Action is king. Even when we use the most compelling words, if our actions don’t reinforce what we say, we risk sending a mixed message that creates confusion or suggests our words aren’t a genuine reflection of our thoughts and feelings.
My heart broke when a good friend told me that her three-year-old daughter misconstrued that her mother didn’t love her because she’d used an angry voice and sent the toddler to timeout for misbehaving.
In the young girl’s mind, a harsh tongue and punishment didn’t equate to love, so that had to mean her mother didn’t love her even though she was told often. Of course my friend had had no intention of conveying any such thing. She was mortified to learn the source of her little one’s tears and quickly explained that her daughter’s behavior was at the root of her tone and actions, not a lack of love.
The experience presenced my friend to the importance of taking time to make sure her actions follow her words and to do so in a way that’s comprehensible to her young children.
We can’t assume others know what we mean if we don’t communicate clearly in word and actions.
Everyone is better served when we’re mindful of acting consistently with our words so that the same message is conveyed in thought and action.
I unknowingly created a similar experience with the kind, senior woman who manages the counter at the dry cleaner I’ve been frequenting for more than decade. I was mortified in my own way when I learned that I’d left this gentle, mild-mannered lady feeling awful from a particular interaction.
I’d gone to see whether they could finish the rough edges of a yards-long piece of sheer fabric I’d bought to use as a window treatment. Without even consulting with the manager or seamstress, she’d said to me matter-of-factly, “No, we can’t do that.”
“Really?!” I’d thought to myself, “You’re insisting it’s impossible without so much as asking the people who actually do the sewing?” Little perturbs me as much as the resignation that something is impossible simply because there is no immediate, known way to achieve it.
I asked if I could leave the fabric for the seamstress to assess, and she remained staunch in her position. “No, the fabric is too sheer to be sewn.“
I grew increasingly frustrated, not at the answer itself, but at the fact that she wouldn’t so much as entertain asking whether the task was possible.
It wasn’t until the following week when I returned to pick up my dry cleaning that I learned that my frustration and disappointment had come through in spite of my otherwise courteous response. Instead of her usual cheerful demeanor, I found a sullen, almost frightened woman that appeared even smaller for her apparent apprehension. She nervously said, “I thought you were really mad at me for telling you that we couldn’t fix that fabric for you.”
I recalled that, yes, I’d been angry and frustrated, but I didn’t know that my anger had been discernible in the absence of words. I’d been polite in accepting the refusal of my seemingly simple request, but something in my actions and demeanor apparently had left this poor woman worried and feeling awful since our exchange more than a week earlier.
I know all too well my acute ability to communicate feelings through my facial expression and body language, no words needed, and now I felt awful for inadvertently communicating something that clearly had been received in a hurtful way.
I explained that my disappointment had been in her unwillingness to even ask whether my request was possible, not in her. I apologized for my reaction and reassured her that I wasn’t cross with her.
In hindsight, we both would have been better served had I expressed my disappointment in the moment rather than ineffectively trying to disguise my anger with polite words that my facial expression and body language betrayed anyway.
Even in the most mundane of encounters, if we’re not careful to walk our talk, there’s no telling how the intent of a message might be misinterpreted and result in hurt feelings, or worse.
Let’s help each other stay on the straight and narrow by being deliberate and consistent in our words and actions, especially if we have something difficult or uncomfortable to say.
