Hot Potatoes

(5 min read)

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or how to take care of others in a time where we have instant access to everything and everyone

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Have you ever been tempted to apologize to someone for not answering a text message straight away or do you know anyone who does that? If so, this story might be for you:

 

I invite you to a world in which the messages we send to each other are potatoes. In this context and thought experiment it isn’t important what type of potato, what shape or size. What is interesting for us is the temperature. Most of us will have peeled some hot potatoes at some point in our lives and know how the fingertips burn after a while, even if we use fork and knife in the process.

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In a quiet and supported conversation in which we all take responsibility for our emotions and express them in a healthy manner, we hand over cold or warm potatoes. When we receive a potato from someone, we can keep it and return a different potato from our own pile of potatoes or we can look at it and decide to return it. We can chop the potato into pieces or carve something beautiful into it. The possibilities are endless.

 

A hot potato represents an intense energy that can be transmitted through a message. That intensity can be emotional or come from an elevated amount of information; or both at the same time. When a conversation becomes more emotional, the potatoes we exchange heat up more and more until we can’t touch them anymore with our bare fingers without feeling our skin burn. The more intense the emotion, the hotter the potato.

 

Now imagine a conversation in which we are throwing hot potatoes at each other. What we would need in that case, is either very thick skin on our hands or a pair of gloves so as not to burn ourselves and suffer in the process. Some people naturally have thicker skin on their hands and don't mind handling hot potatoes for a moment. They can touch them and put them away or return them to the previous owner. Others feel the heat more intensely and have stronger reactions to holding a hot potato.

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The more sensitive humans among us have very thin skin and cannot handle hot potatoes easily. Their hands are naturally unprotected and during “heated” conversations they need to wear gloves or learn how to drop hot potatoes into cold water as quickly as possible. With time, by preparing well, they will be able to handle certain temperatures, but they will probably always avoid extreme heat, because they can still feel it through the gloves and it makes them very uncomfortable. When you hear the word "hot" in the context of emotions, maybe your first thought will be: ah, yes, she’s talking about “dense” emotions like anger, fear or sadness. However, even “light” emotions like joy or euphoria can reach unbearable intensities. In the animal kingdom we have an amazing example for this situation: When a big dog is incredibly happy to see you, he will greet you with this incredibly expressive and explosive joy that dogs are famous for. Another dog may just get as excited and they’ll happily wag their tails and run around like crazy. A cat, however, will probably not know what to do with so much unleashed energy and may either keep a safe distance or leave.

Nowadays, and on a daily basis, we use means of communication that help us maintain relationships at a distance without having to send a letter or go see someone in person. That has many advantages and some disadvantages that we may want to be aware of. The challenge that I observe, and I know of many who experience it the same way, is that the access we have to the other person is much more immediate than before and this creates certain expectations, consciously or unconsciously.

 

A letter, for example, takes days to arrive and on the envelope you can only see name and address of the sender, but it doesn’t give you a preview or a short description of its content. Thus, if you are the receiver of this letter you can choose the right moment for you to open it. Depending on who it is from and your experience with letters in general, you can put on insulating gloves before opening it and have a bucket of cold water next to you in case a hot potato falls out of the envelope and straight into your hands.

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Then there are the landlines that some of us still have at home. Not all of them have a display that shows the name or number of the caller and, most importantly, you can choose to take the call or let it ring. The caller will never know if you’ve actually heard the ringing. This technology is already a little more invasive than a letter. Stephen Fry, a British author, actor, and comedian, once said, half jokingly, half seriously, that the telephone is very rude because it vehemently shouts at you:

Talk to me RIGHT NOW!

With the arrival of the Smartphone and the possibility to send instant messages and to have a list of all incoming calls, the pressure is suddenly on. Since we know that the others know that we have called them, we expect them to call us back as soon as they see the missed call. And if they don't, we become impatient. Sometimes we express this impatience by sending a text message saying: I called you. In the past, with landlines, leaving the person a message in the letter box outside the front door or on the voice mail made sense as they couldn't possibly know that we had called them. Now, however, a message like “I called you” is stating the obvious in quite a comical way, if we really think it through.  We don’t really wish to inform them that we called, because they sure know already. What we want it to make them call us, because we don't know how to wait or express ourselves more assertively.

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If it is urgent we could choose to just say it and if it is not we could let the other person choose the right moment for them to call us back. If we send a message like the one above, it is like writing a letter to someone and then going to their house the next day to tell them that you have sent them a letter. Sounds a bit funny, right? Resisting the urge to send a follow up message is a good practice of patience in a world where everything is instantly accessible.

 

There is another scenario that we can find ourselves in:

Perhaps you know those people who, if you see them on the street or in the staircase of the building, just won’t stop talking. They toss potato after potato at you without regard for your time or if you’re even interested in what they talk about. And your arms fill up with potatoes, some of them hot, some of them not, but all of them unasked for and forced upon you.

Taken into the virtual communication, this is what can also happen via the Smartphone. With Whatsapp, Telegram and other Social Media, it is so easy to have access to the someone else without the need to catch their attention first. We can just toss potatoes whenever we feel like it. A fun fact here, a photo there, a comic, what I’m just about to eat, something that just occurred to me, basically anything really. In the morning, any time of the day, at night, whenever you want...

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In our society, in which many people don’t live in a community anymore, it feels normal that we would use these technologies in order to stay connected. Connection is a very human basic need. So sometimes, it's a way of not being alone with whatever just happened to us, especially if we have a hot potato in our hands. It is a very natural reaction to want to get rid of it and one way is to toss it to someone else and say: Hey, look at the hot potato. It’s so intense.

 

It is important to keep in mind that the other person has no way of NOT receiving a hot potato if we send it to them via a Smartphone. The information arrives with no previous warning, which in real life would be a facial expression or gesture, and often takes the receiver by surprise. And if the receivers of the hot potato don’t wear gloves in that moment or are already holding a hot potato in their hands, they may well be overwhelmed and possibly triggered.

 

There is a very simple way to create a safe and healthy space for a hot potatoes message, that can benefit everyone involved: asking for permission and taking responsibility for our own hot potatoes. We want the other person to be able to decide, if it is a good moment for them and give them time to put on some gloves if they were currently not wearing any. Early mornings and late evenings are especially sensitive moments for me personally.

 

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As with so many aspects of relationships, communication is key.

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Here are some ways to ask permission and clearly state what you need. There are many more and you can adapt them any time to match your own personal communication style:

 

• I need to talk about XY. Is it a good moment now?

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• Are you free to listen to me right now? I need to vent/express my joy.

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• If you can’t talk right now, would you mind if I write it to you so you can read it whenever you are free or do you prefer that we talk later/tomorrow/day X?

 

 

These very short introductory sentences have changed my relationships.

I feel so much mutual respect and love.

 

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Before sending intense information through the Smartphone, it is very interesting to ask ourselves the following questions:

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• Why am I writing this message? Is it, because I really need support or advice or have I just been triggered and haven’t learnt yet to deal with this by myself?

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• What do I know about the receivers?

  • Have they invited me to always share whatever I need to share whenever I feel the need?

  • What is their life situation right now? What are they themselves dealing with?

  • How thick is the natural skin on their hands? Highly sensitive people are usually very empathetic and great listeners. It is easy to forget that they are also easily overwhelmed by too much intensity.

 

• Is it really necessary to share what I am about to put into a message? Does it carry any value for our relationship or for the receiver? If I am the only one benefitting from a message, but I don’t really need to share it, I often try to find other ways of releasing the energy: journaling, walk in nature, throwing stones into the river, dancing…there are so many ways of reducing the intensity of our emotions down to a level that is healthy to share.

 

• While reading this, has any situation or relationship of yours with others popped into your mind? Would you like to introduce this to someone you know?

 

May these thoughts enrichen your life and your relationships.

 

Be kind. Always.