Your First Steps to Healthy Communication
Healthy communication is really important for maintaining strong relationships- whether with friends, romantic partners, or family members. However, many of us really struggle with communicating openly. And it’s often not because we intentionally want to lie or manipulate other people but instead because we are fearful of their response to us. So we don’t say what we’re thinking, we keep emotions bottled up, we don’t address concerns, and we most certainly don’t want to rock the boat with challenging conversations!
While we may tell ourselves that we hide our truth to “protect” our loved ones and maintain the relationship, the real consequence of these behaviors and lack of open communication is a degradation of the relationship. Relationships like this might even last a long time, but they probably aren’t very fulfilling. Inevitably we start hiding so much that we don’t believe that our partners, friends, or family even see us at all. This kind of emotional isolation is really, really bad for us.
Learning how to improve our communication is really important if we want to have healthier, more fulfilling relationships. So where do we start? With ourselves, of course.
1. Acknowledge and communicate your feelings to YOURSELF!
We won’t know what we need to communicate to others if we aren’t listening to ourselves first. I like to encourage my clients to practice “dropping in”- noticing the sensations in the body, naming it (this is contentment, anger, joy, anxiety, etc) and then just moving on.
2. Don’t just focus on negative feelings.
Yes, we need to be able to communicate the challenging feelings we experience but we also need to be able to experience and communicate our positive feelings as well! Notice when you’re feeling good and acknowledge it!
3. Practice communicating your feelings to someone else using “I feel…when…” statements.
“I feel happy when you call me on your lunch break”, for example. Start small- just one simple “I feel…when…” sentence said to one person! Eventually our brain will start to put together that the world will not end if we share an honest feeling and it’ll get easier over time.
Just know that if you struggle communicating in your relationships, you are not alone! By practicing taking just small simple steps, we can start to communicate more openly and honestly, which can help us build and sustain healthier relationships. Why not start today?
