What Does Your Interaction Style Say About You?
Have You Noticed?
As a therapist, I am a constant observer of human communication. It continually surprises me when people simply do not realize their impact on others. Recently, I participated in a social event where one person talked and talked and talked. He told story after story and showed no interest in getting to know others in the group. People tried to intervene and offer their own contribution. He did not take the clue. He did not notice people zoning out with eyes glazed over. His investment in his own stories trumped any curiosity he might have had about anybody else. I left with a sense of disappointment and even annoyance. He just didn’t get it.
I sometimes sit with couples where one person is so flooded with emotion, they cannot see their impact on their partner. They emote on and on, often leaving their partner feeling beaten up and demoralized. Their emotion fills the room and suffocates any real possibility of true connection. They are simply lost. Their partner really doesn’t even exist. The emotion rules.
How do you connect? Do you know your impact on others? How we impact others is something we rarely think about yet it has a huge impact on our lives.
In the examples above the people were simply too much. They took up too much time. Too much energy. Too many words. Too much emotion.
On the other hand, there are those who sit in too much silence. They depend on others to provide the energy. In social situations, they converse only when coaxed. They do not express curiosity about the others in the group. They do not contribute to the repartee that energizes social interaction.
In a relationship, they appear to be passive and let their partner dominate. They have too few words and offer too little energy. Paradoxically, this only encourages or even forces the other person to be too much.
