It doesn’t happen often, but I sometimes get texts that make me angry. But it is not as if my friends and family are calling me names and pointing out my flaws through text messages. It is more along the lines of someone didn’t respond in a way in which I expected, they were being too vague about something, or I completely misinterpreted a tone of a text. The instant reaction is anger or annoyance and I immediately want to send back an equally snarky or annoying text to show that person how I am feeling. The blame is on that person and I want to make sure they know that I didn’t approve of their communication. Sound familiar?
Unfortunately in the world of texting, we are still poor at deciphering the tone of the written word. There are so many subtitles of person-to-person communication that we take for granted. As we grow older through our teenage years and into adulthood, we learn fairly quickly how to communicate with friends and family and strangers. We have learned the social norms by observing each other and mimicking each other. We don’t necessarily get that kind of experience with texting. There is a large learning curve and every generation will have a new way to communicate through text.
Texting also reminds me of 1984 when they are discussing which words to eliminate from the dictionary because they are able to communicate in types of abbreviations or don’t need the word at all. Texting is similar but without force. We have chosen abbreviations and acronyms because they are quicker. Makes sense. Yet, the “lol” has morphed into an entity that now longer necessarily means that I actually laughed out loud. When is the last time you saw a stranger their phone laugh at a text? Yes, our friends may laugh inside, but we are kidding ourselves to think we are really that funny. The ways of communication through texting are evolving and it is extremely difficult to know what kind of communicator the person on the other end of the text may be.
Within circles of friends and age groups, we communicate differently. That is true of face-to-face communication and texting. The problem with adaptation and understanding someone on the other side is that we only learn through those one-on-one conversations with those we communicate with. Sometimes we share texts, but for the most part those conversations are private. Yet, we are expected to know every acronym when communicating. We are expected to know when to use “lol” to let the person know we are being sarcastic. We are somehow expected to know when a person prefers a “Hey” or “Hi” before diving into the conversation. The etiquette of texting is far too broad for all of us to understand because we all have our own personal set of rules. And that is the real problem. There are no rules, yet we all have our personal code of ethics when it comes to texting.
All this miscommunication, this anger and annoyance, can be avoided if we stop to think for a moment about the person that sent us that text. When one of those texts comes through in which I feel my thumbs bubbling up, I stop to ask myself a few questions. I start with, “Is this person intentionally trying to be mean or difficult?” Most of the time, I find that answer to be no. After that, it is a lot easier to formulate a response that doesn’t sound annoyed. I know that anger or annoyance is only something that is happing inside of mean and not the other person's fault. I have no idea what kind of tone the other person intended because maybe they didn’t have a tone at all. Another question I ask myself is, “Is this person angry or annoyed at me for some reason?” If so, then the kid gloves come on. 99% of the time my intention is not to get into an argument. If I know the other person may have misinterpreted what I texted then I need to make sure to communicate more cleary next time and with the softest tone I can muster. If both of those answers come up No, then I can ask myself, “Is reacting with anger and annoyance going to help this conversation?” Almost all the time, the answer is also No.
We infer a lot when it comes to texts. When I read the texts that make my mouth purse and my knuckles tighten, I try to remember not to infer. I try not to assume the worse even when the brain loves jumping to those conclusions. And if I do assume, I try to assume the positive of the scenario. Because when you really get down to it and accuse someone of being impolite or rude through a text, there is little ground to stand on. The other person could say that wasn’t’ their intention whether or not that is true. And I don’t believe that the vast majority of the time we are sitting on our phones plotting out a way to be rude or make someone angry with a few carefully crafted words. Unless we are chatting with our exes. But that’s a different ballgame. Most of the time we are just trying to get or share information with someone, share a funny photo, or just have a peaceful conversation. That's my assumption. With that mindset, it's easier to not let those emotions take over my thumbs.