lack of self-awareness in communication

Projection? Defensiveness? Denial?

Ever known that how someone reacted wasn’t how they actually felt? but perhaps they weren’t even aware of how they truly felt either. These are the main ways lack of self-awareness comes out in our reactions/communication and what they mean.

There are many factors that block self-awareness and prevent us from effectively communicating with others. But these are the main ones, we can categorise them into 3 categories;

• Distorting conditions

• Defence mechanisms

• Transference situation

  Distorting conditions are those which impede the clear communication of a message.

  1 - Hidden Agenda refers to the failure to disclose the real basis for our actions and judgements. People with hidden agendas are often not aware of the agenda themselves.

  2 - Stereotyping choosing the shortest quickest available judgement due to the handling of people or issues seeming too difficult for us to work through on an emotional and psychological level.

  3 - Hostility is an emotion often hidden from us. When we feel threatened (even if we do not acknowledge it) we may react with hostility to the person, the idea or the situation. Alternatively, we may displace our aggression on to other people or objects (eg; slamming the door or ‘kicking the cat’)

  Defence Mechanisms In order to cope with internal and external sources of anxiety, we find ways of coping that allow us some form of emotional stability. They also provide us with a way of maintaining our self-concept. Most of the time we are quite unaware of our employment of such mechanisms in the moment but we may become aware of them on reflection.

  1 - Denial is the refusal to admit the truth. Often, this mechanism is observed in shock reaction when someone is told tragic news.

  2 - Repression occurs when anxiety-arousing thoughts and feelings are pushed into our unconscious mind. This repression protects us against experiences that threaten or disturb our self-concept.

  3 - Reaction formation occurs when we outwardly deny the real feeling we have

  4 - Projection where we transfer, attribute or notice our own characteristics or behaviour in other people.

  5 - Rationalisation is the manufacturing of false but acceptable excuses in order to cover up for our unacceptable behaviour. How often have you heard said, “I only did that because I was drunk”?

  6 - Compensation occurs when we experience anxiety about our capacity to function in an area of our lives; so we alleviate this tension by accomplishment in another area.

  Transference Situations are quite an interesting yet very common unspoken phenomenon. It occurs when we relate to another individual in the way we might relate to, or would have hoped to relate to a significant other in our life, like a parent, spouse or child. This may include idealised versions of these roles we have created in our imagination, trying to fill the gap of what we hoped the significant other would be.

  For example, if a boss at our job may remind us of a parent, and we unconsciously assign them that role. Even though the boss treats us well, we may experience feelings of being put down or really emotionally sensitive by them. Simply because, while they are being a good boss, they might not be being a good ‘parent’, subconsciously, we have identified them with the significant other of a totally different relationship.