I have a really hard time with this. It’s like we’re both speaking English, but it’s not the same language. There’s a lot of meaning that people make out of what I say. It’s almost like everything I say is an implied message to them, so they have to figure out what I’m saying. It causes a lot of confusion and even displeasure if someone takes what I said as being an insult. Often times, I just stay quiet because I don’t have the energy necessary to filter out every possible implication my message may have so that I am understood properly or I think that I will be misunderstood so bad, that it’s better to stay quiet. And even when I do try to filter the message, it’s clearly not authentic, so then I come off as definitely having an implication.
I knew a lady that told me the world was divided into healthy humans and hijackals (people that hijack relationships for their own needs), but they both look the same from the outside. I remember thinking that was so silly because clearly there are spectrums to human personalities. It’s not one or the other. I remember thinking in my head that she sounded traumatized and could probably benefit from Dialectical Behavioral Therapy because she was splitting. However, in the 1.5 years since I spoke with that lady, everything she told me turned out to be 100% right. Every single thing. She was not wrong about anything. She had some incredible foresight. With that perspective, I developed my own model on neurodiversity. There are autistic/adhd people and there are normies. We look the same from the outside, but inside we’re almost different species. So, if I naturally get along well with someone, then I assume they’re autistic or adhd. If there is a lot of misunderstanding and clarifying, then they’re normie.
That’s a very broad question that could be asking about a few different things.
A good start here, would be to elaborate more on what you mean exactly. Maybe give an example?Not what OP asked, but your response is a good example of how someone could/should react to when someone is not understood well 😅
How do you get different people to understand you depending on life scenarios from home to work and in-between.
- Do you mean in conversations, like people don’t get what you are trying to say?
- You could also mean that people don’t appreciate how you are and aren’t more understanding towards you.
To 1.: When there are misunderstandings in conversations, it really depends on the topic and person… For example, today I had to explain to someone how some preferences in a sound mixer worked. For that I tried explain it how I saw it, but when I saw it didn’t work, I tried different methods of describing it (metaphors of generally known topic or a more broad description). Also a lot of people seem to make more an effort to understand, when they feel like you talk to them in a way, that they also feel acknowledged and accepted.
To 2.: In general, I have learned, that a lot of people are trying to be more understanding of a person if one invests themselves in them in some way.
You could also have meant something else, that I missed…but hopefully this helps somehow I’m by no means an expert on this, probably more the opposite. This is just my experience.
More like how people don’t appreciate whether they understand me or not.
Everyone’s got their own problems. When they’re done dealing with people (even trivial like just talking), that’s less problems for them and that’s why few people are investing their limited time on you. In their eyes, why should they care whether they fully understood you or not, they don’t have any drawbacks usually.
I bet. It’s hard to make friends with people on a day-to-day basis unless you have a job like me. My boss is really nice and so are my coworkers but that’s it.
Things that have helped me be understood:
- Reading tons of fiction. Good storytelling is an art, and following the masters has helped me.
- Joining a men’s group. It’s helped me resolve emotional hangups that prevented me from communicating what I felt in the nonverbal signals that evoke people’s empathic response.
- Becoming a better listener. More time spent caring about others and processing others’ stories programs the brain with the common language of shared experience.
- I agree with reading fiction and good storytelling: that’s why I read Herman Melville (Moby Dick) and Mike Mignola (Hellboy)
- Uh…where can I find a men’s group?
- This would be my least greatest specialty, unless I have people I actually trust?
- I recommend Stephen King too
- Google. I’m part of a larger organization called the Mankind Project, but there are many others
- You don’t need to trust people very much to listen to them
