My amour did something wonderful for me the other day.
They told me how I was wrong, and then listened to what I had to say afterward.
In this case, it was a disconnect between what they heard and what I meant to say, supercharged by my own insecurities and weasels. {1} When they told me what they heard, I was horrified at the impression I’d left — it was practically the opposite of what I intended to convey.
But they listened. They heard tone of my voice. They heard my clarification.
They heard that I trusted that they were telling the truth about what they heard, even if that wasn’t what I meant.
They trusted that I was telling the truth about what I meant, even if that wasn’t what they had originally heard.
Giving that basic assumption of good intent — even when one’s triggers and trauma and weasels are screaming in your ear — is a gift to be cherished.
Because of that gift my amour gave me, the situation was quickly resolved and we were back to talking about various movies of sketchy quality that we’d watched since we last talked.
We all have baggage. We all have trauma and triggers and touchy topics. And we all sometimes don’t act or speak the way we strive to. We all screw up.
Having people in your life who extend that grace is something worth being thankful for.
{1} I’m leaving out the specifics because they don’t matter and it gets too easy to be distracted by them.
Featured Image by Arek Socha from Pixabay