Types of communication – 5 levels of communication
1-
clichés -
superficial communication things you would say to a store clerk
“How are you?” “How was your day?” “Fine” “What’s up?” safe level of communication avoids conflict
2 - sharing of facts – shallow communication, just
information “It’s raining outside” “Gas
went up again” “I’ll be home by 6:00”
“What time is the kids event?”
still
relatively safe level of communication if you are starting arguments at this
level you are a pretty miserable person
3 -
state our opinions – potential conflict begins here. This is where you
make yourself vulnerable to rejection and criticism. If you feel insecure about your marriage you
will not move into this realm. “I can’t
believe anyone would vote for that idiot, He has no experience at all” “I can’t believe they would say that they are
absolutely wrong” Most couples make it to this level but rarely go beyond
4 – say what we are feeling – we place
ourselves at risk of having our feeling misunderstood. But we can only reach deeper levels of loving
and being loved by taking risk. The best question at this level is “what are
you feeling right now?”
5 – Reveal our needs – what I need right
now is for you to hold me? For you to listen t me for to just give me a few
moments. To risk revealing your needs you have to feel secure in this
relationship
Three styles
1)
Drive through talking or “active listening
2)
Make your spouse thirsty Cartwright story 1800’s
circuit rider
3)
Word pictures effective especially with men –
you are treating me just my father or scale from 1-10
Test it out
“How can two walk together
unless they agree.” Amos 3:3 BLIS can’t
happen with unresolved conflict
Conflict resolution
Why do we have conflict in a
marriage?
1)
Power and
Control
Mutual
submission
2)
Insecurity
Create and
environment where you spouse feels free to express themselves and they feel
safe
3)
Differences in
Values
He
thinks its OK to go hunting she is against killing anything
He
thinks its OK to watch violence on TV she can’t take it
She
thinks it is fine to compliment someone (lie) he thinks it is hypocritical
Sometimes
you have to agree to disagree
4)
Competition
Some
people can’t stand to lose at anything (don’t play monopoly with them)
Sometimes
a husband will feel jealous over the money, promotion, or advancement the wife
makes
Wives
who have had unbelieving husbands once husband gets saved
If
both trying to lose weight, get into shape, learn something new and one is
better than the other
5)
Personal
differences
Men
and women are just different
Introvert
verses extrovert
Personality
differences
Love
language differences
Warning!!!!! Generalizations are about
to be expressed!
Child rearing men push the children women
nurture the children
Men
generally think I’ll have some buddies over women think what condition is the
house in?
Men
share facts women express feelings (levels of communication)
Men
are independent women are interdependent (community related)
Men
connect by doing things women connect by talking
Men
tend to compete women tend to cooperate
Men
tend to be controlling women tend to remain agreeable
6)
Misunderstood
feelings and unmet needs
What
do you think your spouse should be doing (roles and goals), unrealized
expectations. We often expect others to meet our needs or goals when we haven’t
even expressed them
Generally
this is where most conflicts originate.
If I am in conflict with someone generally one of two things are
occurring 1) someone’s feelings aren’t being valued or understood 2) Someone’s
needs aren’t being valued or met.
What doesn’t resolve
conflict?
1)
Withdrawing –
burying you head in the sand and saying, “if I ignore it or just don’t deal
with it, it will go away.”
2)
Yielding -
giving in – It seems like you gain peace but it is only for a season one person
always loses
3)
Compromise – sounds
right but again someone loses you both settle for half of a loaf rather than
the whole things
How can everyone win?
Focus on resolving the
conflict not on picking on each other or demanding your rights you keep at it
patiently until both. Putting into place
all those levels of communication clichés, facts, opinions, feelings needs.
Understand each other’s
gifts or personality types and love languages
What do you do if the hurt
has been too bad
1)
Define the
offense – it is too easy to simply say that person hurt (offended me) you must
clearly understand yourself what they did to hurt you.
-write
it down discuss it with a neutral party (close friend)
2)
Allow yourself
to grieve – don’t minimize it recognize that you have been hurt, if you don’t
grieve you don’t own it if you don’t own it the you are in denial. Blessed are they that mourn for they will be
comforted this allows you to focus the attention on the real problem
3)
Try to
understand your offender – why did they commit this against me what is going on
in their life what kind of pain, sin, confusion, loss of dream are they living
with that allows them to do this
4)
Release your
offender – the definition of forgiveness is to untie or release someone. This
is not about feelings it is about making a decision. A long as you do not
forgive someone. The person that
offended you may be unable to deal with the offense but that should not
continue to bind you.
5)
Look for the
gems in the offense - all things work
together for good for them that love God and are called according to his
purposes. If we trust God He can show us how we an take a bad thing and learn
from it that will make us stronger “that which does not kill us only makes us
stronger”
6)
Put your
feelings in writing – clarify what you have lost or been denied
7)
Reach out to
your offender – Find some way t help in healing your offender this is very
tough but at a minimum it is raying for that person
