Article on Defensiveness | Song: Do You Hear the People Sing? |

Friends,

Home from Goose and from visiting my family. It's been a great series of travel experiences. And also, I am very tired.

-Liz

Intent Does Not Equal Impact

Often, when I interact with someone--a friend, a neighbor, a church or community connection--I have the best intentions. What I want is to build our relationship, to help someone, to do good.

And sometimes, the impact of my action is not what I hoped. What I say sometimes hurts someone. What starts as a compliment might not be taken as kindly I intended. Things I do to help may make a situation worse. What I think is the best for a difficult situation can add complexity and/or chaos. Acting without fully understanding can worsen the situation; waiting is just as likely to be a mistake.

Each human action has an intent and an impact. I am trying to do one thing, my intent is good. And the impact on others may be great. Or the impact might be unkind, harmful, it may even be felt as hateful. Intent does not equal impact.

This is most obvious with physical behaviors. It is easy to see that a person did not intend a car accident, a fall, or an umbrella popped open in someone's face. Even when the hard is significant, we know it was not intended.

The difference between impact and intent is hardest to see in cross cultural communications. Imagine a compliment to an immigrant that they speak English very well. If they have a doctorate from an English language university, and everyone they meet compliments them, not on their expertise, but on their use of language, it will feel like a back-handed compliment.

Small, annoying, and repeated presumptions that someone is surprisingly smart or capable are called "micro-aggressions". They are statements that are annoying like mosquito bites--one or two a year are tolerable, one or two a week are unbearable. There is no good response. And in cross cultural situations, if the hearer is annoyed and slaps down the compliment they are seen as angry or impatient. The speaker is considering only their good intent. But the impact is exhausting.

Often, we try to address this by learning all the things about another culture. But culture is big--it takes a lifetime to become immersed in one culture other than your own. And then there are hundreds, thousands, of other cultures where you will still make mistakes. It is more realistic to simply accept the fact that we will do things with good intent and yet have a negative impact.

We will make mistakes. We will hurt others. Good intent does not protect us from causing harmful impacts. One of the primary skills for dealing with intent/impact is the quick and honest apology.

I am sorry I hurt you. Do you want to tell me more?

My instinct when someone shares that I have hurt them is to move quickly to assuring them my intent was good. But the purpose of that explanation is meant to make me feel better. To make it clear that I am a good person. To make the hearer feel better, an apology, complete with the willingness to learn more and the eagerness to do better, is much more appropriate.

In fact, the apology shows that you did not intend harm. .

Keeping intent and impact separate is a key to creating strong intercultural, interpersonal relationships.

Do you talk about how to communicate in your congregation? What are the tips and tricks you have learned? Reply to this email to let me know what's happening. ​
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Do You Hear the People Sing? From Les Miserable (2:21).

One of the challenges that is created by the White Dominant Culture that we live in is that we are encouraged to try to always be right. And so when told we have hurt someone, we feel defensive, and want to show we are right. Here is an article about overcoming defensiveness.

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