Liminalist is for people who want to spend their lives working creating.
This week I talk about the personal growth path to adulthood, including 5 tips for how to have hard conversations with people you care about.
Also, if you have 1 minute to fill out this survey, I would love your feedback so I can write more of what you like, and less of what you don’t.
Let’s dive in. 🐇🕳️
Years ago, a friend told me adulthood starts when we forgive our parents.
I'm adding to that today: adulthood starts when we don’t shy away from hard conversations.
Conversations are usually hard when your needs or view of reality is in direct opposition with the others — like quitting your job of many years, breaking news to someone you care about or telling a loved one you’re on a different page than them.
It's your younger self who believes things are hard. The adult version of you simply carries the past into the present because it's familiar and you’ve already survived it.
This feeling of hardship stems from early childhood experiences when your needs or realities clashed with your caregivers. And when it did, you may have felt disconnection in the form of rejection, neglect, judgment, or abandonment.
Even minor experiences can wire us to develop alternative methods of maintaining connection, even if they aren't healthy.
Examples of alternative methods:
Silence to avoid conflict
Over-giving of power, time and attention
Fighting instead of feeling
Consciously or subconsciously convincing ourselves we don’t have needs
Working on ourselves or changing ourselves to fit the differing reality
Let me explain what I mean by “adulthood,” because I don’t mean someone who can pay their bills, get married, or take vacations.
To me, adulthood is having a clear sense of self and maintaining a connection with oneself, regardless of what’s going on externally. It refers to someone who isn't controlled by their childhood fears and can comfort themselves and create their own sense of safety. It’s someone who knows that no matter what happens, you’re good because you have you, your full time companion.
For me, this is what personal growth and the spiritual path looks like.
This path requires a deep trust in the unknown. A belief that when you commit so wholeheartedly to your Self in this way, that all that is meant for you will align— even if that doesn’t look anything like you thought it would. (Hint: it usually doesn’t).
Here are 5 tips that have made having hard conversations feel less daunting for me. While I'm still very much a work in progress, bringing them into my day to day has brought more alignment into many aspects of my life, and I believe will for you, too.
5 Tips to make hard conversations feel easy 😮💨
🧠 1. Self-talk
What’s that beautiful mind of yours saying about the hard conversation you need to have? Start noticing by jotting repetitive thoughts down. Your perception of yourself, which in turn influences your view of others, shapes the flow of the conversation. This is the essence of the patterns you've been carrying since birth and your map to adulthood.
🙋♀️ 2. “I” statements
Making clear, compassionate statements about where you are is a very key part of owning your truth and claiming your pattern. These feel especially hard when you perceive them to be in direct conflict with the other person, but are critical to adulting. There’s a very real chance you get turned down or get a big reaction as a response but that doesn’t mean you shy away from saying it. If that happens, focus on breathing and staying connected to yourself. Don’t meet them in their reaction.
🙅♀️ 3. Avoid diving into the details
During a hard conversation, you or the other person may try to hash out the details to make sense of the situation. You might say, “Well when you did this, I did that, so you then reacted like this” as an attempt to get to a shared understanding. This is your mind’s attempt at fixing the situation. Accept going into this that you are two different people with two different realities. Again, stay connected to yourself.
🧘🏼♀️ 4. Pay attention to your body
Your body is your guide, always. The simplest thing you can do in a hard conversation is focus on your feet touching the ground and in moments of overwhelm find an object a little ways away to look at and re-center yourself, like a painting or a tree outside a window. Advanced level body noticing is letting your body, instead of your mind, give you the messages to offer in the moment.
🙏🏼 5. Offer appreciation and gratitude
Always, always, always offer appreciation and gratitude. Even if you think the other person is “wrong” or did something out of integrity. They are a teacher for you and this moment you’re in is for you to grow and become an adult.
I’ll leave you with a quote from one of my recent favorite books, “The Courage to Be Disliked” by Ichiro Kishimi & Fumitake Koga.
The courage to be happy also includes the courage to be disliked. When you have gained that courage, your interpersonal relationships will all at once change into things of lightness.
Is there a hard conversation you’re avoiding?
Start with the first tip and see where it takes you.
Hit reply to let me know what else has worked for you.
I’d love to grow my list.
🖤
Adulting,
Ashley
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