Unspoken Agreements Can Have Bad Consequences

It is not wise to communicate only halfway. Unfortunately, there are whole social and cultural mechanisms that allow us to leave messages in the air, such as indirect or unspoken agreements. Society defines words and how they should be used, sometimes to encourage good manners, and sometimes just to facilitate daily use.

Often people do not know how to communicate because their own thoughts are not clear. In such cases, internal communication fails and becomes a difficulty in expressing oneself.

Human relationships can also affect these unfortunate communication dynamics. People think that there are certain people to whom they can say certain things, while to others they cannot say those things. Almost all the powers of the world declare that they have the right to demand silence. And they have. Sometimes they limit all aspects of communication, and sometimes only parts of them. But this only leads to mistakes and confusion.

The disadvantages of unspoken contracts

Unspoken agreements are an indirect form of communication in which one or both parties assume that the agreement is clear enough and no further clarification is needed. Let’s take an example: Someone tells us to knock on a door. We understand, of course, that this means “could you go open the door”. We can understand the message between the lines by inferring it from what we were told.

Even in normal, everyday situations, unspoken contracts can end ugly and cause misunderstandings.  Let’s continue with the same example, “someone knocked on a door” can mean different things depending on the context.

It could mean “it’s time to stop talking because someone is at the door,” or it could mean “the person we’ve been waiting for has arrived”. Or it can mean “be careful, we don’t expect anyone to arrive but there is someone at the door and he can be dangerous”.

Both parties to a conversation must be in harmony with each other in order to understand exactly what the other person means when they say ambiguous sentences that they think are clear. Misunderstandings would be nothing more than funny stories if they didn’t happen in more complex situations either.

This can be devastating when it comes to commandments and desires. And a lot of this happens. We want someone to do something for us, but we don’t tell it to them. We assume he understands and then we wonder how he didn’t even understand what we wanted or needed. But people can’t always guess what we’re thinking. In this way, misunderstandings emerge.

Indirect agreements

An agreement is essentially an agreement between two or more parties. Sure, we can always make an agreement with ourselves, but in this article, we’re talking more about social agreements. In these agreements, both parties promise to act in certain ways. People reach consensus when all parties believe that a certain type of behavior achieves a common goal.

Sometimes, however, people make the mistake of assuming that there is an agreement between them and the other party without directly asking or agreeing with that party. So nothing has actually been agreed. For example, some assume that if they remember other people’s birthdays, other people should also remember their birthdays. Or if they always put other people ahead of themselves, those people should put them ahead of themselves.

People can make any kind of agreements and agreements with each other, but the bad thing is if the other person thinks that the agreement exists even when in reality there is none. Just like in the example above, this happens a lot in return services, but this can also happen in much more complex situations. For example, “because I’ve suffered so much in life, you shouldn’t complicate my affairs” or “because I think I’m superior to you, you shouldn’t criticize me”. Both of these can end badly.

It would be best to promote direct and clear communication. The original text always loses its meaning when translated, but the risk is doubled when the message is implicit, suppressed, or obscured. Thus, punctuality can help us avoid many contradictions.