This is a message for anyone who is having trouble communicating with someone.
Perhaps the two of you are not talking at all anymore, or perhaps many things are going unsaid. Or perhaps there are many angry arguments.
I'd like to recommend a wonderful idea which I believe was originally proposed by the late Ken Keyes. He called it SOS, for Sharing Of Space.
In my experience it works like magic, because it allows even very difficult subjects to be discussed and resolved.
Often, in arguments or disputes, there is a continual tendency to be "right," to interrupt the other person to show them how they're wrong, angry silences, and other counter-productive behaviors which lead to further misunderstanding and separation.
The SOS tends to dissolve all that, because it puts the emphasis on really listening and beginning to hear each other.
You start by agreeing to agree on a small set of groundrules. They are as follows:
1) Only one person at a time talks.
2) The person talking is allowed to talk without being interrupted. If person A is talking, person B just listens.
3) When person A is done, person B then summarizes what they said to the satisfaction of person A.
For instance, person A might say, "Yes, you sort of got it, but you missed this part." Then person B summarizes that part, until person A says, "Yes, you got it."
4) Then you trade places. In this example, it would now be person B's turn to talk. Person B then talks without being interrupted (just as person A was able to do), and when person B is done person A summarizes what they said.
5) You continue alternating like this, one person at a time talking and the other listening and summarizing.
What happens is that for the first time you begin to understand the other person, and they begin to understand you. You begin to understand what's important to the other person, what's motivating them, what's underneath their positions.
And they begin to understand the same about you. Perhaps for the first time, you will get the deeply satisfying sensation of being really heard by this person.
What happens is that you both begin to soften as listening and hearing and understanding slowly take the place of painful self-righteousness and defensiveness. Your heart begins to come alive towards this person, and theirs begins to come alive towards you.
When your hearts come alive, and you see the human beings behind the posturing, you migrate to a different world with each other, and yet it's this world right here.
Often even very intractable, profound and long-standing disputes can be resolved this way. And when a piece of your heart comes alive again, and when you see the other person's heart come alive again, what a joy that is!
—jim sloman, for 9/7/01
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