Being heard
My counsellor and I started working on a new facet of my emotional health which led me to create an interesting division of my needs. Last week we established that we would explore the avenues in which I could feel heard and supported.
My biggest fear is to put too much emotional labour on my friend as well as occupying too much conversation space since I tend to talk more than listen. What I came to realize is that I can’t expect the same people in my life to carry a multitude of interaction types to fulfill all my self-expression needs. A part of me needs to nerd out at ultra high-speed speech about all the different things I’m studying; while another part wants to share recipes, life-hacks and health tips; another desires to enter deep meaningful personal growth conversation to guide and be guided; finally, I want relax and simple chats to be present to the person beside with no purpose in mind and let things casually flow.
The beauty about this newfound awareness of my conversation styles is that some can be relegated to work while others can be nurtured in my personal life. The key to not overwhelm my interlocutor with blabber is to properly assess the nature of the interaction and stick to it. Most importantly, I need to create outlets for the more intentional types of communication I crave to engage in.
In order not to fall into a verbal diarrhea mode as I get over-excited to have someone to talk to, I want to cultivate ongoing multiple conversations of a different nature, virtually and in real life. Making sure I can interact regularly on my favourite subjects will allow me to unload my squirrels in the right place, at the right time and in the right amount.
The isolation the pandemic has imposed upon us has made it hard to socialize, I don’t know about you but my social skills are quite rusty and I feel clumsy and often too excited when I get to chat. Hopefully sharing my speech load with multiple interaction outlets to cover all my fields of interest will help me feel heard and fully expressed.
