Owning Feelings

The purpose of this paper is to explain to you the skills I have used in communicating in relationships. I realized how I have been applying skills like owning feelings, sending clear messages, and describing feelings. Also other skills like coming from an â€Å"adult, child, or parent† places and using assertive behavior instead aggressive and passive behaviors. When I communicate mainly with my boyfriend, family, and friends, I see how the skills in communication in relationships really work. From learning how to own my feelings, I have learned to let people make me feel something. When I communicate with my boyfriend, I see how much we don’t own our feelings. It’s always â€Å"you make upset†, â€Å"you make me sick†, instead of â€Å"when you are frequently late to pick me up, I feel upset, and I would appreciate it when you pick me up at the time I ask. † I would always judge his behavior; like when he is laughing at the top of his lungs, I would call him inconsiderate because I feel to be so loud while I’m on the phone, is rude. When I say those things, I don’t see that he doesn’t realize that I find he is being inconsiderate because he is not trying to be. That is just how he is. After looking back in the way my boyfriend and I handle situations, we both come from different places communication-wise. I always come from a â€Å"parent† place, and he comes from a â€Å"child† place. I realized this because in my nature, always wanting to help people, I tend to tell them what to do (I can admit). It works when I’m the leader of a group in class, but not on my boyfriend. I tend to tell him to clean up his mess & what he should do-just being on his case. I feel like he won’t do certain things unless someone is on him. I am this way because he doesn’t own up to his actions sometimes. He likes to blame me when something happens to him, like if I say something to his about doing him looking for a job and his mom over hears and then speaks about it to him, he blames me. Instead of owning the fact that if he was already doing looking for a job, no one would bother him. I realize I need to let him make his mistakes and not act like his mother. In this paper I have discussed, how communication skills such as owning feelings, describing feelings, and sending clear messages affect communication in my relationships. I see that the things I say and my behavior can affect the climate of my relationship with my boyfriend. I tend his mother and he acts like my child.