Discussing: Seek to understand (get clarity), from the source
Here are the 9 Principles of Mike's Creed:
- Seek to understand (get clarity), from the source
- Assume they have the best intentions
- Assume they are intelligent
- Give them the benefit of the doubt
- Look past their delivery methods
- Trust them until given reason not to
- Acknowledge my interpretations could be wrong
(regardless how sound and logical they are) - Be teachable
- Follow these principles until conclusive reason not to
In this post, I am going to try and explain the importance of the first principle of #mikesCreed: "Seek to understand (get clarity) from the source," by way of storytelling and examples.
Let me begin.
It was a sweltering hot summer day and my friend Daniel and I were walking back from the beach after a killer surf session. He pointed to a woman standing at the corner just across from us and said, "she's hot," and I nodded in agreement. Several days had passed when the topic of this woman came back up. We had been watching a movie and Daniel commented on how hot the main actress looked. I was like, kinda like that woman the other day, right?!? He starred at me with confusion. What woman? You know, the hot woman that you pointed out last week after surfing. He laughed and then clarified, I can appreciate your understanding as she was pretty, but last week I was commenting on how temperature hot she looked because she was sweating profusely. All that time, I had completely misunderstood what he communicated.
Now, this completely made up story highlights at the simplest level how easy it is to misunderstand what someone means, because we assume, for many good reasons, that we understood what they communicated. Thankfully, in this example there is no real relational harm to my misunderstanding of Daniel's use of the word "hot." Sure, I didn't actually have his correct meaning, and who knows how this could play out later. But the point is, there are numerous ways in which we misunderstand what others are communicating, and this can have negative ramifications.
Let me retell the story above but changing a few details. Instead of it being my friend and I, it's now my wife and I. And I am the one who said to my wife about the woman across the street, "She's hot." What is my wife thinking? Maybe nothing. Maybe yeah she sure looks pretty. Or, is my husband attracted to her? Does he think I'm hot? Was he talking about temperature hot, because she was sweating? Maybe he meant both ways: attractive and sweating?
How could my wife know what I meant? Ask the source. Ask me, the one who said "she's hot," I know what I meant. But if she doesn't seek clarity, who knows how this might come back up. Maybe later we are watching a movie and I mention how attractive the main actress is, and now my wife thinking ... is my husband interested in me... he keeps talking about other "hot" woman. But really in the first occasion when I mentioned "hot" I was talking about temperature, and with regards to the actress, attractiveness. But she is accidently lumping them together, because she didn't clarify from the source. And now there are all kinds of ways this can unravel in a "negative" way.
Negative Clarification:
When I say that an interpretation is "negative," in these posts, I mean hurtful, felt suspicious or awkward, rubbed you the wrong way, seemed to contradict what you know, may be weird or odd. Additionally it does seem to be a consistent observation that humans tend to give "negative" interpretations more credence than deserved. Odd. More on that later.
Back to more examples:
Your spouse rolls their eyes while you are talking to them. Do you assume they think what you just said was stupid? Of course not. Maybe they had no idea, maybe their thought window is up to the left. Instead, if someone rolls their eyes, ask them, I noticed you rolled your eyes, was that directed at what I just said? You'll be more surprised by the fact that it almost never was something directed at you, or even known to have been done by them.
What if your brother is talking to you in a tone that sounds angry. Do you assume they are angry at you? No. Maybe they had no idea how they sound ... and I know this intimately ... many in my life have thought I was angry or mad because of my tone (which I had no idea I came across like I was angry). So, you cannot trust the tone. Sometimes you need to disregard the delivery method ... another principle of #mikesCreed we will discuss in more detail later. But what is needed here, is to seek clarity from your brother. Ask them, "Are you angry?" If for whatever reason you cannot clarify, offer them #mikesCreed. Assume they meant the best. Give them the benefit of the doubt. This is your brother.
What if your friend makes a comment about your clothing, like oh I see you wore those pants. Do you assume they were being mean? Of course not. Maybe they didn't say it right. Maybe it made them think about some really cool person. Maybe they are envious. People's delivery methods are not that great. Think about it, most people are not trying to be mean to you, especially your friend. So ask them ... "when you made a comment about my clothes, it sounded almost like you were making fun ... did I get you wrong?" If you don't ask, offer them #mikesCreed. I promise you will find yourself enjoying those close to you more, because you aren't taking them "negatively," which if you took time to clarify you'd learn that they weren't trying to be negative anyway.
What if a trusted person in your life makes a comment about another person and it seems "negative?" Well, this is when things can be more challenging, because you know this trusted person isn't lying to you. You know they are smart and you know they have good intentions. But when listening to your trusted person's interpretation of another person or event, ESPECIALLY when there are "negative" conclusions ... you cannot assume that your trusted person necessarily has the correct interpretation. You can certainly hold their observation with a level of high confidence, especially if you asked them if they clarified. But look, my closest friends have been equally guilty of jumping to conclusions without having sought clarity from the source. I don't blame them, there are truly multiple believable narratives about most things. But trust me on this, let your conclusions about a person or an event ultimately be based on your seeking clarity from the source(s). When you cannot, or it's too awkward to do so, you give them #mikesCreed. In this case with your trusted person, you certainly don't need to argue with them, nor do you need to share your uncertainty about their conclusion. You can just hold it in proper perspective with #mikesCreed.
In these examples our learnings are two-fold: 1) we all need better precision in our communication, and 2) we need to seek clarity of what was communicated, from the source(s). Now, because we have observed that people are not precise in their communication, and they tend to use words interchangeably despite having different technical meanings (like dumb, idiot, stupid), we need to focus on seeking clarity from the source(s), ESPECIALLY when the interpretation could be "negative." The source is the person who was communicating, not their friend, not your friend, not their spouse, not their coworker or gatekeeper, not your feelings, not the context... but from the person who communicated the message. That's who you clarify with, the source. And when you cannot seek clarity, for whatever reason, you give them the benefit of the doubt. Don't trust negative interpretations without clarity being sought from the source.
In general, there will be times that you just missed someone's point unknowingly, this will happen. But definitely if you are walking away with a "negative" interpretation of what someone just communicated, this is the time to seek clarity from them, and not just assume you understood their point which came across "negatively." When you cannot seek clarity, or it is too awkward to seek clarity, then you practice #mikesCreed.
In my next post, I will discuss in more detail the second principle of #mikesCreed: "Assume they have the best intentions"