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I Know What Youre Thinking

OK, my friends, lets be real for a moment.

Have you ever said to your partner, I know what youre thinking, and then proceeded to tell your

partner, only your partner says, No thats not it. Then you say, Yes, it is. Your partner says, No its

not. Then you have a disagreement about what you think they think?

Admit it, weve all done it. Ive done it. You probably have done it and we will all probably do it again.

Its crazy-making.

I think it always starts with non-verbal behaviour. Think about your own non-verbal communication with

your partner. Here is a quick review of how it shows up in relationships. Identify what you do on the list.

Review your non-verbal behaviour

Eye contact - When you look at your partner do you really look or avoid eye contact? Do you hold their

gaze and feel connected when you look at your partner? Facial Expression - What is YOUR face showing?

Are you expressive and emotionally present? Do you smile? Are you expressionless or show disapproval

in your face? What does your partner see when they look at your face at different times? How does your

face look when you are thoughtful, scared, upset, interested? Do you ever roll your eyes at them and

make a face if you disagree? Do you yawn when they are telling you something important? What are

your raised eyebrows saying? Facial expressions are key to how the I know what youre thinking

scenario starts. Tone of Voice - What does your voice project? Does your tone tell your partner you are

present, non-judgmental, interested, delighted, curious, compassionate or quite the opposite? This is

also KEY to the I know what youre thinking scenario. Posture and Gestures - What does your body

look like when you are communicating with your partner? Relaxed or tense, open or closed, warm or

cold? Do you nod your head to show you are listening or nod in a different direction to show you are not

listening and disagree? Are your hand/arm motions inviting or threatening to your partner? When your

partner is talking do you ever keep watching TV, reading, walk out of the room? Touch - How do you

touch your partner? Is that how THEY like to be touched? Sounds - Do you use sounds to show you are

attending to your partner like Mmm, hmm in a gentle soft manner or the opposite? The opposite

includes sighing in an irritated manner. Timing and pace - Do you give your partner time to respond and

to talk or do you interrupt or even finish your partners sentences?

These aspects of how you communicate non-verbally are probably the most important determinants of

how any interaction with you partner will go. Whats exciting is that you control this and can change if

you want to. That is why in Imago we say YOU can be a container of safety for your partneror not itsa choice.

Communication is more than the words you say

Couples tell me all the time that the main problem in their relationships is that they cant communicate.

They generally believe that if they could just learn how to talk to their partners and more specifically

how their partners should talk to them, their problems would be solved. I must say, in all due respect,

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they are wrong. What couples need to learn is how to work on their non-verbal communication. Couples

need to learn about everything that is NOT about talking but about non-verbal connecting. This is where

the real work lies.

Did you know that when we hear a message only about 7% of whats important is the words we are

saying. In fact 38% is about vocal aspects of communication (volume, tone, rhythm, pitch; not the actualwords) and a further 55% is our body movements, primarily our facial expressions. Isnt that

astounding? To realize our words dont really matter but how we communicate them is what gets

processed and interpreted by the brain. Research in the field of non-verbal communication shows some

parts of our faces are more revealing than others. For example, our eyes can communicate happiness,

sadness or surprise. Our mouth and lips say a lot too. The most positively powerful facial expression is a

smile. This is, by the way, a cross-cultural phenomenon.

What does this mean for relationships?

Well it means we make up stories about our partners based on their non-verbal behaviours. Then we

usually decide that we are right about what we have just made up and that we know What They are

Thinking all by interpreting what they are NOT saying. Whats interesting is that our partners may not

even be aware of what their non-verbal behaviour is communicating.

Heres a case in point. For a long time my partner thought that when I made this certain look and

wrinkled my forehead in a certain way I was angry. After years of believing this, and her withdrawing

because she wanted to avoid my anger, we realized it. That wrinkle in my brow was something I was

doing unconscionably when I was really concentrating on what she was saying. I was not angry. But of

course when she withdrew thinking I was angry when I was not, I got really angry because she was

withdrawing! Guess what, this only reinforced her interpretation. We could have saved a lot of mis-

communications if we had only realized this much earlier by just sitting down and checking it out, butyou live and learn!