This week I found myself in a state of agitated pause. I had hurt my friend’s feelings, and my friend had hurt mine. What had taken place—a disagreement—had been mangled by something else—a misunderstanding. In the moment, we hadn’t been clear-headed enough to clarify. Now we were taking space from each other, at a loss for how to bridge the gap. I started a draft of an email.

I love you. How many ways can I say I love you? And why?

My first impulse was to tell my friend exactly how they had hurt me. Not in a judgmental way, or in a vengeful way, but in a useful way. For the sake of clarification. In the future, when we’re still friends, we can avoid misunderstanding by avoiding X, Y, and Z. By acknowledging the source of my hurt and resolving it, I could bridge the gap between me and my friend. Done deal. Still, I held off on pressing SEND. Every message merits a pause for breath.

There was a time when a husband beat his wife to show he loved her. The reasoning was: I am invested in you, so you will conform your will to mine. I exercise force on you because I really care.

A day later, I was second-guessing myself. I reread the draft email and cringed. This is how I feel. This is how I will feel better. This is all I know. That wasn’t all I knew. My friend was hurt too. As the brunt pangs of my hurt were beginning to wane, that space in my heart was being occupied with concern over my friend’s hurt. There had been a misunderstanding, and part of that fault belonged to me. I needed to explain exactly what I had meant, as opposed to what had come across. By acknowledging the source of my friend’s hurt and resolving it through explanation, I could bridge the gap. Again, I held off on pressing SEND.

The eldest of all my siblings and cousins, I am the most direct echo of our elders. I can come across as motherly when I make a point of saying I love you at least once every time I see my fellow kids. In a close-knit family like mine, we instill devotion in each other. Our deeply felt I love you is our first social survival mechanism. If it all came down to it, I know who I would give my life for.

A day later, something didn’t feel right. I asked for help from yet another friend. Please read it, I asked, and tell me if it sounds like I’m just talking to myself. Of course it did. This is what I meant. This is how I can fix it. My message kept turning back in on itself because I wasn’t communicating, I was processing.

“Why don’t you talk to your friend in the way you want your relationship to be?” My other friend suggested.

He was right. I needed to hone my message. I needed to bridge the gap between what my friend needed to hear and what I needed to explain, but with an eye on how and what I can say that best defines and informs my relationship with my friend. An email wasn’t the place to clarify the misunderstanding. What mattered was that, despite the fact that a misunderstanding had occurred, I hoped that my friend and I were still friends. I love you. Because it benefits me that you know. Because it benefits you that you know. Because it benefits us to define and assert the dimensions of our feeling. I took a deep breath and pressed SEND.