Reply To: why can't people communicate?

[sar316]

@blackdog

I think I have figured it out. I have spent a lot of time over the past two days trying to figure out why relationships are such a huge energy suck and why it is easer for me to downgrade a relationship than it is to not have communication.

I want to point out this is my mind blowing break though and has really relieved any and all anxiety that I feel with people and relationship that I have felt my entire life. I also want to point out that I really don’t want to offend anyone, but this is how the world makes sense to me. Also for sake of making this easier to type out, I am going use the term ‘normal’ people to describe those who don’t share my thought pattern and I have had conflict with my entire life.

A friend has recently pointed out that I am a problem solver, which is probably my greatest strength, but also my greatest weakness. When I say problem solver I don’t just mean i am good at logic based assignments. I mean my entire life revolves around every aspect of it being approached in a problem solving way and I am relentless at not letting go of a problem until it is solved. This is because I can’t. The world doesn’t make sense to me with out understanding it in its entirety and this is because most of the ‘normal’ world isn’t logical, reasonable and black and white. My world and reality is. So I have to communicate with the ‘normals’ to understand how/why they do/think the way they do because with out it I will never understand because it’s not logical.

I have very recently realized that I live on an entirely different planet than most people. Most people have a small argument or disagreement and then can move on. We are going to call these relatively small bumps in relationships leaves. Sick with me here.

Now leaves are small and annoying but compared to the rest of the day they are not even on the radar for most people. Compared to their feelings to each other these leaves aren’t worth the uncomfortable conversation.

I have realized that normal people only ever see leaves. I am a problem solver. I very much understand that big leaves or commonly occurring leaves are attached to a twig, that twig is attached to a branch, which is attached to a bigger branch and that branch is attached to a huge freaking tree.

Now the ‘tree’ is what the real problem is. I very much understand that most larger arguments or recurring smaller ones don’t just happen. They are symptoms of something much larger. And this much larger something is something that most people are completely unaware is present. In their reality, only leaves exist.

For most people long uncomfortable conversations aren’t worth it to simply not be brushed by a leaf any more. But for me I didn’t understand this. I didn’t understand that people don’t look for, recognize and then tend to the tree. For me in a large conflict I’m am very seldom bothered by the actual surface issue or emotions and this is because I understand that the surface emotions are only a sign/symptom of a much deeper problem.

I am a problem solver. My life up until this point would get hung up on a problem and I would be physically, mentally and emotionally tied up to remedy the problem. Seriously, I could do nothing but to fixate on the problem because by not understanding the problem I don’t understand the world around me.

Relationships were hard for me because it never occurred to me that people don’t recognize there is an entire tree to be dealt with. People are ok day by day week by week brushing off leaves. I see this as annoying, repetitive and a useless waste of my time and energy because if we would just find and fix the tree, people would stop sucking my energy on the useless tiffs in a day. I need conversation. I need others perspectives to get me thinking in other ways. I need to talk through the leaves, twigs and branches so that I can tend to the tree and shape it as my own instead of having the tree shape my landscape how ever it happens to. Me VS problem, not a problem. I will not let up until that sucker is solved and I can move on. PROBLEM: Me——Person——-Problem. Relationships are hard because people get in the way of me finding the real problem, understanding it and then fixing it.

It would take so much energy from me to live with the tree in every relationship that I would get frustrated that the other person never seemed to care to match the energy that I was putting into the relationship. It would be very easy for me then to down grade the relationship (love aside, I would always still love the person), but I would no longer hold any expectation to them in any capacity and they just would become another person instead of being in my ‘inner circle’.

Here is where I really don’t mean to offend any one as I understand that this is not going to sound nice, but I have no way of understanding people otherwise. I have a new freedom in seeing most people as emotional toddlers compared to me. AGAIN I know that sounds horrible, but let me explain. Toddlers are people you are with and need to show affection. Toddlers also cannot be reasoned with and they cannot understand the world as you see it through adult eyes. Most normal people won’t be reasoned into thinking there is a tree and most normal people who are  going into and out of arguments don’t understand there is this unexplainable tree.

I now find a lot of freedom in understanding that to most people there is not tree to see. There are only day to day leaves that mean nothing to them and just happen because they happen. They accept it as no more than a knot in the cables behind the TV, small, insignificant and minor.

I now no longer expect people to fix what they don’t see exists. I feel really bad that I held this unrealistic expectation to people before now because I never realized they didn’t see the tree or are unequipped to deal with it. For me just talking is so logical and worth it to up root trees, but I now understand why normal people don’t want to put in the energy to up root a tree when all they have to do is brush a leaf off their shoulder.

Sorry this was a long one and I hope it makes some sort of sense I am in kind of a rush, but i felt that I really need to get this out there. I have very recently realized this and it has opened my world to relationships and toleration for people where other wise anxiety, stress, frustration and lack of understanding would be.

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