I am pleased that you are pleased
Quote from Bel on July 2, 2022, 8:28 pm
… people would interpret my behavior as snubbing them. Now I understand why I had so many frenemies …
I was blaming myself unfairly here: not answering a positive comment does not give anyone the right to abuse.
The thing that encouraged the kind of behavior I used to encounter was my former difficulty to recognize and stand up to abuse.
Responsibility lies and will always lie squarely and solely on these bullies.
Yeah, true, that was only one piece of the puzzle.
Still I wouldn't discount it, it can be an important piece of the puzzle.
And there can be situations where people are also contributing to providing justifications to an attacker, or for a frenemy to turn into a frenemy (ie.: bragging usually makes more frenemies as it sets up a competitive frame).
But most likely it wasn't just that the issue for the examples you have in mind.
And for many cases it was probably more of an asshole personality, than you not being "warm enough" (also because over all these exchanges we've had you never once provided the slimmest reason for anyone to dislike you, attack you, or turn into a frenemy).
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Another follow-up/feed-back to Kavalier:
My relationships improved 2x since I'm answering every email. There's a secretary I saw in the hospital and she was all warm with me. We see each other rarely but I do answer all her email quickly and with a "thank you".
So this behavior has a high RoI. I'm grateful to you!
Quote from John Freeman on July 7, 2022, 11:08 amMy relationships improved 2x since I'm answering every email.
Quote from Kavalier on June 30, 2022, 7:05 amThe most important thing would be to calibrate your reply (almost always must happen) to the input you received. If the input was rather cold, then a minimum threshold of politeness would be preferred. If it was rather warm, then it would be advisable to at least match the tone in warmth.
Thank you @kavalier and @john! I will start doing this today. One silly question is, 1) if my supervisor sent a massive email to all of my teammates (30-ish workers), shall I still reply with a "thank-you"? 2) if some other management team send a massive email to like 1000 employees, do I still reply?
2 ways to go about it:
- Think about your culture and manager and adapt to it
- Test it
Personally, I would not answer a generic email but more to the 1-to-1 emails.
I was thinking about this again: the need to reply to, and acknowledge, thank you messages; that it is important to (always) answer these kinds of messages, because otherwise the “thanker” will come to think you may be rebuffing him or her.
I recently met a person who, when I thanked him, didn’t answer. After a while, I started thinking maybe he didn’t care for me and my thanks. Then I realized he was just like I was: and only this kept me interacting with him, because I was frankly giving up. It was painful but enlightening to understand how I was coming across to people in my life before this thread.
Today, I was also going through the dating portion of PU, and the lesson on “chasing” seemed to me very in parallel with this. So I think that, if someone thanks you and you don’t acknowledge the thanks repeatedly, you may also probably lose him or her (as a friend, client, etc.): because he or she may do something similar to “self-reject”, to not remain in an unbalanced relationship.
I feel like there s little downside to defaulting to warmth and kindness. In English we say my pleasure. Looks like it's an art form in French:
Je vous en prie/ Je t’en prie
Il n’y a pas de quoi
J’étais heureux de le faire
Oui, avec plaisir
Lovely glidings on these - French is still cool
Writing here again as this seems to be a sticking point for me.
I found myself lately answering most "thank you messages" with "thanking back".
One example:
Client: Dear Lawyer,
thank you for the great news.
I enclose the coordinates for...
My answer was:
Me: Dear ...,
thank you for the coordinates, I communicated them to the counterpart.
We are now just awaiting for the payment.
Kind regards
However, I am starting to think that "thanking back" is only a partial acknowledgement of the emotional bid of the other person.
Because, while it is better than staying silent, it still does not explicitly thread-expand on the "thanks" by the other person. And it still could be interpreted as a rebuff ("thank you!" - "no thank you!").
In other words, I think I'm still breaking rapport inadvertently.
So maybe it would have been better to be more explicit in acknowledging the compliment:
Me: Dear ...,
thank you for your kind words, I communicated the coordinates to the counterpart.
or, as Lucio suggested in another thread:
Me: Dear ...,
glad that things seem to proceed in the right direction. I communicated the coordinates to the counterpart.
If you have any comments on this, happy to read.
To me that’s totally ok in your example. At this level it’s more a question of communication style.
He gave you something so I think it’s ok to say thanks. I would maybe have just said “thanks”.
To give more appropriate feed-back: who is this person? Equal? Subordinate? Superior? It could be in terms of status not forcibly hierarchically if this does not fit the situation.
Thank you John,
it was a client. So I would say an equal.
So I understand you saying my real reply just "thanking back" was enough to fully acknowledge the bid. That's a relief.