Deborah Tannen - That’s Not What I Meant!: How Conversational Style Makes or Breaks Relationships

Chapter One
The Problem Is the Process

Y ou know the feeling: You meet someone for the first time, and its as if youve known each other all your lives. Everything goes smoothly. You know just what she means; she knows just what you mean. You laugh at the same time. Your sentences and hers have a perfect rhythm. You feel terrific; youre doing everything right. And you think shes terrific too.

But you also know the other feeling: You meet someone, you try to be friendly, to make a good impression, but everything goes wrong. There are uncomfortable silences. You fish for topics. You bump into each other as you both start at once and then both stop. You start to say something interesting but he cuts you off. He starts saying something and never seems to finish. You try to lighten the mood and he looks as if you punched him in the stomach. He says what may be intended as a joke but is more rude than funny. Whatever you do to make things better makes them worse.

If conversation always followed the first pattern, I wouldnt have to write this book. If it always followed the second, no one would ever talk to anyone else and nothing would get done. Talk is mostly somewhere in the middle. We do get things done; we talk to family and friends and colleagues and neighbors. Sometimes what people say seems to make perfect sense; sometimes it sounds a little odd. If someone doesnt quite get our point, we let it go, the talk continues, and no one pays much attention.

But if an important outcome hangs on the conversationif its a job interview, a business meeting, or a doctors appointmentthe results can be very serious. If its a public negotiation or an international summit conference, the results can be dire indeed. And if the conversation is with the most important person in your life, the little hitches can become big ones, and you can end up in a conversation of the second sort without knowing how you got there. If this happens all the timeat home, at work, or in routine day-to-day encounters, so that you feel misunderstood all the time and never quite understand what others are getting atyou start to doubt your own ability, or even your sanity. Then you cant not pay attention.

For example, Judy Scott is applying for a job as office manager at the headquarters of an ice-cream distributora position shes well qualified for. Her last job, although it was called administrative assistant, actually involved running the whole office, and she did a great job. But at the interview, she never gets a chance to explain this. The interviewer does all the talking, Judy leaves feeling frustrated and she doesnt get the job.

Or at home: Sandy and Matt have a good marriage. They love each other and are quite happy. But a recurring source of tension is that Sandy often feels that Matt doesnt really listen to her. He asks her a question, but before she can answer, he asks anotheror starts to answer it himself. When they get together with Matts friends, the conversation goes so fast, Sandy cant get a word in edgewise. Afterward, Matt complains that she was too quiet, though she certainly isnt quiet when she gets together with her friends. Matt thinks its because she doesnt like his friends, but the only reason Sandy doesnt like them is that she feels they ignore her and she cant find a way to get into their conversation.

Sometimes strains in a conversation reflect real differences between people: they are angry at each other; they really are at cross-purposes. Books have been written about this situation: how to fight fair, how to assert yourself. But sometimes strains and kinks develop when there really are no basic differences of opinion, when everyone is sincerely trying to get along. This is the type of miscommunication that drives people crazy. And it is usually caused by differences in conversational style.

A perfectly tuned conversation is a vision of sanitya ratification of ones way of being human and ones place in the world. And nothing is more deeply disquieting than a conversation gone awry. To say something and see it taken to mean something else; to try to be helpful and be thought pushy; to try to be considerate and be called cold; to try to establish a rhythm so that talk will glide effortlessly about the room, only to end up feeling like a conversational clod who cant pick up the beatsuch failure at talk undermines ones sense of competence and of being a right sort of person. If it happens continually, it can undermine ones feeling of psychological well-being.