You Say Tomato, I Say Fudge You

If I had a dollar for every time a a simple miscommunication amongst in-laws created mountains out of molehills, I’d be wealthier than Warren Buffett. One of the biggest culprits behind these types of miscommunications is how each of us makes decisions. Some of us are Thinkers – make most decisions based on logic — and some of us are Feelers — make most decisions based on subjective criteria. Familial miscommunication is universal but it gets magnified with in-laws because you’re not as familiar with each other as you are with family members you’ve been interacting with for 20+ years.

Sure, Thinkers — Classic Structures (STJ), Fun Structures (STP), and Smarts (NT) — do and say a lot of things that leave Feelers — Classic Freedoms (SFJ), Fun Freedoms (SFP) and Organics (NF) — scratching their heads. And vice versa. But, often these end up being the easiest misunderstandings to resolve. About 60% of men are Thinkers and vice versa for women. So, once you realize your new father-in-law or brother-in-law is a Thinker, you can often let go of a lot of seemingly insensitive things they’ve done, said or left unsaid. And if you’re thinking problems only occurr between Thinkers and Feelers, you’d be dead wrong. But, first an illustraion of the former.

When my husband and I told my in-laws that I was pregnant with their first grandchild, my mother-in-law, a Feeler, nearly jumped out of her skin with excitement whereas my Thinker father-in-law’s reaction was beyond subdued. When I told my brother’s wife about this exchange, she said, “Oh dads are just like that sometimes. When we called to tell your parents that we were getting married, your mom gushed with excitement while your dad was silent until he asked Patrick if he’d caught the Indians game the night before.” Knowing my Thinking father WAS excited about Patrick’s marriage, I realized that Thinkers don’t often do a great job of emoting what’s going on inside and quickly dismissed my father-in-laws lack of excitement as just a Thinker forgetting to express his feelings. And I was right to do so, the man couldn’t be a more excited, happy grandfather.

When it comes to miscommunication amongst Feelers, the real tangled web begins. Since Feelers use subjective criteria to make decisions, the criteria they use can be very different. The criteria is amassed over a lifetime gleaned from various sources. So, let’s say you’ve got a mother-in-law and a daughter-in-law who are both Feelers but have very different sets of subjective criteria. Well, the examples are infinite but you know where all of those stories all end — hurt feelings and sometimes irreparable damage to the relationship.

One of the easiest ways to avoid said hurt feelings is #1 bite your tongue — often easier said than done for Introverts than for Extroverts. #2 is to ask yourself if you’re projecting your own subjective criteria on to their behavior. For example, if you’re a prompt email replier, but your mother-in-law takes on average 1 week to reply to you, you might be constantly miffed at her tardiness. You might start thinking that the only times you take 1 week to reply to someone is when you don’t really like them and then infer from this that your mother-in-law doesn’t like you or is mean. THIS is projecting your subjective criteria and it’s often off base. Your mother-in-law might just be a Fun Freedom or an Organic Freedom whose concept of appropriate replying time is different than yours. And that’s all. 

As a Feeler, I’m not really sure how we annoy Thinker in-laws. I’m sure it’s something trite like we come off as making crazy subjective decisions that make no sense to them. Or they always feel like they’re walking on eggshells around us to not offend us in some way because they can’t figure out the logic behind all of our actions. And I’d say the best advice I can come up with for Thinkers is to be better observers of their in-laws reactions and to more often consider how their actions, words or lack thereof impacts their in-laws.