This week, we’ll continue and conclude the four-step Auxano Communication Approach©. As a reminder, the first two steps are:
Step 1: Observe and talk about what you just noticed.
Step 2: Invite the other person to hear the story you’re telling yourself.
Today, we’ll look at possibly the hardest step that may demand the most from you:
Step 3: Share with the other person the feelings you have as a result of the story you made up in your mind.
As I wrote in The Stories We Tell Ourselves, “If we only share the story we’ve been telling ourselves, we leave out half of the relevant information as to why we’re sharing that story.”
In other words, if you just relate the “facts” of the stories you’ve been making up and not how those stories are making you feel, you’re not exactly telling the other person the entire narrative.
To achieve relational connection, and even relational wholeness, you must be able to endure the awkwardness of telling someone else both the stories you may have been making up about them as well as how those stories have been affecting you internally.
To do this, fill in the blanks of this sentence when you’re conversing with the person about whom you’ve been fabricating stories: “Based on the story I’ve been telling myself about you, I’ve felt ____.”
This will demand vulnerability and honesty from you, but your truthfulness ought to help the relationship grow. In fact, the other person may even mimic you and relate how they’ve felt about the stories they’ve been telling themselves about you.
And once both of you have disavowed yourselves of the fabrications possibly surrounding your relationship, a foundation for a stronger, healthier relationship can be built.
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