I HAVE TO JUST SETTLE TO DIFFER

As November was rolling through, and the time to begin writing this month’s blog arrived, I was initially stuck with deciding what to write about. However, earlier this morning feelings of frustration occurred when I couldn’t understand something that my mum was telling me (due to my difficulties with discerning most people’s verbal language). This even led to a minor meltdown.

Though, perhaps on a much more positive note, the subject of this month’s blog came along to me from this experience. The subject is about me having to just settle to differ, whenever I don’t understand the language/communication of most, or even when they don’t understand my method of communication.

What I have written above does sound very petty at first. Yet it is indeed an issue that affects a significant number of other people in the same (or a similar) situation as myself.

Meltdowns are something which I have always experienced rather frequently. Before getting therapy to help manage them, I would usually have at least one meltdown a day. However later on I was taught a few very useful mindfulness exercises to help me along, and decrease the intensity and frequency of my meltdowns.

But there are occasionally moments when having a meltdown seems to be completely unavoidable. These are almost always times when I’m having a conversation/talking with someone, and then (suddenly and unexpectedly) I misunderstand what I’m being told. These misunderstandings could come from someone not speaking in a literal way, words being given in a way that’s too quick for my processing, if I’m given information that doesn’t seem to relate to the initial discussion, or if the topic of complex emotions is brought into the conversation.

The sensations I get whenever I experience those moments mentioned include frustration, confusion and especially shame and embarrassment. That shame and embarrassment also lead to more frustration when I realise that there is (seemingly) no possible way for me to fix the situation within myself. There are even various occasions when I verbally inquire about why most other people can’t “just speak my language” in a loud outburst. This would make life so much easier for me.

But the truth of the matter is that it’s just as difficult a job for them to change the way they speak, as it is for me to change the way that I speak. The only difference is that there are many more people in the world who speak their language, and not as many people who speak mine. So this does at first appear to be an unfortunate and unsolvable situation.

However, the one and most important thing that I can change is my reaction to this life issue, whenever it arises. After all, it’s never the external problem itself that causes a meltdown. Indeed, if I were to be emotionally/psychologically unaffected by these occurring external issues there wouldn’t ever be any kind of problem for me to have to deal with! Therefore if I simply change my reaction to experiences, I strongly believe that I can eliminate meltdowns from my life.

To improve my psychological reaction to communication difficulties, I feel it’s best for me to just accept my differences, and just settle to differ. This I’m working on in the present day. But the largest challenge I’m currently facing is to not feel embarrassed or ashamed of my communication difficulties and to not feel pressured to try and understand certain things which are beyond my capabilities. Meltdowns always happen on those occasions, thus I need to stop trying to achieve the impossible. It is indeed important for me to be optimistic and to have hope. Yet there are certain things in life which are in truth impossible to achieve, fix or solve. Though in regards to always having hope, I can positively affirm that I can tackle the impossible by finding a way around the issue instead. Being accepting of myself and simply understanding that I communicate differently (and not view this as me being cursed) is an example of that.