potential for stress and conflict. When a miscommunication occurs the chance for stress and conflict rises pretty quickly. It doesn't matter if it's a boss to underling or me to you when communication breaks down stress increases and stress can lead to conflict.

Communication is such an important skill to develop Bean, it really is. The better you are at communicating the more successful you will be. Learning to communicate can be hard because people communicate on so many different levels. Not only do people communicate on different levels, but we all communicate in different ways. Sometimes it's a wonder we can communicate at all, but we can and it's a vital part of our survival as people.

Learn to communicate Bean. Learn to understand how other people communicate. Make the effort to make communication your first action in preventing conflict. Remember, this morning and how it all could have been resolved if two people had listened to each other and made sure they understood each other. While I doubt it's possible to communicate successfully with every person on the planet, I do believe that most people are open to communication if you know how to communicate with them.

Think I have said all I really need to about the importance of communication. I love you Bean, I will talk with you tomorrow.

Dad.