30 December 2019 — MISUNDERSTANDINGS OR MERELY DIFFERENT WAYS OF UNDERSTANDING!

These last few days I have been made very aware that the way I view and respond to what people say is somewhat different from people younger than me. When someone I meet regularly in a cafe says to me I can’t make it tomorrow see you in here on a certain day and states a time, I take this to be a serious arrangement and NOT a casual one.

This is not the first time this week I have taken an arrangement to be a serious commitment, when for the other person it was merely a casual remark = a possibility and NOT a definite arrangement.

So what is the answer? Where does THE POINT OF POWER lie? Firstly it lies in not getting upset and accepting that we are all different. I do not think it lies in my changing myself to be casual but perhaps before I ‘break a leg’ as it were to keep an arrangement of this kind I need to confirm with the other person that they will be there. Very simple really. And it is good to bear in mind that each generation evolves a different code of ‘normal’, acceptable behaviour and the precept to keep in mind as ever is GO WITH THE FLOW.

In the final analysis we are all different and to honour that difference by making sure we truly understand what the other means is one way of avoiding MISunderstandings.