#MEANING OF RADIO SILENCE HOW TO#

If I were to go by my experiences with my family (and similar people), I would be terrified of having boundaries and dealing with C-situations, so I’d just keep it zipped, do whatever I think is pleasing, and fester in misery. I hardly know most of my mother’s family and on my father’s side, they’re very Soprano-ish (clan-like not putting bodies in the back of cars), so if you annoy one, you annoy them all, hence why it’s mostly been tumbleweeds since I got married.

This one isn’t talking to that one and I’m sure half the time they can’t even remember why. Both sides of my family are not into discussing or apologising. Ten years ago, when I embarked on having boundaries, I was terrified of the vulnerability that came with not only getting honest with me about my own needs, feelings, expectations, desires, opinions and beliefs and how I was going to go about honouring these, but that also came with having to express them with others. We use associations with past experiences to inform us and then end up wondering why we’re simmering in resentment or feeling isolated even if technically, there are people around us.

#MEANING OF RADIO SILENCE HOW TO#

Our comfort zone can become not honouring our boundaries and not learning how to navigate conflict and criticism because at least we don’t allow anybody to get close enough to us that we might not be able to deal with what we regard as the bigger pain of disappointment.

Some people roll with the You’re either with me or against me attitude, so they have a dangerous expectation that if we are their family member / friend / partner etc, we must always agree with them (even if we don’t) and anything they perceive as criticism can be met with a great deal of hostility and/or radio silence, so we can be chopped from their lives temporarily or permanently and not always know why, or be baffled as to how it escalated to that level or why there was little or no conversation.Įven without this attitude, conflict and criticism (C-situations), whether it’s the actuality of it or just the potential for it, does bring up vulnerability and if we are not comfortable with expressing our truth as we know it at that time, or stepping up for ourselves, hearing their side or dealing with any potential fallout, we may feel inclined to ‘go dark’ so that we remain safe.

Meaning of radio silence