Sounds of Silence
"Fools', said I, 'You do not know
Silence like a cancer grows..."
- Simon and Garfunkle's Sounds of Silence
Let's get a little real here- what do you do when your spouse, significant other or friend decides to get angry and give you the silent treatment? I'm the type of person who wants to talk it out. I can't stand the silence and it just ticks me off the more days it continues.
Have you ever felt that way? Or are you a "silent treatment" personality that needs to cool down for days on end before discussing the situation/problem? What is it that makes you go "silent"?
A friend of ours is going through this right now- The silence got so bad with her husband that he ended up walking out on his family after finally airing out all the problems that he had seen in his marriage but had NEVER said a word about. He had never stuck up for himself, never told his wife what he was feeling and one day just blew up...
Communications my friends is the key.
Had there been communication maybe the marriage would have been salvagable, but then again maybe not. When a spouse choses to only focus on the negative, (don't fool yourself we all do sometimes,) the negative becomes the blinders and you never seem to see the rest (or the good) and it just gets worse from there. It's like dealing with your kids; the kids complain about something their sibling does or doesn't do and you let it go, they complain again and you let it go again thinking eventually they will just move on while playing but then the complaining continues and it festers and festers until that is all you hear from that child.
We've had that situation in our house and I've always told my kids that when they see one negative thing they have to find a postive and either write it down or continue to think about it until they notice that positive thing over the negative.
Sometimes it doesn't work, more often then not it does only because kids have short attention spans and finally they move on.
Maybe with adults though the problem, is we are so busy in our lives, running to and fro from meeting to meeting or activity to activity that our attention spans have developed a detrimental time lapse and we just forget to change the focus to the good.
I'm not sure if my way of thinking is the right way. If I focus on what is bad then it overwhelmingly becomes part of my personality and I end up being a mad and complaining woman. I try to focus on the postive so much so that I tend to get a little flighty with it and seems to my own self not strong enough in my convictions. But strength in convictions can get you to where Compromising is less apt to happen since we get stubborn and unmovable. So where is the happy medium?
I don't have the answers.
I just know that for my part I have decided to be grateful for the large, small, complex and simple things that others do in my life and try as hard as I can not to dwell on the negatives. I use a Gratitude Journal for those days that I am extremely negative but maybe instead of just having my Gratitude Journal I need a book where I can write down what is bothering me and then burn that page to let it go (the burn book- hee hee)? It might be better for me and everyone else if I do that and let it drain off my mind and into the reverbial garbage can.
What does everyone else think about "Silence"?
courtesy of WebMD.com: Philipp Klinger/Flickr
Silence like a cancer grows..."
- Simon and Garfunkle's Sounds of Silence
Let's get a little real here- what do you do when your spouse, significant other or friend decides to get angry and give you the silent treatment? I'm the type of person who wants to talk it out. I can't stand the silence and it just ticks me off the more days it continues.
Have you ever felt that way? Or are you a "silent treatment" personality that needs to cool down for days on end before discussing the situation/problem? What is it that makes you go "silent"?
A friend of ours is going through this right now- The silence got so bad with her husband that he ended up walking out on his family after finally airing out all the problems that he had seen in his marriage but had NEVER said a word about. He had never stuck up for himself, never told his wife what he was feeling and one day just blew up...
Communications my friends is the key.
Had there been communication maybe the marriage would have been salvagable, but then again maybe not. When a spouse choses to only focus on the negative, (don't fool yourself we all do sometimes,) the negative becomes the blinders and you never seem to see the rest (or the good) and it just gets worse from there. It's like dealing with your kids; the kids complain about something their sibling does or doesn't do and you let it go, they complain again and you let it go again thinking eventually they will just move on while playing but then the complaining continues and it festers and festers until that is all you hear from that child.
We've had that situation in our house and I've always told my kids that when they see one negative thing they have to find a postive and either write it down or continue to think about it until they notice that positive thing over the negative.
Sometimes it doesn't work, more often then not it does only because kids have short attention spans and finally they move on.
Maybe with adults though the problem, is we are so busy in our lives, running to and fro from meeting to meeting or activity to activity that our attention spans have developed a detrimental time lapse and we just forget to change the focus to the good.
I'm not sure if my way of thinking is the right way. If I focus on what is bad then it overwhelmingly becomes part of my personality and I end up being a mad and complaining woman. I try to focus on the postive so much so that I tend to get a little flighty with it and seems to my own self not strong enough in my convictions. But strength in convictions can get you to where Compromising is less apt to happen since we get stubborn and unmovable. So where is the happy medium?
I don't have the answers.
I just know that for my part I have decided to be grateful for the large, small, complex and simple things that others do in my life and try as hard as I can not to dwell on the negatives. I use a Gratitude Journal for those days that I am extremely negative but maybe instead of just having my Gratitude Journal I need a book where I can write down what is bothering me and then burn that page to let it go (the burn book- hee hee)? It might be better for me and everyone else if I do that and let it drain off my mind and into the reverbial garbage can.
What does everyone else think about "Silence"?
courtesy of WebMD.com: Philipp Klinger/Flickr
I am sorry for your friend Sandi.
ReplyDeleteI need to think about things before I discuss them otherwise I might say things I regret in the heat of the moment. I don't do the silent treatment but I may take a little time to talk about the issue until I'm ready.