Relationships in the Raw: Tips to build healthy communication

During the holidays, I was sitting with my 3 year old nephew on my lap reading him a book. After reading the story, he proceeded to get off my lap, grab another book, and sat across from me. He rapidly flipped through the pages mumbling phrases and words as if he was reading the book, and as if he were a teacher, turning the book around to show the pages. While watching him present each page, I began to think about how frequent he watches a teacher sit in front of the class, read a page, and then share the picture pages with the class. My guess is he sees his teacher read one to two times a day, 5 times a week, for the past 8 months.

If we take my nephew as an example, he just watched and absorbed the teacher’s behavior that he has watched for only 8 months. Now, take your own experiences as children. We watch our parents when they get upset, feel anger or sadness, and communicate with others. We learned from watching our parental figures daily, for many hours a day, and for 7 days a week. We absorb behaviors similar to our parent’s behaviors. We watched them express anger, communicate, cope with stress, and more. The things we saw as children influence our reactions in our current relationship. Similarly to my nephew, we replicate behaviors that we watched growing up.

Take a look at the behaviors you took on from your parents. Do you shut down like your father when you get upset? Do you drink alcohol to calm your nerves, just like mom? Do you avoid conflict at all cost, similarly to how dad avoided conflict? Do you leave, just like your father left you?