E 370: Tammy's Takes #45: What If They Misunderstand You?

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good morning, everybody.

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Welcome back to another

episode of Tammy's Takes.

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So if you listened to my conversation

yesterday with Nima Rahmany, there were

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so many things that we could unpack

from that episode, tons of things.

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But there was one sentence he made

that stopped me in my tracks, and he

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said, when I asked him at the end,

"What tip or trick or words of wisdom

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could you give the rest of the world?"

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He said, "You need to learn how to expand

your capacity to be misunderstood."

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And I thought, "Damn."

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Because if you're an adult child of

dysfunction, being misunderstood can

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feel almost unbearable, and I don't

think we really talk about that enough.

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So think about how much energy you might

have spent throughout your life trying

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to make sure people understood you.

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You explain things, and then you

over-explain them, and then you

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explain your explanation, and

then you give them more context.

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Then you soften what you said

because maybe it sounded too harsh.

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Then you send another text because

you're worried they took the first text

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wrong, and then you replay the entire

conversation for three days in your mind.

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And these are the things you're asking

yourself, Did I hurt their feelings?

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Do you think I'm selfish?

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Do they think I'm angry?

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Do they think I'm a bad person?

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Should I text them again?

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And then we call that communication But

sometimes, that's not communication.

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That's flat out fear.

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The fear of allowing someone else to

have a version of you in their head that

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you cannot control, that's what it is.

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And for an adult child, that

can feel incredibly unsafe.

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Because think about what many

of us have learned growing up.

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You learn to read a room, you learn

to pay attention to everybody else's

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emotions, you learn that someone's

mood could affect what happened next.

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So you kept questioning things

like, "Are they mad at me?

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Did I do something wrong?

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Are we okay?

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Do they still love me, and am I safe?"

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And the list goes on and on and on.

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And eventually, people's perception

of you can become connected

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to your own sense of safety.

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So now what happens?

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Now you're 30, 40, 50, 60, even 70

years old and someone misunderstands

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you, and your body literally reacts

like something is terribly wrong.

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That's the part I want you to notice.

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Because sometimes the problem

is not they misunderstand me.

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Sometimes the problem is I don't feel

okay unless they understand me, and those

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are two completely different things.

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And this is where self-trust comes in, and

this is what I work with a lot of people.

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Because self-trust says, "I know what

I meant, I know what my intention

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was, I know what I need, I know what

my boundary is, I know who I am."

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And someone else is allowed to have

a different opinion about that.

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It doesn't mean we don't care

about other people's feelings.

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It doesn't mean we become insensitive.

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it doesn't mean we're just

saying, "Screw everybody else.

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I'll say whatever I want

and not worry about it."

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That's not healing either.

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If I hurt someone, I do wanna know.

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If I've behaved badly, I

wanna take responsibility.

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And if there's something I need

to repair, I wanna repair it.

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Nima actually talked a lot about

repair in our conversation, and he

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talked about how healthy relationships

aren't relationships without conflict.

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What matters is whether we can come

back, listen to the other person's

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experience, and repair after the rupture.

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Here's the difference.

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Repair is not the same thing as abandoning

yourself so somebody won't be upset

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with you, and adult children confuse

those two things all of the time.

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Let's say someone asks you

to do something this weekend.

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You say, "I'm sorry,

I can't this weekend."

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And they respond, "Wow,

you've really changed."

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Ouch.

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There's the trigger

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Now, because your nervous system,

what it really wants to do is say,

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"No, no, no, I haven't changed.

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It's not that I don't wanna see you.

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It's just that I've had a really

long week, and this was on Sunday and

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Saturday, and I promised myself I was

going to blah, blah, blah, blah, blah."

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You're abandoning yourself.

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Look what just happened.

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You went from setting a boundary,

which was healthy, a healthy boundary,

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to building a legal defense for

why you're allowed to have one.

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Why?

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Because they misunderstood you.

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Or maybe they understood you perfectly

and just didn't like your answer.

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That's another big one.

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Someone being disappointed in your

boundary does not automatically

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mean your boundary was wrong.

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Someone thinking you're selfish

doesn't automatically make you selfish.

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Someone disagreeing with your decision

doesn't automatically mean you've made

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the wrong decision, and someone being

angry with you does not automatically

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mean that you did something wrong.

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That is very hard concept to

wrap your head around if you are

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an adult child and growing up,

you always did everything wrong.

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Somewhere along the way, we have learned

if you're okay with me, then I'm okay.

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So healing becomes

something very different.

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Healing needs to say, "I can be okay even

when you're not okay with me," and that's

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huge, and it doesn't happen overnight.

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You're building capacity.

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That's why I love Nima's wording where

he said you have to build the capacity

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for people to misunderstand you.

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He didn't say stop caring

what anybody thinks.

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He said to expand your

capacity to be misunderstood.

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And maybe that means that today you

tolerate 30 seconds of discomfort

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without explaining yourself.

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Maybe next week you set a boundary and

don't add six paragraphs explaining why.

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Maybe someone disagrees with you

and instead of immediately defending

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yourself, you say, "Huh, interesting.

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We're gonna have to agree to

disagree on that one," period.

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Oh my God, do you know how

hard that can be though?

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No defense, no PowerPoint presentation,

no 14 screenshots proving your side, just

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I understand that you see it differently.

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And then notice what happens

inside of your body, because

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that is where the work begins.

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That is where it starts, my friends.

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Your chest might tighten, your stomach

might turn, you might feel the urge to

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grab your phone and send one more message.

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You might feel guilty.

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You might feel selfish.

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You might feel scared.

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And instead of immediately doing something

to make that feeling disappear, see

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if you can stay with it for a moment.

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Put your hand on your chest, slow

down your breathing, and just

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ask yourself or tell yourself, "I

can tolerate being misunderstood.

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I don't have to fix

their perception of me.

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I'm allowed to know exactly who I am

when someone else sees me differently."

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Can you do that?

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can you say those things to

yourself and be okay with that?

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Because here's the question I really

want you to take with this week.

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How much of your life are you

spending trying to control

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other people's version of you?

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Their version of you, not yours.

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Because every time you change yourself

so somebody else won't misunderstand

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you, every time you don't say what

you really think, every time you

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say yes when you wanna say no, every

time you shrink a boundary because

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someone doesn't like it, you may be

protecting the relationship with them,

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but I want you to ask yourself this.

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What is it costing with your

relationship with yourself?

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Nima said something else

in our conversation that

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connects perfectly with this.

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He said, "The ultimate freedom is when

your sense of okayness is no longer

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conditional on another person changing."

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I would add something to that.

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Your okayness doesn't have to depend on

somebody else understanding you either.

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That is self-trust.

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That's authenticity.

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That's freedom.

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So here's your little Tammy's

Takes challenge for this week.

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Catch yourself the next time

you start over-explaining.

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Just notice it, and ask yourself, "Am

I explaining because this information

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is actually necessary, or am I

explaining because I'm afraid of what

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they'll think about me if I don't?"

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And if it's the second one, see if you

can say a little less, let the discomfort

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be there, let them have their opinion,

and keep reminding yourself, "I do not

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have to abandon myself just to make

sure someone else understands me."

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Because maybe healing isn't

getting everybody in your life

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to finally understand you.

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Maybe healing is getting to the place

where you understand yourself enough

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that you don't need everybody else to.

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So guys, that's my

Tammy's Takes for today.

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Love you guys.

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I will see you next time.

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If you wanna reach out and ask me any

questions about this, I always offer a

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complimentary calm and clarity call where

we can get online, we can talk about

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whatever's going through, what patterns

you have, what questions you have, and

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we can meet you right where you're at.

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So go ahead, book that call,

and I will see you soon.

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Take care.

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Bye-bye.