I was listening to a Chris Williamson podcast today and he put a label to an all too common phenomenon which reeks havoc on relationships. He calls it “speaking in shadow sentences”.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n
Williamson illustrates the concept with this scenario: You’ve been dating someone and you haven’t spent time together for a week and you ask what they are doing tonight and they reply that they are hanging out with friends.\u00a0<\/i><\/p>\n\n\n
What you want to say is, “I really would like to see you soon and it makes me worried when you spend time with your friends but not with me – that it’s because you don’t actually want to be with me.”<\/i><\/p>\n\n\n
But what you end up saying instead is “Oh, it must be a very important night to see your friends again this week, is it? I’m glad that you’ve got so much spare time to catch up with them<\/b>.”<\/i><\/p>\n\n\n
The passive aggressive thing we actually say is what Williamson calls a shadow sentence. It’s the dark shade of what we desire to communicate.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n
Given enough time, the habit of speaking in shadow sentences – especially if all sides in a given conversation are doing it – has the potential to maim or even destroy marriages, families, friendships, workplaces, and churches.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n
At the very least, the practice will frustrate the heck out of those relationships and keep them unstable.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n
It is tragic. And it happens every day.<\/p>\n\n\n
But I do believe with a little awareness, we can at least catch ourselves before a shadow sentence escapes our lips so that we aren’t contributing to the miscommunication. And … sometimes … perhaps we can even coax real sentences out of others.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n