I Love You, but..

Clear communication in a partnership.  It’s what everyone I know claims to want, but so few actually get, never mind actively practice themselves.  This used to amuse me.  When I used to hear the goings-on in the lives of some of my friends, I would laugh, because I could see the issue coming out of someone else’s mouth, but I couldn’t see past the end of my nose on my own issues in this arena until one day it dawned on me that I really needed to change the way I communicated with people in general.  All that said..

I love you, but…” is a phrase that in any of its forms, drives me straight up the wall.  However, I am getting to the point where I can just chuckle and ask which, exactly the person making the statement really meant to say.  The ‘I love you’ part, or the ‘complaint’ part?

You either love someone wholly or you don’t.  There is no halfway.   Halfway, is exactly where ‘I love you, but” is at; it’s about leaving someone doubting exactly where your focus is.  Is your focus on loving that person, foibles and all, or is it on what I will call here, for my purposes, the complaint du jour?  Make up your mind already and communicate accordingly.  When you love someone say so.  If you have a complaint with someone, say so.  If you find you can’t stop complaining to or about that person in terms of the relationship, find what the _real_ problem is and fix it already!

It’s ok to (nicely!!) say to someone, ‘you know, sweetheart, I would appreciate it if…’, and it’s ok to say “sweetheart, I love you’, or say, ‘This relationship is over and here is why.”.

Saying two things at once, along the lines of, “Sweetheart, you know I love you, but I would appreciate it if X could be made to happen.” or, “You know I love you, but unless you do X, I’m leaving you.”  dilutes the intent and power of any of the messages above, and further, dilutes your credibility when you do say “I love you”.

How could any sane, rational person believe a declaration of love, followed immediately by a complaint, or the threat of the ending of a relationship?

If you practice dilute communication, and you’ve taught your partner that you practice dilute communication, you can believe that your partner is not hearing the expression of love in your statements, so much as listening for the verbal slap or complaint that you’ve taught them is coming, so that they can formulate a response, and that response just might be loaded.

For example, two people are in relationship, and one says to the other,”I love you honey, but must you continue to smoke?  Don’t you know how unhealthy that is for you, me and the kids?!”

Now, switch that around to the point of view of the person who is hearing that come out of the mouth of their partner.  Do you think they’re hearing love in that line of questioning?  Oh hell no.  What they very well might be hearing is  ’just bitching’  for the umpteenth time, feeling very picked upon and wish it would just stop already, and chances are, the party feeling picked on, will say something to that effect, and the next step is an escalating move towards a fight.

It’s a safe bet, that, in the end, that either party would fail to feel feel heard or loved in that resulting exchange, as well as in the presumable fight. Either party might justifiably feel verbally slapped, un-heard, and rejected, and all because of a poor reaction to what they heard coming from someone who claimed to love them.

That cycle of mis-communication and poor focus will continue in future relationships of any and all stripes, because the Universe is more than happy to continue to teach lessons that people just aren’t grasping.  For example, you may have children and do an “I love them, but..”  or, “I know she’s the mother of my children, but…”or somesuch on top of “I love you, but..”.  So on it goes..and this is definitely one of those situations where ‘what comes around, goes around’, until the lessons are learned about the power of love, the power of words, the power of  intentions and what can be created with them, and you *stop* diluting what you mean by what you actually say, vs. what you really mean.

Until next time..peace.