You Can('t) Break the Cycle of Miscommunication
31:54 Share

Good day, good people. Welcome back. It's another episode of the Imperfectly Phenomenal Woman podcast. On this pod, we talk about limiting beliefs that hold women back from living fully and authentically. I'm feeling good because I feel like I'm going to get to 200 episodes of this pod. We're at 180 something right now. And then after that, I'm going to wrap this thing up.

I'll still leave the platform open to, you know, just get on whenever I feel like getting on because I enjoy being behind a mic. But I'm so excited for whatever is about to be next. Like, so excited. But this week I'm talking to my good friend, Alayna, and we're talking about the limiting belief that you can't break the cycle of miscommunication. Do you know how important this topic is?

Whether it's with your family or with your romantic partnerships or with your friendships or with whoever else, whoever you've been miscommunicating with, there is an opportunity to break the cycle. But you will only break the cycle if you make an effort to do something about it.

So we talk about boundaries. We talk about defining your needs and your wants, feelings that might come up when you're giving advice versus when you're receiving advice. We get into Elena's family service level agreement, which when we're in this episode, I think this one is so funny. I really enjoy it. It's not easy to communicate during conflict, but the key is

is love. So let's get into the episode. I started by asking Elena when she thought about back in the day, what her communication looked like with her family. So let's get into it. This is Elena, and let's chat about and reframe this limiting belief.

Back in the day, yeah. I think a lot of times, especially with Black and immigrant families, it's not really set up to be something where you can communicate openly and honestly with each other. Like, it's very much, you know, you must have respect and just go with how things are supposed to go. And, I mean, that's how our parents were raised, so it's not surprising that that's how they raised us to be. But...

We the difference, I think, between the boomer generation and the millennial generation is so huge because of the Internet. We have access to so much more information. We can learn how to best address our own needs and best, you know, communicate with our family to build better relationships. And I mean, these are just small, not small, big examples, but particular examples of how we've been able to use information to help sort of reframe how we see the world and

And coming into my adulthood, coming into who I am as a person, and I consider myself like a researcher, like not by trade, but I am always looking stuff up. Like I'm always just- On Google. Yes. And just learn new things and understand new things. Like I'm not the kind of person who-

you know, I'm well, I'm solution oriented. That's the best way to put it. I'm very solution oriented. I am not someone who can just like deal with something being bad and do nothing about it. Like I have to find a solution, which isn't always the right thing, but that's just the way that my brain works. So in all of that, I know that I've had a really challenging time with my family. And when I say my family, I really just mean my parents. Um,

coming to a space where it feels like I can be open and honest and communicate with them. Because that's not how it was growing up. I wasn't expressing my real feelings about things. I just sort of went along with whatever they said. And that's pretty much the norm for, I think, a lot of folks. But as an adult, I can't keep doing that. I have my own life. I can't just

go along with what you say because that's how I've always done it. It's very much I have my own life and it's very different from yours and I'm going to make different decisions than you would. But there's a lot of reasons why communications can be fractured and I don't know. I want to make it better. Long story short. I want that. So I want to make it better. Yeah. And I just feel like it

If we can communicate more honestly and more about what we need from each other, then this would be better. Because I think we're just having the same sort of issues come up over and over again and expecting a different result. We never talk about what we actually need or what we actually expect. Any of that, nothing's ever going to change. So like I'm finally getting to the point where I'm like, okay, I have to do this. Like I have to talk about what I need.

Isn't it so wild that we are in our 30s now? Yeah. And this is when we're finally saying, and I can't even say that I'm at that point yet, to be honest with you. Like, you ahead of me, child. It takes a lot to get there, I think. It does. Like, how has it taken this long for us to feel comfortable just being, one, who we are with our family, and then two, honest with our family? I think now...

Having been in therapy on and off over the last, I don't know, four years or so, maybe more, I've learned how to establish boundaries and, you know, talk about what I need. But I think me bringing a kid into it is accelerating that timeline in terms of like, you can't keep dealing with this same shit over and over. Like you're bringing a kid into this. Like you need to have the best possible relationships in your life for this child to enjoy. Because like-

I don't feel my parents are great grandparents. They are so involved. They love them. Like, it's amazing to see. I want my kid to have that relationship with them. She can't have that relationship with them if I'm not feeling connected to them because I'm not going to want to see him. And that's not fair. You know, so it's like there's got to be something's got to give basically like almost sounds like, um,

because you had said you can't which is goes back to limited belief stuff it's almost kind of like you can't break the cycle of miscommunication that's that could be it something like that you can't break the cycle of miscommunication I like that um yeah I think something like that we'll still see as we go through as we keep going but I want to go back again how did it feel like actually starting to speak your truth to people yeah

What did that feel like? Terrifying, I would say, because I think I am a recovering people pleaser. Doing anything that I perceive someone else to not like or to make someone uncomfortable is like, or I guess I should say was really, really scary, like really crazy, but also empowering because it's like,

I can't care what everybody has to say or what everybody thinks or else I will not be able to live my life happily. So I think, yeah, a combination of those two things. It's almost like taking a leap of faith where you're terrified, but you're also really exhilarated and excited by it. So that's it. Okay, so, but obviously, so it was worth it. And so how do you feel now? I'm really proud of myself.

yeah go lades all right i get like really out of breath from talking because i'm pregnant and i'm drinking water and like breathing hard i also have aligners in i started smile direct club you heard that oh they just closed the company down like a week ago so i'm just out here i don't know floundering anyway oh wow um i'm proud of myself i'm proud of myself because

If I think about me in like middle and high school, I would never, ever think that I would be this person who can. The fact that I can easily visualize who you were back then. Like I can see you in my brain. Like visually see you. And it just had a whole moment just now. Yeah. Even in college. I never thought I would be the person who...

was like, okay, I don't really care what you think about what I'm doing in my life. I'm making the decisions that are most better, that I feel are best for me. And I'm the only person who can do that. Like nobody lives in my brain. Nobody lives in my body. I'm the only person who can make these decisions for me. I never, I don't even think I thought about that period, but never thought I would be this person. And I think there's still a long way to go. I still consider myself a people pleaser to a certain degree, but

I'm really proud of how far I've come and to be able to establish boundaries and still have good relationships and communicate and all that stuff. Like that's all part of it. That's a lot to be proud of, I would say. Yeah.

You mentioned that you're making this SLA. Yes. Oh my gosh, the SLA. It's an SLA. So can you explain that to people? Now we're on this journey of trying, like continuing this journey of trying to express your needs and your wants to your parents and to other people in your life. So talk to me about this SLA that you're creating. Okay, so...

It's funny to me because remember before I mentioned I'm very solution oriented. I think that there are people who are of two minds, one very logical and one very emotional. I am totally the logical one. I...

everything to me is like something to be solved. And again, not always the best thing, but that's how my brain works. And I'm trying to find a balance when it comes to people who are more emotional. I also mentioned that I'm like a researcher. I am someone who likes to learn things. So

An SLA is something that I learned about, I think, in my first job out of school or something. And essentially what it is, I'll read you the definition that I've written down here. An SLA sets the expectations between a service provider and a customer, describes the products and services to be delivered,

It can describe the point of contact for the problems, the metrics by which the effectiveness of the process is monitored and approved, blah, blah, blah. Obviously, family relationships are not, you know, services and we are not customers and vendors and stuff. But if you look at the sort of basis of it.

It's essentially defining what needs are and how we're going to meet them. And I'm like, that's exactly what we need. And how you're going to measure them. Yes. Okay. The only thing is that I don't really know how to measure. I like them. I love measuring. I think that's great. But I figured that out. Maybe you can help me figure that out. Yes, we could talk about that. But like, yeah, I was like, okay, this is very straightforward. Like,

We need to define our needs and expectations for each other. And so if we can put together this family SLA, and I should actually share it with you. Let's do it. What did you come up with? I have your Gmail, don't I? Oh, you're going to send it, send it. I'm literally sending it to you right now. All right. Is it an Excel doc or a Google doc? No, no, it's a Google doc. Okay. Yeah. So it should be in your email. So anyway, I started off with a definition of boundaries because boundaries are also important. And I think that

I was talking to my dad about boundaries the other day and he's like, why do you need boundaries from your family? And I'm like, oh, this is good that we're doing this. This is good why we're doing this. Yeah, exactly. So anyway, I started off with the definition of boundaries and the types of boundaries that exist that are relevant to familial relationships because there are plenty of can we pause actually? Can we pause? Yes, we absolutely. Because that part was really big.

The fact that my parents didn't understand boundaries. Yeah. The fact that he was like, why do you need boundaries with your family? Yeah. Like the fact that I feel like a lot of us would have skipped ahead and assumed that people already know these things, you know, but you've really got to meet people where they are first. If you want to improve any communication with them, um,

So I applaud you for just meeting people where they are first. Absolutely. And it was a shock to me when he said it. I was like, oh my God, you don't even know how important boundaries are. You don't know. Oh God. You don't have social. The boundaries chart didn't pop up in your feed, child. No, no, no. So I was like, okay, this is going to be family boundaries and service level agreement document, basically. So starting off with definitions of boundaries. Okay. Wait again. Wait again. Okay. I'm scrolling through y'all.

Y'all how many pages is this? No, it's long. I think it's at least five and that's not even there's more to add I'm sure this is just a working draft at this point. Y'all she used to really truly truly truly Creating a service level agreement document like this is a real business vibe document with true paragraphs very few bullet points full pages of text and your family has to read and

There needs to be a meeting. I saw I saw at Amazon, apparently they schedule meetings to just read the brief before they even talk about it, because people will lie and say they read the brief and then come to the meeting and pretend like they read it. So like you got to schedule an hour long meeting. 30 minutes is dedicated to everybody reading this at the same time, asking questions in real time. What does this mean?

And then the next 30 minutes is dedicated to talking. But y'all, this is a real document. This is not a game over here. Elena is taking this seriously. I am. I am. And she said she wants it to be better. And these are real true steps to make it better. This is not a game. Okay, you go ahead, Leitna. Talk to me. Talk to me. Listen, anyone who knows me knows that this is not surprising. Like, I've always been the person to write a sternly worded email. Like, I'm just like...

This is how I process information and it helps me feel better to have it written down and that this can be potentially a real solution. The only thing, and this is something I talked to my sister about, was this can come off as cold. Like it is a business document. Right. And we're talking about family and family is very emotional. It's something, you know, whatever. Right.

And that's another thing that I struggle with is finding the emotional side when it comes to the logical side. So my sister was saying, this can be really great because all of us work in corporate America. We all have the business mind to be able to process this type of information, especially my parents, especially my mom. She's like, that's a corporate lady right there. All right.

she was like this could be great this could be great to have everything written down this is a document we can refer back to we can annually review it we can do whatever we need to do however leading with i created an sla for our family to talk through our needs or whatever might be a little bit cold so saying what if we you know have a conversation where we're like listen we've been having some difficult open honest conversations with each other that has led to some good progress

What if, you know, to keep this going, because we do want to continue to grow together as a family and make sure that all of our needs are met. What if we write it all down and we have a shared place where we can, you know, talk about this stuff together, where everybody has a say in it, everybody can put in their needs and boundaries, everybody can agree to these things. And then we won't have the issue of miscommunications moving forward because it's all written down. So that's my thinking.

And TBD if this is going to happen at Christmas Eve. Because that's when we're all going to be together next. Right. I might pitch it. TBD. I got to see how I feel. I got to read the room. Okay. Can I jump in? Well, yeah. Okay. All right. So here's what I'm thinking. There could just be a genuine moment where you can slide it in easy. Yes. Fingers crossed that that works. But regardless...

For the emotional people, I kind of am an emotional person. I'm both, honestly, and it depends on the moment. But for the most part, I think I'm oddly kind of emotional. And when it's towards me, I'm emotional. If it's coming out of me, I am solutions, if that makes sense. So what you're going to be saying is towards other people. Right. So starting with...

And from, I think you have to be grounded in a place of love. That's really good. Starting with love. Starting grounded in love. Yeah. Yeah. I think it could go well. I don't feel like people are going to be like, oh, God, Alayna, you're so cool, whatever. I don't think so. But I don't know. Yeah. Did your family say I love you? I can't remember. Mm-hmm.

Okay. Okay. So then it could work. Yeah. But I think you have to start warm. Yes. And I would love for it to be like organic too, sort of reflowing. I might have to sort of like make it happen in an organic way, but we'll see. Okay. So there's types of boundaries. You have physical boundaries. You have emotional boundaries. You have material and financial boundaries. You have time. Mm-hmm.

I'm going to read this for myself. Listen, this is helpful. And the link at the top is a link to a website where I found this information. Talks all about boundaries and benefits and all that stuff. So feel free to click that too. This is just research that I put together basically. And then it goes into what is an SLA, benefits of an SLA, SLA best practices, key components. Now let's put this all into practice. Okay. Okay.

So objective. The family SLA outlines the collective commitment of our family members to establish clear expectations, foster open communication, and cultivate healthier dynamics within our family unit. By defining roles, responsibilities, and boundaries, we aim to create an environment that promotes mutual understanding and strengthens our familial bond. I think this is going to work. I do. Just having them written down. Mm-hmm.

is helpful. Like seeing it all in one place and like being able to talk about what's important to me. So for example, there's a section after we talk about the key principles, which is after the objective, there's a section for individual boundaries and commitments. So these are things that each family member can write down that are most important to them, especially when it comes to boundaries. It's huge. Mine is,

The ones that I have, I'll read a couple of them. I don't have to read all of them because there's a lot and there'll probably be more. My main one, the one that I started with, and this is one that's really important to me, is if I share a decision with you and you disagree with it, you can tell me one time, if I'm certain in my decision, I ask that you do not bring it up again. You don't have to like my decisions, but you do have to respect them. And I feel like that is...

sort of the basis of a lot of conflict that I've had with my parents is that I feel like they don't respect my decisions, even if they disagree or yeah, if they disagree with them. So that to me was like, that's number one. The second one, I think that, I guess this was sort of newish information to me, but please ask if I'm open to receiving advice before you are. I learned that I can be, I can be defensive because I, I know that

I mean, it was hard. Why are you making that? Because this is, you're the same as me.

So because remember just now I said when I am giving it, I'm solutions oriented. When I'm receiving it, I'm emotional. Perhaps I'm more emotional than I think then. When you're receiving it, you're emotional. You just said you get defensive when somebody's trying to offer you advice, but it's because you didn't ask for the advice. Right. It's just like if you're trying to give the advice when the person didn't ask for it, you were being solutions oriented, but they were being emotional. That's so true. Look at that. Learning new things here.

There we go. You're right. You're right. And I think that's something that I've learned throughout these difficult conversations and putting this together is that I have my guard up, like I'm defensive because I've felt like I

I've had to sort of defend everything that I've done in my life. Right. Because it's not what they would have wanted for me. So I feel like I'm always like on guard against them giving me advice or offering things that I don't want to hear or that are not relevant to what I want to do with my life. So I said...

You know, if you ask me if I'm open to receiving the advice before you give it, that ensures that I'm in a space to let down my defenses and actually hear you. Yeah, I'm in a space where I'm like, I'm frustrated. Like, I don't want to talk about this. And then you come with advice that I'm just going to be like, you know, like a bad shutdown and bad. So, like, let's put this into practice. Yeah.

Are you in a space to receive advice? Are you open to hearing more about this at a later date or something like that? And my sister started doing that with me, which I really appreciate. Love that. She can be intense too. And she knows this. I want to, I want to pause there for a second. Cause we said we were kind of going to talk about this as a thing too. So this was an article and it says, do you want to be helped, heard or hugged? Yeah. And I think that is huge. Let me see if there's a piece in here that I can kind of just read. Yeah.

Throughout our marriage, if I told my husband Tom about a problem I was having, he would start troubleshooting before I was done talking. He meant well, but his suggestions just made me crankier. Sometimes I just craved a silent bear hug. Now, when one of us is upset about something, if I'm honest, it's usually me, the other will ask that question.

It has been a game changer over the last few months. It clarifies needs. It deescalates squirreling emotions. It helps us take positive action. Each option, an embrace thoughtful but solicited advice

or an empathetic ear has the power to comfort and calm. Receiving a hug from your partner increases levels of oxytocin, the bonding hormone, and helps dial down stress. There's evidence that being heard, known as high-quality listening, can reduce defensiveness during difficult conversations and intimate conversations. And some research suggests that couples who give each other supportive advice have higher relationship satisfaction. Maybe you could put the helped, heard, or hugged in your FSLA.

I mean, that really might be a good thing. Like if there's like, hold on, I have a communication section here. Maybe I'll put like that line in there, something around. Yeah, that could work. Very good. Let's see what else is in your document. Holidays.

review and amendments this is so funny signatories is everybody supposed to sign everyone's supposed to sign actually i don't really know how that's gonna work since it's a google doc um but i don't know i thought it was cute so i put that in there that is so oh austin i know little babies i have to put the babies in there i feel like they just want to sign to you know be a part of it

Because it's one thing to say you want it to be better. And it's another thing to take the action to try to make it better. Exactly. I'm done with just hoping. What do you think? Insanity is doing the same thing and hoping for a different result. I'm not trying to be insane out here. I want, I got to do something different because something's got to give. And I think that this could help. And starting with the difficult conversations and coming from a place of love, I think is a good place to start. Yeah. Yeah.

That's beautiful. Thank you, friend. I think it's going to go good. It's going to go great. I think, yeah, I think people will laugh because like, you know, it's funny that I created an SLA. It is. But like at the end of the day, it's good stuff. And it's from a good place. Coming from a good place. Yeah. Want us to be good. And I think if anyone has the ability to make a change in this family, it's me.

There you go. And then I forgot that at the end of each episode, we always reframe the living belief that holds us back from living fully. I forgot what we said that it was. You can't have better communication. Yeah, it was like you can't fix miscommunication or something. You can't improve miscommunication. And we should have wrote it down. Well, you can listen to that.

Okay, well, I'll just reframe that generally. Yeah. So how would you reframe that particular thing that we talked about just now? Improving communication with your family. Right. You are capable of... Okay, no, no, no. I won't say that. Okay, how will I say this? Use your strengths and how your family knows you and come from a place of love and you can find a way to break through that.

and make communication possible I love that word breakthrough use your strengths and come from a good place I love that word breakthrough yeah because sometimes you know you're working with some hard-headed people oh hell yeah oh hell and I think it's really easy to give up sometimes when it's been your whole life like I remember I told you though with my mom um she be she be

She just be, she be like that woman. So here's an example. So I had to go to Helsinki Finland for work. I think we, I told you this maybe, um,

And Helsinki is far, far away. You know, she doesn't know anything about Helsinki, Finland. And knowing my mama, she was not about to be here for that idea of me getting on a plane for that long and flying to someplace she has no clue about. And it's right by Russia. She was not about to have that. So I like psyched myself out. I had the worst anxiety. My body was terrible just because I was so afraid to tell her I was going to Helsinki.

And then I had to write it down. And as I was writing, I started, oh, you know what I did? I actually made an entire document that was like, hey, Ma, guess what? I'm going to Helsinki. I was like...

I made a document. It wasn't this detailed as yours, but I had, this is where I'm going to be staying. This is what I'm going to be doing. Did you know this interesting fact about Helsinki? Oh, I love that. Yeah, all of these different things on it. And I tried to make it fun so that she wouldn't stress me out. So I made that document. I went to the library. I printed it out. And...

Then I was still nervous to give it to her. So then I started writing some more and I realized that every time I've told her I needed to go somewhere, she fussed and she fussed and she fussed. I genuinely thought she was going to kick me out the house this time, but she fussed. And then she took me to the airport every single time.

And so having that realization that, okay, she just needs to get her feelings out and then she's still going to be supportive. That was huge for me. That is huge. Yeah. That's a really good takeaway. So like, I realized I just got to let her fuss for a little bit and I don't even have to respond. I just got to let her get it out. And then she's going to be like, when do you need to be at the airport? So even though we're dealing with hardheaded people, like one, the hardheadedness often comes from love.

and her wanting to protect and then two they still might support you anyways not everybody but some people yeah i saw something somewhere that i wish i would have shared with you because i feel like you would get it it was basically like anxiety is not your fear of the thing that's happening it's your fear of your response to the thing that's happening or something like you won't be able to

control your response to the thing that's happening or something like that I gotta find it and send it to you because it's like that's that's sometimes how I feel when my my mom especially similar to your mama oh your mom at the level she worries intensely and sometimes it's really irrational worry and I'm like I've got to work out

It's you. It's you and your head here. It's not what's going on. It's your reaction to it that's getting you to this. But that might be a lost cause. The neural pathways have been formed. They have been formed and they are set. So we just have to find a way for us to be able to deal with it and not let it get to us. And I think we're getting there. I think that's a good point, though. I think it's a good point, though, that anxiety is...

Not necessarily my fear of her response, but the fact that I would have to not necessarily just deal with her fussing, but deal with her disapproval. Like it hurts to be disapproved of. Yes, for sure. Yeah. I feel like we talked about this before. Probably. Yeah. Yeah.

That's what we do. That's what we do. All right. We have these guys. We go. Okay. So let's, let's end it again. So if people wanted to connect with you, if people wanted to connect with you, where can they find you?

They can find me on Instagram, on my personal page, which does not see a lot of action, but Siamese, S-Y-E-A-M-E-S-E. And y'all know where you can find me. I am, I was about to say at iPillman Podcast, but I don't really post there anymore. So you can find me on my personal page at lauren.e.will. And yeah, ladies, thank you for joining me. Thank you, friend. This has been really lovely. Always love our conversations.

And listeners, I will chat with y'all next week. Farewell.