Blaze Carpenter and Tim Lee

Dr. Langan
COMM 221
12 December 2020
Just Partners #4

Throughout the conversation with Dr. Kelley, both of us were able to learn a lot about

how and why he wrote Just Relationships. We both were able to find practical applications for

the themes of forgiveness, shame, and dehumanization, through his comments and writing. For

the theme of forgiveness, the class heard Dr. Kelley talk a lot about the emotion of anger in

relation to forgiveness. Dr. Kelley said that anger is such a powerful emotion, but at the same

time, it's okay to dwell in it somewhat and take time to move forward and start the process of

forgiveness. And I think that is practical especially for us. Often, we think of forgiveness as just

moving on, getting over the hump, and trying to forget what the second party may have done to

us. But when trying to forget, we don't acknowledge the emotion of anger, and that can really

negatively affect our mood and attitude towards the other party. What we can do is recognize

that this person really did hurt me and let that emotion of anger or sadness be real as well.

However, we realize that we can't let this emotion of anger be a weight that drags us every day.

As Dr. Kelley said, we have to learn to move on eventually, or else we just become bitter people.

And for us, that is really important because we easily create prejudices and unhealthy judgments

towards people who have hurt us because we haven't been able to start the process of

forgiveness. We also want to apply what Dr. Kelley said about how, even after forgiveness, it is

natural to feel those negative emotions. Maybe because of what the Bible teaches us, we

misinterpret that forgiveness is supposed to wipe all those feelings of sadness and anger away,

but because we are human, they often don't. So for us, we have to recognize that when we feel

those emotions, it is not because we are bad people that letting those emotions go is hard.

However, like what Dr. Kelley said, if it is a relationship that we want to keep, we should try not
to let those emotions drive the relationship. For me (Tim), oftentimes, I think only about what

the other person did to me and what I am feeling, rather than thinking about what he/she might

be feeling. Dr. Kelley helped me realize that what we should do is to be human and recognize

that we make mistakes as well. Both of us really liked the TUF acronym in the book, particularly

the truth part of the acronym. Kelley writes about while the truth is something wrong happened,

the truth is that we all have failed and hurt other people as well, and while someone did make a

mistake, we shouldn't let that mistake define that person. Because relationships are so delicate,

there will be times that it will break, but we can learn to forgive and better ourselves and the

relationship. We both believe that this mindset of understanding our emotions as well as others

can help us learn to forgive in a healthy and genuine way.

Another theme that we found very interesting in the talk was how he spoke about shame.

As Christians, we are especially aware of how we should act and when we do not behave to that

standard. Recognizing our wrongs or having them brought to our attention is often very painful

because it means that we have failed. Many people fall into the trap of letting this shame define

their self-concept and, therefore, their self-esteem. During our talk, Kelley said that our shame

becomes "like a centrifugal force, it starts pulling you down smaller and smaller and tighter and

tighter." When this happens and you begin to define yourself by your shame, it will also affect

how you interact with others. It will alter the confidence with which you speak, and it can make

you less focused on others and more on yourself. This topic of shame is also interconnected with

our previous topic of forgiveness. If you have not received forgiveness for a mistake, it is much

easier to wallow in that shame. Likewise, if you have not forgiven someone and relieved them of

some shame that they felt, it will likely have a negative impact on both the relationship and its

communication. Kelley said during the talk that it is important to tell yourself that "this is not
going to characterize my whole life." Realizing that we are broken but that Christ makes us

whole is essential for Christians trying to overcome and remove its effect from our

communication and relationships.

The last theme that we wanted to talk about was about dehumanization. It was very

insightful that in order to humanize someone, it takes more than empathy to do it justly. He says

that some people use empathy as a manipulative tool because they understand that person.

Empathy is understanding the person, while humanizing them is empathy plus fully embracing

their humanity with choices and opportunities for growth. (De)Humanization is present in

virtually every concept of communication that can be covered, including our other themes of

forgiveness and shame. With forgiveness, humanizing them will be viewing them as a broken

person just like yourself and allowing them to grow beyond whatever mistake they made. It is

very similar when relating to shame. Dehumanization is like an inverted version of shame.

Instead of one person characterizing themselves by one thing, we characterize other people by

one thing. Humanizing them allows for their growth and realizing that there is so much more to

their life and personality than one thing. Even if we tried to take into account everything we

know about someone, they are too complex for us to fully grasp them fully, and realizing that is

humanizing them. Pulling ourselves away from the habit of dehumanization is very difficult, as

the wisest people likely still do it everyday. As Kelley said, from birth, we as humans are

naturally dehumanizing creatures as children are unable to take into account the perspectives of

others. It is something that we must intentionally embrace if we are to break the habit. Our own

perspective and humanness will always be more naturally appealing to us than the humanness of

another. Making a conscious effort to humanize every person we interact with is critical to
maintaining healthy relationships with them, and humanization will be beneficial across all

aspects of communication.

We both thoroughly enjoyed this book and our conversations that went along with it.

Being able to verbalize our thoughts and feelings on such topics make them easier to grasp and

also develop, while at the same time getting direct input from another person. The talk with

Doug Kelley was also very enlightening, and we are grateful for being able to learn such

practical knowledge to enact in our everyday lives.