Touché: the essential skill of conceding a point

I've been a blogger since September of this year, and during this time, I have grown as much as a person from writing my thoughts as I have from reading others. This is an arena of acceptance and understanding like none other...for good reasons.

My sister-in-law, who happens to be married to a lawyer, told me that she has heard of marriage counsellors suggesting to their clients that, for a given period of time, that most communication occur via email between the partners. This is suggested in order to leave out non-verbal communication, which is often a killer when two people are face-to-face. Thoughts are given a chance to fully form, feelings are crystalized, and shouting is left up to how many angry Smileys you add to your email.

Communication, and sharing ideas, in blogger world follows the same theory. The person communicating via their personally designed blog, invariably takes great care in forming and editing their content before it is finally posted. The reader, who is most likely a repeat visitor, reads expecting to be open and accepting of the content...although not necessarily agreeing. When disagreements arrise, care is usually taken to not to object too loudly when leaving a comment. When a valid point is made, the writer usually graciously concedes the point, and it is taken to heart...a point to ponder.

Brad Jersak, a contributer to The Clarion Journal has written a short entry titled: "Touche": the essential skill of conceding a point. I smiled when I read it as I recently conceded a point to a commenter of a post I wrote in November. I had nowhere to go, so I simply said "Touché". I could rather have said "en garde" to be a smartass and belabour the point, but it just felt better to concede. I crave this for all my relationships.

I'll post this now and, after my wife reads this, she'll say, "Yeah, but what about when..."

You're right dear... "Touché".