Mean Girl Gone Nice

I told you all recently that I really enjoyed a speech I heard about improving your emotional language. After the speech, I decided to not only try to improve my emotional language, which is how you respond to people when they come for you for support, but I also decided to just improve my general language. My friend Dizzle is always telling me to be positive, so I felt that there was no time like the present.

So allow me to give you some history. I would pinpoint high school as when I began to change my language; when I started to get mean. I was made fun of a lot, so I guess that you can say that hurt people hurt people. In college, I continued to be mean because I was able to vocalize my nastiness in a way that made people laugh. People thought I was so funny and loved me for it, but at the core, I was just mean. So as an adult, I have continued my poor emo language and I can also throw shade with the best of them. I was eager to see what life would be like if I kept my mouth closed if I had nothing to say. There have been at least a couple of days when I have literally said nothing! 

The first major difference I have seen from trying to keep a clean mouth is that my ears have become sensitive to other people's cruelty. Hanging around colleagues recently my ears were burning from the nasty things that they were saying about our mutual friends. I had never noticed how nasty they were before. I guess because I was too and people like to keep like company. 

Another thing I have noticed from not being quick to respond with a remark is that I now have a lot of time to listen. Funny, it seems that nobody notices the listener. So I get to sit quietly listening to other folks spill their tea for the heck of it. I don't even repeat what I hear, but I find it funny how people are okay with being unkind and messy publicly, not caring who overhears. 

No, I will not be able to change my language overnight, but I am working on it. That is not to say that I will not stand up for myself if needed, but I really am trying to get away from just being nasty because. In trying to be more positive, I need more positive things to leave my lips. I will let you know that end result. 

TheBG Discovers Emotional Language

A few days ago I was talking to my friend FeFe on the phone, having a fun covo, when she goes, "Guess what I am going to do? Nevermind." I hate it when people do that. I tried to press her to tell me what she was going to say, and she refused, essentially saying that she felt that I was going to be judgmental. Now, I really, really took offense to this and I can't lie, my feelings were a little hurt. My friends have been calling me for advice and support since I was in the third grade, and I have always considered myself a good friend. Plus, what is wrong with a little judgement? I for one think that folks should know when they are being stupid.
Then I was invited to the Women 2 Women Conference and had the opportunity to hear an interview with Dr. Camille Davis- Williams and Dr. Pamela Thompson who wrote the book Surviving Mama . And during this interview, Dr. Pam talked about emotional language, and it wasn't long after she started talking that I found that my emotional language was TERRIBLE and needed some serious work.
What is emotional language? I took it to mean that it's essentially the way that your react when someone comes to you for emotional support. She said this can also include having an "oh please" attitude when people come to you with their problems. Through Dr. Pam's words, I realized that I often react to what my friends tell me when they come to me for help instead of respond. And my reactions are not always positive and coming from a place of love instead of judgement. This, it dawned on me, was why FeFe didn't want to share her news with me. She discussed that emotional language is usually taught to us, and, if your emotional language stinks, people typically don't want to confide in you because they are afraid that they are going to be judged. This, the doctors explained, is why a lot of daughters are not honest with their mothers when it comes to their sexual behavior and, in my case, why folks sometimes don't want to tell me stuff.
The good news is that your emotional language can be improved. Below are the tips that Dr. Pam gave to the audience:

1. Validation- This includes the acknowledgement of someone's pain when they come to you for support, no matter how trivial their issue sounds to you at the time. So if a friend came to me upset about her job, an example of not validating and having bad emotional language would be me saying, "Girl please! At least you have a job!" This is no bueno. 
2. Touch- Touch is a big part of good emotional language. When someone is expressing their feelings to you, you should give them hugs and caresses as they are talking. According to Dr. Pam, this does a lot to encourage the person that is confiding in you. 
3. Check-In: So after the conversation goes down, you should circle back and make sure that the person is okay; make sure that they are soothed.

I have to say, I have been working on this for the two weeks since the conference, and I feel really good about the way that I am interacting now with the people around me. How is your emotional language? It wouldn't hurt to work on it. I am and I really feel that is has totally changed the way that I communicate.