Interacting with others can be one of the most challenging things that you do throughout your life.  Think about it.  Everywhere you look, there is a “relationship.”  You have a working relationship with your boss, co-workers, customers, and vendors.  At home, you have a relationship with your mate, children, neighbors, door-to-door sales people, garbage person, delivery person, mail carrier, etc.

Everywhere you look there is some sort of “relationship” with people.  You even have a “relationship” with other drivers on the road, with people on the bus, train and plane.   Unless you move to a desolate place to live off of the land in solitude, you most likely cannot avoid these “relationships.”

So the question is how to you adapt yourself for each of these “relationships” without giving up your truth?  Take for instance, a politician that puts on the “public face.”  How can they adapt to an image the public can relate to, without sacrificing their own truth about who they really are?  Some politicians admittedly do a poor job of this, because they in fact morph into someone who they are not, while pretending and acting when up on the “public stage.”

However, in your life, you most likely are not in the “public eye” and can make small adaptations so that you can easily relate to whoever you are interacting with.   For example, your interaction with the person picking up your weekly garbage, may need to be a little different from your interaction with your largest customer at work.   Neither is better or worse, it is just different.   The person dressed in clothes suitable for loading trash may not want to feel like they are being talked “down to” if you are wearing an expensive suit.  It is up to you to make sure you can adapt the conversation, your language and demeanor to match the person for which you are interacting.

When you are speaking to your mate, you need to have empathy for the current struggles your mate may be going through.   You need to adapt your tone and conversation to one that is gentle and caring.  When you interact with your children, you need to understand the pressures they may have outside of the home, and adapt the tone of the conversation appropriately.  This technique holds true for any and all of the “relationships” that you encounter throughout your day.

When you make a conscious decision to “adapt” your behaviors, tone, language, and content of the discussion based on who you are interacting with, you may find that the relationships in your life magically seem to “improve.”  It is up to us to make these seemingly small changes so that we can set an example to others on how to interact with others.

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Our schools teach us many things.  Our parents teach us many things.  Society teaches us many things.  Let’s help others learn how to interact with the world, by setting the example we care to see mirrored back to us in our relationships.

Written Wed, Jul 30, 2014, 7:40 – 7:52 AM MT