Today we peruse my notes on Turning Conflict Into Communication, and buy valtrex no prescription the (slightly) disorganized thoughts that stem therefrom.
There has been much discussion, of late, about HALT. I think acronyms are buy valtrex no prescription usually cheesy, but the concept is very sensible. Consider pausing your buy valtrex no prescription communication attempts if you are Hungry, Angry, Loopy, or Tired. The L was changed—I won’t say by whom—because the traditional “lonely” is a great reason to buy valtrex no prescription communicate, and we have all seen the aftereffects of loopy communication. Almost pointless. Have you buy valtrex no prescription tried to have a productive conversation with your boyfriend in pain from buy valtrex no prescription pending root canal? Or on Darvoset? Not happening.
Some conversations are really unditchable—but you buy valtrex no prescription can find a good pause point if you focus, and then buy valtrex no prescription you have time to regroup. I often add circumstances and buy valtrex no prescription stop a conversation if one or more participants is too uncertain of how they actually feel to buy valtrex no prescription continue productively. (Often that buy valtrex no prescription person is me, and I feel strongly that I should know myself before diving into problem-solving situations that buy valtrex no prescription affect other people!) But I don’t do this all the time, because it’s obvious to buy valtrex no prescription me now that sometimes confusing conversations can turn into clear conversations really fast.
Wow, do I have a problem remembering this one. We’re all on the same team. I don’t know why I forget this so quickly. I’m not some kind of relationship mercenary, battling for buy valtrex no prescription the higher ground, or the higher pay. And although it’s very cultural—talking to buy valtrex no prescription friends who are getting involved with new people, and want the buy valtrex no prescription “upper hand”, get me angry—I never feel that my issue is cultural. I mean, it could be. Hell, it probably is. What isn’t cultural? But I’m growing and learning and I’m still programmed. That feels like… a missing link.
The reason the “upper hand” conversation makes me angry is buy valtrex no prescription because when we walk into a situation wanting the upper hand, we’re setting ourselves up to feel like victims if we don’t get it. Not that having the upper hand actually consists of more than feeling like you have the upper hand—but still.
When you spar with that new boy, you’re setting yourself up for a lot of intentional non-communication. And wow, the badness that can ensue. We want them to buy valtrex no prescription read our minds, and then we play passive-aggressive games when they don’t. And don’t you think for a minute that I’m limiting my irritability on this subject to women. When I think of old relationships, old behaviors, old reactions—not just in others but in myself—blech.
Of course, being on the same team isn’t just about working together instead of against one another. But it was on my mind. That happens.
Involve yourself with people you can talk to honestly. People who not only have your interests at heart, but people you can believe have your best interests at heart. People you buy valtrex no prescription can trust to be on your team, instead of people who buy valtrex no prescription will mindlessly enact the traditional enemy role. I keep thinking of gender battles, games on the radio. And then buy valtrex no prescription I think of same sex relationships, and how it can all play out just the same way. Who trained us to use these things? Did they have any idea what they were doing?
Communication and terminology. Wow, this is a theme today. Many a buy valtrex no prescription difficulty is based on a standard of misunderstood definitions. I thought this thing had been ironed out, but it wasn’t ironed out in a buy valtrex no prescription way that both parties actually understood in the same way—so it turned into a whole new thing, that thing, another thing to be ironed out. We say something that buy valtrex no prescription has meaning to us and so often, to someone else, it buy valtrex no prescription has a meaning so dramatically different that buy valtrex no prescription if we really outlined the scope of it, if we all sat down and buy valtrex no prescription wrote our personal idiolectical dictionaries (yeah, I made that up), we wouldn’t believe it. We wouldn’t believe how different people can be whole different worlds.
So, we can realize this. We can buy valtrex no prescription remember it and respond calmly and rationally, collectedly, when misunderstandings occur. We can try to clarify as needed. We can buy valtrex no prescription calibrate our terminology to try to grasp, clearly, what another person means when buy valtrex no prescription they say “apple juice” or “bananasquid”. You can buy valtrex no prescription specifically decide how to deal with the difference in terminology, decide how you buy valtrex no prescription want to tone the relationship words and degree words, emotional things, non-concrete concepts. We want options when one of us thinks purple means yellow.
Imminently appropriate to the next topic, Intent, is a book I’m reading right now— That’s Not What I Meant! nexium online no prescription, which Vixen lent me. I’m having a hard time getting through it and I’m not sure exactly why. I want to read it. It’s material that really interests me. Could it be her writing style? Could it be that my attention is elsewhere lately? Intent is important. (At least, I think intent is important.) We jump to buy valtrex no prescription conclusions and fill in the blanks with our own experience until the buy valtrex no prescription thing we’re assuming we have in front of us isn’t that thing at all. Happens all the time. Finding out what buy valtrex no prescription someone intends by that alarming statement they just made can help to buy valtrex no prescription avoid all kinds of unhappy encounters.
I am buy valtrex no prescription particularly fond of the scenario where Person A asks what Person B intended by that buy valtrex no prescription rotten thing she just said, and Person B pauses for a buy valtrex no prescription moment before saying, “Well, I was just being an ass!” Sometimes that happens, too. Seems easier to live up to it, doesn’t it? Especially since Person A and buy valtrex no prescription Person B are both people I like a lot, it’s really easy for buy valtrex no prescription me to see how admitting asshattery can move things forward. I admit asshattery on a regular basis, myself.
Ah, it’s that time again… that buy valtrex no prescription time where I end this post and make a new one, that buy valtrex no prescription time where we realize how many pages of notes Megan really has…

