Comunication in relationships

            There are many things people can do to better relationships. Most are common sense: avoid threats or put downs by avoiding labels, smile, allow others to help you and give you advice, help and advise others, avoid conflict and criticism, express genuine appreciation and give them time and attention. Long-term relationships have many drawbacks and require additional work and skills. If one wants a relationship of any length to be healthy and well, one must take the time to learn how to communicate, conquer barriers and accept loved ones as they are.
             Intelligent people know there are many communication barriers. Many people have what we call "select hearing". Mostly true when discussions become heated, people only hear what they want to hear. With this they are unable to clearly consider other points of view. Silent treatment, another conflict, is often another way of suppressing our anger. A negative attitude will complicate issues. Words will not be heard if used as threatening or defensive. Ones volume and tone matters when you are the speaker. In many cases a person will break down when yelled at, common symptoms are tears and loss of interest in the conversation. Peoples poor ability to put there words to their lips and others words to their thoughts create unclear expression in opinions. Becoming uninterested, distracted or lost in thought creates us not to hear. Some friends or significant others have an unwritten rule that says, "We do not talk about that". Thus, forbidden topics are never dealt with. Conflicts can interfere with communication. Competition, attempts to get ones way, blame, argumentativeness, teasing are all disruptive conflicts. .
             There are unavoidable conflicts in relationships. No two people want the same thing, not at the same choice point. Commonly people hide and deny conflicts. For many the hiding of a conflict comes from fear in the other person's reaction.