I Have A Tendency To Speak In Analogies And Metaphors
I remember learning about similes and metaphors when I was in the 8th grade, and I found it incredibly boring. (Though I still managed to get A's in the class - I was THAT kind of kid).
As I've grown older, I've come to recognize how powerful they are as learning and communication tools. I use them to help me understand new concepts, and I find I use them a lot during a conflict with another to try to paint a picture about the situation or how I feel, or even to check in with the other person's perception.
I'm not exactly sure what others think about this, as no one has ever said to me, "Gee, I really loved your imagery/analogy", but I do wonder if others see this the same way I do.
One analogy I used that I'm pretty proud of is with a friend who at the time tended to be, in my opinion, too negative and critical about literally EVERYTHING. He genuinely values truth, but (at the time) tended to do so at the expense of kindness and relationship. I found it to be really difficult to take his criticism seriously because he was so darn NEGATIVE and judgmental in how he expressed it. I was trying to make the point that when you give criticism, both truth and kindness are needed. I wanted to express this concept in terms of something I knew he understood, and what I happened on is the fact that he likes tinkering with car engines. After talking to my brother to make sure I understood the functionality, I told him truth was like the engine itself - it's where all of the power and action is. That sounds to me like that's something that would appeal to a male, and I told him I could see how he would appreciate that, and that he's not wrong about there being power there. Then I told him that grace and kindness are like the radiator. It doesn't do the same thing the engine does, but it cools the engine down so it can KEEP converting gasoline into energy and doing its work, and that without the radiator, the engine simply overheats and stops working. I asked him, "What good is an overheated engine that doesn't work?" I told him that if he wanted to drive down the road of life with the radiator ripped out of his car, I certainly couldn't stop that, but that I didn't care to "ride" with him for more than a short jaunt because I could see that without that radiator, he was going to stall out.
He lives out of town, so I'm not exactly sure how he took it, but I do remember getting something along the lines of a "WOW!" (Not a common reaction for him.)
What about the rest of you? Have you ever used analogy or metaphor in a particularly creative way?
As I've grown older, I've come to recognize how powerful they are as learning and communication tools. I use them to help me understand new concepts, and I find I use them a lot during a conflict with another to try to paint a picture about the situation or how I feel, or even to check in with the other person's perception.
I'm not exactly sure what others think about this, as no one has ever said to me, "Gee, I really loved your imagery/analogy", but I do wonder if others see this the same way I do.
One analogy I used that I'm pretty proud of is with a friend who at the time tended to be, in my opinion, too negative and critical about literally EVERYTHING. He genuinely values truth, but (at the time) tended to do so at the expense of kindness and relationship. I found it to be really difficult to take his criticism seriously because he was so darn NEGATIVE and judgmental in how he expressed it. I was trying to make the point that when you give criticism, both truth and kindness are needed. I wanted to express this concept in terms of something I knew he understood, and what I happened on is the fact that he likes tinkering with car engines. After talking to my brother to make sure I understood the functionality, I told him truth was like the engine itself - it's where all of the power and action is. That sounds to me like that's something that would appeal to a male, and I told him I could see how he would appreciate that, and that he's not wrong about there being power there. Then I told him that grace and kindness are like the radiator. It doesn't do the same thing the engine does, but it cools the engine down so it can KEEP converting gasoline into energy and doing its work, and that without the radiator, the engine simply overheats and stops working. I asked him, "What good is an overheated engine that doesn't work?" I told him that if he wanted to drive down the road of life with the radiator ripped out of his car, I certainly couldn't stop that, but that I didn't care to "ride" with him for more than a short jaunt because I could see that without that radiator, he was going to stall out.
He lives out of town, so I'm not exactly sure how he took it, but I do remember getting something along the lines of a "WOW!" (Not a common reaction for him.)
What about the rest of you? Have you ever used analogy or metaphor in a particularly creative way?
