You make a good point. I too find it hard to shift focus. Is it a man thing? I think not. My daughter does the same thing (my W says she takes after me). In any case, I completely agree that it is a skill that we have to learn. It usually doesn’t hurt anything except that the perception is that we aren’t listening, and like you said, that gets us into major perception problems.
Jen,
Yeah. We can talk an talk, but it is meaningless. Then we change our behavior, and it takes soooooooo long to make a point that, if we could only explain (and be believed), it would be understood so much faster.
greenbar,
quote:Originally posted by greenbar: I think we are getting into semantics here. ("wants to hear" vs. "expects to hear")
No. It’s not semantics. There’s an important distinction. An example:
One day, W mentioned to me that she and MF could start on a certain phase of our renovations, and I could work on something else. I said that another option was for she and I to do the work, since we could avoid getting in each other’s way. She blew up. She was “sick and tired” of me competing with him for dominance of the project. I had to say that I was just putting an option out. Did she want me to be in competition? No. But since I had always wanted more involvement, she interpreted my statement in this light. She didn’t hear my words, she heard what she thought I was thinking based on past conversations. She had preconceptions about my motives.
Having said that, I must now change my answer.
quote:Originally posted by ANS: True or False. A person hears only what they want to hear.
I said False. My answer now is… Depends.
I have to agree with you that sometimes, a person does only listen to (hear) opinions that agree with their own.
I guess my point is that we can’t change a person’s opinion when they have their mind made up, and especially if they see themselves as being in an adversarial position. This is the scenario you described. However, I think what we are attempting to do with 180s is to change their expectations. Your W has grown to expect a certain action from you. This becomes the expected behavior. Over time, a 180 becomes the expected behavior.
