Communication Problem Quotes

“One of the most common platitudes we heard was that “words failed.” But words were not failing us at all. It was not true that there was no way to describe our experience. We had plenty of language to talk to each other about the horror of what was happening, and talk we did. If there was a communication problem it was that there were too many words; they were far too heavy and too specific to be inflicted upon others. If something was failing it was the functionality of routine, platitudinous language—the comforting clichés were now inapplicable and perfectly useless. We instinctively protected other people from the knowledge we possessed; we let them think that words failed, because we knew they didn’t want to be familiar with the vocabulary we used daily. We were sure they didn’t want to know what we did; we didn’t want to know it either.”
― Aleksandar Hemon, The Book of My Lives

“That I had been shallow, stubborn, and selfish did not alter the gravity and stupidity of what I had done. I had made the greatest mistake for a woman literate in nu shu: I had not considered texture, context, and shades of meaning.”
― Lisa See, Snow Flower and the Secret Fan

“Maybe this was a male-female translation problem. I read an article once that said that when women have a conversation, they're communicating on five levels. They follow the conversation that they're actually having, the conversation that is specifically being avoided, the tone being applied to the overt conversation, the buried conversation that is being covered only in subtext, and finally the other person's body language.
That is, on many levels, astounding to me. I mean, that's like having a freaking superpower. When I, and most other people with a Y chromosome, have a conversation, we're having a conversation. Singular. We're paying attention to what is being said, considering that, and replying to it. All these other conversations that have apparently been going on for the last several thousand years? I didn't even know that they ~existed~ until I read that stupid article, and I'm pretty sure I'm not the only one.”
― Jim Butcher, Cold Days

“Judgment separates us from the people we want to be close to incredibly quickly. Whether it’s our internal self-judgment that shuts down opportunity for connection or our judgment of others that makes it hard for loved ones to open up to us, judgment is cancer for authenticity in
relationships.”
― Gina Senarighi, Love More, Fight Less: Communication Skills Every Couple Needs: A Relationship Workbook for Couples

“It must be part of the inescapable human condition--each person ultimately deaf, impervious to other people's emotions, incapable of deciphering gestures, looks, or silences, all condemned to give painful explanations with words that are never the right ones.”
― Christine Féret-Fleury, Fata care citea în metrou

“If they don't hear your silence,
Words won't do you any good.
Listen to the silence beyond the words,
And you shall hear the divine tune.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Amor Apocalypse: Canım Sana İhtiyacım