🚂Mind the Gap....to Bridge the Gap
Do you mind the gaps that exist between yourself and others? This story and reflective question will help you bridge the gap.
Like many people experience in their youth, the time before meeting that special someone was rather confusing for me. I hadn’t figured myself out and kept attracting people I didn’t match with.
We can grow up in one city, go to the same school, and socialise in the same community and still think differently according to sociology. I didn’t understand how to mind these gaps, let alone bridge them back then.
Minding the Gap: Then and Now
It was different when I met the man who’d become my husband in 2016: we spent a lot of time getting to know each other’s fears, wants, needs, and behaviour. Unlike my past experiences, it suddenly felt very comforting to say “I like to spend time alone despite being in a relationship” to him.
He nodded and said he liked that, followed by sharing his preferences. Phew! No more clingy, Bollywood-style, suffocating love, I thought.
In the second or third month of dating, I sent him a “this is how Leo women think” article from an astrology page as a sheer joke. Side note: I don’t take astrology all too seriously but this particular article was like someone had described me to the letter.
Little did I know he’d save that article and use it as a Standard Operating Procedure (SOP). SOPs are common in his line of work and he was deeply appreciative that I’d spared him the figuring out and adjusting. I only found out about this joke-article-turned-SOP a few years into our marriage. Boy, did we have a good laugh about it.
The cute yet remarkable thing was how this simple article had not only demonstrated the gaps that existed in the way we thought: accepting it as an SOP had also helped us bridge them.
It got me thinking about all the gaps we need to mind when dating, working or being friends with someone, such as:
Social differences
Cultural differences
Economic differences
Geopolitical differences
Gender differences
Psychological differences
We’ve become more aware of the last two in current times. For example, people often share that they feel misrepresented because they don’t identify with their gender at birth. Others talk about feeling misunderstood or isolated because they are neurodivergent. This leads me to think there are many existing gaps in society with little understanding on how to mind them!
How Do I Mind The Gap?
A family member was recently telling me that Gen Z now prefer to introduce themselves with “Hi I’m … and my pronouns are ...” This is a useful approach as it prevents offending someone. But what if someone isn’t comfortable revealing their gender identity at first?
And what about neurodivergent people? They don’t typically walk in and say “hello, I’m autistic or have bipolar disorder”. That would be a harsh expectation as well. We usually have to learn about them by falling (hard) in these cases.
So, what is the answer?
Mine would be to give someone a helping hand by telling them what we need, like, and want. A tiny SOP describing how we function best could work miracles. Of course, it also helps to ask someone if what we are doing is okay for them, and how it can done better. Life is a two-way street.
Why Forgiveness Helps us Bridge the Gap
It’s easy to blame someone for disappointing us, but we forget that people don’t know what’s going on inside. We may see a person and not know their gender identity before they disclose it.
We may not know what annoys someone or stresses them out in the workplace before something goes wrong. We can make an effort to mind the gaps that exist between people, and find ways to bridge those gaps by educating ourselves and others.
It’s like the signs we see at train stations telling us where to walk, which gaps to mind, and to hold the handrail when walking up the stairs. They are redundant to some and helpful to the rest :)
To err is human; to forgive, divine, said Alexander Pope.
I’ll leave you with a question to reflect on: Is it time to become more forgiving of the errors made by society, and more aware of the gaps we create through our expectations and the lack of communication?
With gratitude,
Raksha
Very interesting questions, Raksha. I don't know the answer(s) because it's so dependent on the individuals involved, the context and level of trust. Probably best to concentrate on not assuming or judging, but keeping an open mind. And creating an atmosphere where it feels OK to share.
We should understand that all of us are human beings, and after that anything else say men or women, with some ability or without some, or say any kind of pronoun we may be using, so why not just respect and love eachother as just human beings. The only important criteria I believe to love and respect people.