Relationship Advice on Poor Conversation & Communication Skills

Can we talk? NOT! 

There may be an exception to the rule, but it seems to us that every relationship starts with a conversation.

If the first one goes well, there may be dozens or hundreds or thousands that follow. In the happiest of all circumstances, those conversations continue for a lifetime.

Unfortunately, many men are adept in the art of making a good first impression by being great conversationalists. Also unfortunately, they’re so good at it because they’ve done it so many times before.

But where deep, honest, two-way communication is concerned, the devil is in the details, and in this case, the details come in those conversations that follow the first one.

This is where Prince Charming’s crown may lose some of its glitter and frog warts start to show.

Here are some conversational clues that--smooth talker though he may be--if you listen closely you’ll start to hear some croaking in between the lines. 

Does he interrupt frequently? We mentioned this one earlier, but it bears repeating. If he won’t let you finish a sentence, it either means

he thinks he’s smarter than you, or

you--or what you have to say—aren’t worth listening to.

In either case, when one partner in a relationship feels “more equal” than another, it’s not a good thing.

It should be noted though that geographical differences may come into play here.

Deborah Tannen, in her research on conversational communication, notes that there are different degrees of acceptability where interrupting is concerned.

For instance, if you’re a slow talking Southern Belle and you hook up with a Type A guy who grew up in New York City, you may occasionally find him trying to hurry you along by helping you reach the end of your sentences.

So you may want to take geographical and cultural differences into consideration when making judgments on this subject.

Do your conversations often focus on him and his accomplishments? Does he talk a lot about himself without being prompted by your questions? Does he bring up things he’s accomplished as if he’s trying to impress you?

Every woman probably feels a little flattered if a guy wants to show off a bit for her. It signals that he wants her to like him.

But it might also signal that he has an inflated sense of affection for himself, which does not bode well for the future of a relationship.

 
Is he always the hero in his stories? As the grammatically-challenged Hall of Fame baseball pitcher Dizzy Dean once said,

“It ain’t braggin’ if you done it…”

But if most of his stories seem to be aimed mainly at glorifying himself, you have to ask, “Why does he feel he needs to do that?”

Does he ask too much about you while telling you almost nothing about himself? True, you want a guy who is interested in learning more about you.

But sometimes he’ll spend much of his time trying to learn a lot about you because he doesn’t want to reveal much about himself.

As mentioned before…if he’s vague about the details in his life—job, family, friends, personal history—it’s probably because there’s something he doesn’t want you to know.

Which has to make you wonder, doesn’t it?

Do the details of his stories change with each telling? Everyone in our group has admitted that they’ll sometimes “exaggerate for effect” or “customize” a story a little to make it more interesting. It reminds us of what Mark Twain said,

“Nothing spoils a good story like the arrival of an eyewitness…”

Nonetheless, if you hear the same story from your Prince several times, and some of the material facts change significantly from one telling to the next, you might conclude the Prince is something other than just a bad storyteller.

He might be habitually loose with the truth…which makes him considerably less promising as a potential partner.

Related articles in this section:

Communication Style

Body Language

Unspoken Expectations

Verbal Abuse