Language Barriers

Have you ever watched some doggedgly determined to speak English to someone who doesn't speak English, or verbally address someone who is deaf...and just get louder? And you think, "Moron. That tool is obviously not working. Try something else."

I’ve been that person. I am that person. I know it isn’t working, but I keep using it anyway in the vain hope that something will magically transform them or me so that this tool – English – will suddenly work. Sometimes I have completely given up on it working: I know they don’t understand me, but I keep speaking to them in English anyway because that’s the only language I know.

I'm trying to learn a whole new way language, and I'm not very good at it. My current language – for thinking, for learning, for connecting with people, for expressing myself, and most of all, for problem solving – is talking. This is a curse that most of the McPherson clan share, and I have a sneaking suspicion that it drives our in-laws crazy. The real secret is: it drives us crazy, too – but, like the person in the example, sometimes it’s the only language we know.

I seem to have this compulsive need to try and solve every problem by talking about it. Discussion is not the only, and often not the best way to work through differences. But that's a new idea for me; after all, it's a tool that has served me pretty well all these years (probably because I have usually been surrounded by other extroverts). Even my mom and Jared – who are more introverted – have learned to adapt to us "talkers".

But I really want to try and change. Not because I think that good communication can't solve problems – because it can be very helpful at times – but because I’ve come to learn (mostly through Dan) that there are other ways to work through problems besides communication, and that there are other ways to communicate besides talking.

I fall prey to the false notion that if something is good, more is better. I know it’s wrong. I know it goes against logic and experience. However, I have seen by my behavior that I must believe it. For example, if SOME communication can solve some problems, then more communication can solve EVERY problem. But it doesn’t work that way, of course, and anyone who’s ever been locked into a never-ending discussion with a McPherson (especially me) can tell you how frustrating it can be. And meanwhile, I’m trying to be rational, and honest, and brave – to face up to and talk about the conflict, find a resolution, compromise, sacrifice, etc., etc. Often, I try so hard to do everything just right, that I do it all wrong. Irony sucks.

I’ve seen how sometimes I try to push through to a verbal resolution – come hell or high water. I think: You may feel miserable, I may feel miserable, but DANGIT, we’re talking this out until we’re both happy. I feel like I’m beating my head against a wall and other person looks like they’re getting beaten, and we're both exhausted and unhappy, and I can see that talking about it isn’t helping. Sometimes it’s making it worse. But I don’t know what else to do. I know there are other tools, but talking is the only tool I know how to use.

Jared’s always been pretty good at it. I remember as a young teenager, I would get upset at something, and storm to my room, angry and hurt and embarrassed and stubborn. And I’d hope that the person I’d been fighting with would feel bad, come apologize, and I could be “right.” But then Jared (who was never the one I was fighting with) would come to my room. And he wouldn’t really talk. Not about what had just happened, anyway. He would just hang out in my room, sometimes asking me about some object I had on a shelf, or telling me about a movie he’d seen or recounting a funny Calvin & Hobbes he’d read that day. And pretty soon, the anger and stubbornness and hurt had left, and all that I felt was some shame over losing my temper, humility to accept my part in the conflict, and the feeling that – despite my weaknesses – I was loved, and always would be. And he did it all without hardly saying anything.

Dan’s good at it, too. Maybe that’s one of their qualities that make them such good friends. They say a lot without needing to say much. I think of how often Dan has soothed my fears, hurt, or anger - not by what he said, but by the look he gave me, or just when he just pulls me tight to hug me and holds me there for a while as I cry and catch my breath, and listen to all he’s communicating silently. It feels like he reaches past my mind, past my logic, past my words – and he addresses my heart directly. Kind of like music does. A truth that I think these men have always known -- and that I'm trying to learn -- is that maybe problems can be solved as much in silence, or with a look, or a touch, or just a "feeling" that you radiate to the other person. Or just with patience, and time, and your presence – letting the person know through your actions they are loved - despite your weakness, despite their weakness - and always will be.