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Honestly, it’s amazing we can even communicate at all when you think about it.

We are all essentially ‘aliens’ to each other.

And we try to use language and definitions in common to bridge the gap between our unique and individual experiences, to be able to share ourselves with each other, and build together.

There is a reason that when you call a crisis line, the crisis listeners are trained to summarize your words back to you, to intuit and identify your specific feelings.

We call it ‘active listening’ and we use it so that the other person feels heard, feels seen, feels that someone is truly with them as they are experiencing and talking about their pain and trauma. It does – incredibly – help. Because if you think about it, there is really only so much someone can technically do on the phone with you, e.g. give you resources for you to contact to get yourself help.

But people call to talk to another human being because they feel alone in their suffering.

It’s the secular version of going to a pastor or a priest, it’s what we wish we could do with an unconditionally loving parent: bring them our problems and our pain, be met in our suffering, and not be shamed for our feelings.

The process of ‘active listening’ is intended to reproduce what happens when someone can perspective-take for you.

So someone can be ‘trained’ as an active listener and not necessarily be able to perspective-take for another person, but the effect is the same (or closely enough) for the caller. If the training works, the caller feels seen and heard and understood, and that they are not alone, even if the listener doesn’t actually understand their perspective or their pain.

To perspective-take for another person is to understand how they see the world and how they think.

It’s something I’ve been thinking about a lot recently as I have been (unsuccessfully) navigating communication in my most recent relationship. When I expressed, for example, that we are struggling to communicate because he doesn’t understand me, he interpreted that to mean that I was saying he wasn’t smart enough to understand.

Of course, it’s not a matter of intellect at all but of a kind of cognitive flexibility.

That’s why the most stubborn people are the ones who adamantly insist that ‘this is the way X is’ and will not deviate from that, and even become angry if you try to explain otherwise. Because, from their perspective, you are unraveling reality.

If you are the kind of person who desires safety and security, then you have low tolerance for ambiguity.

The foundation of the world is solid.
Reality is completely understood.
They know the answers to the important questions of life.

I truly envy that certainty.

I miss when I felt that way, and I was so sure about everything. The flaw, however, in that approach to modeling reality and life is that you we can’t know everything and so what you don’t know will inevitably undo the fabric of your life somehow 😂

The level of shock that engenders cannot be understated.

There’s a reason that people who read and have higher levels of education often have more cognitive flexibility in general.

Reading allows you to ‘inhabit’ the interior life of a character in a way that is still unparalleled by movies and other media. When you’re a reader, you learn so many different ways that people think, how they approach the world, even if it is reprehensible.

I accidentally got a crash course in perspective-taking when I was a kid.

My father used to take me and my brother with him to AA meetings when we were little. We’d sit in the back, coloring quietly, while (usually) man after man after man would talk about the worse things they’d done in life and why.

It reminds me of Alia’s character in “Dune”, who absorbed the memories of generations while still in the womb, and therefore was born with understanding beyond what she could have experienced in her years.

Which itself – side note – reminds me of that episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation I hate

…where Picard and the alien captain basically repeat “Darmok and Jalad at Tenagra” at each other the entire episode.

But that’s why shared media (along with shared experiences) allows people to understand each other better.

Not only will you have shared references that you both understand but it also shapes your worldview and your beliefs and experiences.

For some people, being in a relationship is simply about having someone to ‘do life with’.

For others, it’s about feeling seen and understood, and sharing your essential selves with each other.

Still others view it almost as a business where the purpose of the relationship is to maximize material resources.

I don’t think any one is ‘better’ than the other as long as everyone is on the same page. (I absolutely love that the metaphor for “understanding” is related to reading: ‘being on the same page’.)

I personally think that the ability to perspective-take for others is a indicator of how maturely self-aware someone is

…in addition to their level of life experience, or what they have learned of others’ life experiences. As well as the ability to recognize the same patterns and cross-apply them to other concepts.

If you are dealing with someone who does not have empathy for others, it means they are likely not able to perspective-take for them, and your ability to communicate with them is intrinsically limited.

It’s often still worth trying anyway.

My favorite definition of love comes from John Steinbeck (yes, “Of Mice and Men” John Steinbeck) from a letter to his son:

‘[Love] is an outpouring of everything good in you — of kindness and consideration and respect — not only the social respect of manners but the greater respect which is recognition of another person as unique and valuable.’

Iris Murdoch says:

“Love is the extremely difficult realisation that something other than oneself is real.”

And St. Thomas Aquinas defines love as “willing the good for the other”.

THE ELEMENTS OF LOVE REQUIRE

Two separate individuals

• full awareness of someone else as a separate human being (meaning each person has ‘theory of mind’ and doesn’t see other people as basically NPCs)
• belief that this person is a valuable human being, as they are

who respect each other

• respect for this person (treating them like they matter) and respect for them as their own person (autonomy)

who have good intentions toward each other

• empathy for this person (“empathy” – the ability to understand and share the feelings of another – is, by proxy, a measurement of someone’s ability to perspective-take for another person when that person has good intentions towards the other)
• being able to perspective-take for this person and see the world at least nominally from their perspective (versus main character syndrome)
• have the ability to recognize and discern the good intentions (or not) of the other person

and who pour out their goodness on each other

• mutual relationship, not one way
• you are your best self in the relationship, and even inspired to be better

so that you can pour more of your goodness out into the world

• you and your partner want each other to be more of who you are, so that there is more of ‘you’ in the world

Ultimately, your partner sees you as precious and unique, and strives to preserve that and encourage it.

Therefore someone who loves you will not try to erase you or who you are.

Someone who loves you respects your autonomy; your voice, your beliefs, your approach to life, your feelings and your opinions.

You are not only a gift in the eyes of this person but your beingness – your you-ness – is a gift to the world.

The Bible has a concept that ‘you know a tree by its fruit’, and therefore you know a person or relationship by the things that are produced by that person or in that relationship. There’s even a checklist in 1st Corinthians!

When I was trying to figure out what healthy love looked like, I found myself often going to 1 Corinthians 13:4-7

…a passage a lot of victims of abuse use to talk themselves into staying in abuse dynamics because they are too focused on whether they, the victim, are being loving enough…instead of applying the rubric to their partner.

Are they patient?
Are they kind?
Do they envy?
Do they boast?
Are they proud?
Do they dishonor others?
Are they self-seeking?
Easily angered?
Keeps a record of wrongs?
Do they rejoice with the truth?
Do they protect, trust, hope, persevere?

The very reason this works is because all of these attributes are the outward evidence of a person who is hoping for the good for you

…who includes your well-being with their own, and who is not in competition with you for happiness or success or resources but is coming from a construct of sharing. Sharing is often a result of caring because it means the other person is perspective-taking for us to the best of their ability.

So you can define love as that which occurs when two separate people – who respect each other and have good intentions toward each other, and who can recognize their partner’s good intentions toward themselves – mutually live in relation to each other in a way where they pour out their goodness on each other, and the world.

And you can back-check whether someone actually loves you (or is even capable of love) by using 1st Corinthians diagnostically. (Seeing the ‘fruit’ of their inner being.)

It’s important to recognize that someone who is selfish cannot love you.

It’s important to recognize that someone abusive cannot love you.
It’s important to recognize that someone with low or no self-awareness cannot love you.
It’s important to recognize that someone who enjoys hurting others (a sadist or troll) cannot love you.

You can absolutely use a similar framework for friendships.

The love-feeling we associate with “love” is actually connection which we do need in healthy relationships, but which becomes attachment in unhealthy relationships.

We know that this feeling itself is not love because you cannot have actual love in an unhealthy relationship but you can have romantic connection/attachment.

“Love is not binding, it’s linking; there’s a difference.” – Hans Wilhem

Three primary indicators to determine if you are dealing with a safe person:

1. Respects boundaries, as well as social norms.
2. The ability to perspective-take for you and others.
3. Their accurate understanding of reality.

…and how you can tell:

Their ability to communicate.

.

Before I discovered the definition of love – something I could reference and use to check against what I was dealing with – it was extremely frustrating that there were only ‘proofs’ of love.

Basically, the list in First Corinthians that shows you what love looks like (love is patient, love is kind, et cetera – meaning that someone who actually loves you is patient and kind).

I am reversing that process to illuminate what it looks like when someone is a safe person.

Because we have the primary elements of safety, but only one of those is completely self-evident: whether someone respects your boundaries and social norms.

[Side discussion: the reason I am including “social norms” is because there are legalistic abusers who act as if you not listing every single thing and if you don’t, they didn’t violate your boundaries. Social norms are understood as part of our social contract. You do not have to explicitly tell someone that not calling you names is a boundary that you have because that is understood to be abuse in our society. Or someone calling you 20 times in a row at 2:00 a.m. It is socially understood that this is not polite or okay behavior. So when a legalistic abuser tries to rules-lawyer you into accepting their violation of social norms as NOT being a violating of your reasonably understood boundaries, that is part of their abuse of you.]

Someone who is a safe person is someone you can communicate with.

It is literally that simple. That is what it looks like. If you are engaged in circular arguments, if you are having to quote someone back to themselves or are starting to over-explain yourself because they are willfully (or not) misunderstanding you, they are not a safe person.

I have had enough experience to recognize that you CANNOT create safety with someone who is unsafe.

I am a teacher and I long labored under the misapprehension that if only I could explain something well enough to another person, that they would see and understand. “Ah!” they might think to themselves, “I completely get what you are saying! Wow!” I assumed that because I have had those moments and I know plenty of people who have those moments.

But when you are ‘teaching’ someone who is unsafe, you are teaching them how to be a better abuser.

That’s it. It is literally that simple. And also the explanation for why so many victims of abuse end up spiraling further into the abuse dynamic after they have started therapy. They think “if I could only explain this to the person I love, they will understand and stop!”

[Narrator voice] They do not stop.

Is communication possible with this person?

Are they misunderstanding you?
Do they mis-state your points?
Do they recognize nuance?
Do they have the mental or emotional capacity to have the discussion in the first place?
Do they have the ability to consider someone else’s point of view?
Do they have the ability to consider evidence?
Do they understand the system?
Do they just restate their premise?
Are they more focused on how you are ‘wrong’ or have made a mis-step in logic?

I first began to notice the communication red flag when I was a suicide crisis line listener.

Particularly during phone calls with people with schizophrenia or who are schizo-affective. I am so used to being able to meet people where they are at and communicate with them, that it was jarring to talk to someone who was simply incapable of considering information outside their schema of reality.

At first I didn’t realize what was happening, but their explanation of what was happening didn’t make any sense. Or you would have your classic ‘missing missing reasons’ (credit u/Issendai). Normally you ask questions to clarify, but when you do that with someone having these particular mental health challenges, they will get agitated and then angry. Because for them you aren’t ‘clarifying’, you are questioning their reality.

I then realized this was true for abusers as well.

The reason abuse exists in the first place is that an abuser wants or feels entitled to something they don’t have. By virtue of the way reality is set up, they don’t have love or respect or money/resources or whatever the thing is. And so they have to ‘undermine’ reality to get it. The most effective way to do this is to convince others of your reality, to uphold it in the same way as “The Emperor’s New Clothes”, so they can still get what they want and pretend that they are not abusive.

So when you engage with an abuser in conversation, they are defending their false reality.

There can be no communication, no perspective-taking for others, no respecting boundaries/social norms, because they fundamentally cannot or do not want to accept reality as it is.

The purpose of the conversation is not understanding but of convincing you that you are wrong.

It is not to respect you as your own autonomous person, and to see as important your intrinsic areas of decision-making and power.

That is why a safe person can actually AGREE with an unsafe person.

And I do this often with people who are not safe for whatever reason, especially because they are generally attacking and trying to assert that I am unsafe. You can agree that things are unsafe and that the best course of action is one that supports safety, e.g. setting/respecting boundaries.

So when you are dealing with an unsafe person, you assert your boundaries, you are not asking someone to ‘respect’ them.

I generally give people the opportunity to show me that they will respect my boundaries before enforcing my boundaries, but that is at my discretion.

It wasn’t until I became a parent that I understood how crucial the action-consequence axis is for developing: accurate feedback is how we adjust our behavior and beliefs, so that our model of the world and ourselves is accurate.

Abusers don’t get that accurate feedback, then of course they have no idea what will happen, because they are living in a fantasy.

No matter what, reality is still real, still there and chugging along in the background.

There comes a point where there is only so much the abuser can control. The only person who can control reality in its entirety would basically be God.

In order for your word to have power with people who don’t respect natural boundaries (your body, your mind, your things) you have to show them that those boundaries are defended by consequences.

The paradox is that safe people already know that you have authority over yourself, your body, your mind, and your things – and so you don’t need to ‘set boundaries’ with them for the most part.

Whereas unsafe people need consequences because they already don’t respect natural boundaries.

Telling someone that ‘they shouldn’t curse at you and call you names’ is not ‘setting a boundary’, enforcing the boundary is setting the boundary.

Because really what you are communicating is that you will defend your boundaries.

Society already set the boundaries.

By virtue of calling you names and cursing at you or assaulting you, they’ve already shown that they don’t respect you or natural boundaries.

‘Setting boundaries’ with them just disempowers you because they already know that you ‘aren’t supposed to’ call people names and curse at them.

And you know that because they don’t do that with their boss or police officer, or etc.

The only people I can think of where you genuinely need to ‘set boundaries’ with them is children because they are still learning ‘nice hands’ and to not take other people’s things, etc.

@darthlaurel, adapted from YouTube comment

There’s a concept in psychology called ego-syntonic vs. ego-dystonic. It refers to whether a person’s dysfunctional traits are in harmony with their self-identity (ego-syntonic) or in conflict with it (ego-dystonic).

When dysfunction is ego-syntonic, it can be more damaging to others than to the person themselves because they don’t see anything wrong with their behavior and feel no need to change.

–@jmfs3497, YouTube comment

See also:

Ego-Syntonic and Ego-Dystonic Behaviors: Understanding Their Role in Psychotherapy OCD (content note: minor eating disorder references)

Ego-Syntonic: The Psychology of Self-Consistent Behaviors (content note: academic)

I was watching this Instagram post from Kiki Astor, when she said something that caught my attention:

…everyone within earshot froze, and then did their best to pretend nothing happened, as if the insult was going to fade into the wallpaper.

The highest status person – patriarch, the grande dame, the hostess – are responsible for maintaining the correct order by putting the rude person who’s displayed vulgar behavior their place.

She’s coming at this from the perspective of ‘explaining old money etiquette’, and so her explanation is within that framing.

But it made me wonder about that ‘bystander freeze’, if it is an unconscious response to see what the person with the most status or power in the scenario will do (assuming they’re not the perpetrator of the behavior).

Abuse flourishes when victims are not able or allowed to protect themselves, when abusers are protected from the natural consequences of their actions, and when a victim has the ‘lowest status’ within their hierarchy within which they exist.

That’s why, for many victims, help often comes from outside the group, because that person is then outside the hierarchy of the group.

It has to be self-sustaining:

• it can’t sacrifice or eat its own to maintain it, but it can convince its own to sacrifice and be eaten;
• it can sacrifice or eat others outside the system as long as the system never becomes dependent on doing so, for then it is no longer self-sustaining;
• it can’t been seen or known to violate its social contract

A “functional” system is, essentially, a system that serves itself wholly, or a system that is seen to do so.

If the system only serves part, it will eventually cede governing the whole system. And a system that doesn’t govern entirely is a failure.

From what I’ve seen, a primary source of pain, anguish, and anger occurs when what the system does is not the same as what the system says it does or says it is or is purported to do.

Lies, gaslighting, and other cognitive manipulations are efforts to disconnect and redirect someone’s assessment of reality from reality.