Williamson illustrates the concept with this scenario: You've been dating someone and you haven't spent time together for a week and you ask what they are doing tonight and they reply that they are hanging out with friends.
What you want to say is, "I really would like to see you soon and it makes me worried when you spend time with your friends but not with me - that it's because you don't actually want to be with me."
But what you end up saying instead is "Oh, it must be a very important night to see your friends again this week, is it? I'm glad that you've got so much spare time to catch up with them."
The passive aggressive thing we actually say is what Williamson calls a shadow sentence. It's the dark shade of what we desire to communicate.
Given enough time, the habit of speaking in shadow sentences - especially if all sides in a given conversation are doing it - has the potential to maim or even destroy marriages, families, friendships, workplaces, and churches.
At the very least, the practice will frustrate the heck out of those relationships and keep them unstable.
It is tragic. And it happens every day.
But I do believe with a little awareness, we can at least catch ourselves before a shadow sentence escapes our lips so that we aren't contributing to the miscommunication. And ... sometimes ... perhaps we can even coax real sentences out of others.
(Here's the episode. The stuff about shadow sentences starts around the 44 minute mark.)
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