RSVP: THE KEY TO HEALTHY RELATIONSHIPS.

There may be nothing as satisfying as being in a conversation with another human who is willing to be totally open, present and vulnerable. In fact neuroscience research shows that we humans are wired to respond to one another on many levels.

William Condon did research in the 1960s on what he called “CULTURAL MICRORHYTHMS”. He discovered that:

“When two people talk, their volume and pitch fall into balance. What linguists call speech rate — the number of speech sounds per second — equalizes. So does what is known as latency, the period of time that lapses between the moment one speaker Stops talking and the moment the other speaker begins. Two people may arrive at a conversation with very different conversational patterns. But almost instantly they reach a common ground. We all do it, all the time. Babies as young as one or two days old synchronize their head, elbow, shoulder, hip, and foot movements with the speech patterns of adults. Synchrony has even been found in the interactions of humans and apes. It’s part of the way we are hardwired.” (From Malcolm Gladwell on Condon’s research).

Though this blog is not an academic paper on human interaction or the “cultural micro-rhythms”, the purpose is to highlight the importance of responding.

When we don’t respond to the “bids for attention” (John Gottman’s term for the ways we humans initiate interaction), we are literally inhibiting the flow of life that is seeking to express as a way of connecting with another.

All creatures seek this connection. When a horse is lost in a pasture, it will neigh over and over again and very loudly until it hears its herd calling back to let the lost horse know where they are. Birds call to one another to connect and share information. Dogs always respond on many levels to one another. They sniff, they look at each other’s body, they may verbalize all in a way to connect and see if the other is safe to let one’s guard down and begin “dog games”.

In fact, I don’t think I have ever seen a non-human not react to the “bids for attention” from another creature be it a creature of the identical species or a different species.

We are on this earth to connect one to the other and when we respond to this innate call of nature, we are blessed in ways that nothing else can.

Yet humans seem to have become masters at ignoring the other’s “bids for connection/attention”.

What I mean by this is the following:  Every day I reach out to people via phone, e-mail, text and in person and I would say that at least 50% of the time (or more), I am ignored. That is, the person I am reaching out to simply does not respond. And, I hear every day from clients, friends and family members that they reached out to someone via one medium or another and they never got a response back. The problem is rampant. It seems that the lack of response is becoming more the norm than the exception.

The question then is “Why do humans ignore this basic need; this basic drive that brings about deep intimacy on every level”?

I have a hunch that it comes from a sense of shame, about feeling “less than”, feeling that there is something wrong at the core. This feeling develops when we are very young either because there was direct abuse from our early caretakers OR the caretakers were not able to be present and reflect to the child the “wonder of who they are”. No parents are able to do this perfectly. So, I think that all of us have to deal with the feeling of “less than” in one way or another.

This sense of shame does not feel good at all. Often someone will become an over-achiever to prove that there is nothing wrong with them.  However, if one is achieving to overcome this deep sense of shame, there is no amount of achievements that will heal this internal wound. Others may resort to under–achieving; they live from the sense of shame as if it is true.

Some others become grandiose in big and little ways. The sense of being “better than” feels good and can effectively cover up the inner “less than”. .And finally, some not only under achieve but they resort to crime and violence and they may not even be consciously aware of why they are doing this.

But no matter what direction one’s life takes; over achieve, under achieve, grandiosity and entitlement or resorting to crime, there is something else that nearly all humans do in reaction to this deep sense of shame: They try to feel better in the moment when the sense of shame is felt; even if on a very unconscious level.

So, getting back to not responding to emails and messages; I think people get a “hit” (almost like an instant or momentary high) when they say “no” to someone’s requests or “bids for attention”. Thus they ride an imaginary and internal elevator from feeling a deep sense of shame to the upper levels of grandiosity.

This is my theory. I believe that people don’t respond because they get this instant high, albeit fleeting.

Now, some people do this more than others but to try to deal with the sense of shame by inflating oneself at the expense of another does nothing, zip, nada to heal the shame. It only creates confusion, sadness, disappointment and bewilderment.

My remedy is 2 fold

1. We all need to deal with our “sense of shame”; because it is just that, a sense of it. And, it is a false sense. This requires therapy or counseling or finding friends who also want to deal with this toxic sense that there is something wrong with them and doing group work. And the purpose of this article is not to help people deal with this false sense of who they are.
2. The purpose of this article is to tell humans what they should do when a “bid for attention” is made via direct speech, e-mail, voice mail, or other forms of communication. What they should do is    RSVP. This means in French:  Respond Please.

That is it. Simply be willing to respond. Even if you don’t agree, respond. Even if you don’t have time to do what is requested:  Respond.

Even if you don’t know the answer the bid for attention may be seeking: RESPOND.