A few years ago, I took the bus from Dinuba to Reedley, two small towns in California. Some of you will recognize the name Reedley — I am from there, and my mom lives there now.

I was the only passenger on the bus, and the driver was very friendly, so we had a little conversation.

One of the first things the driver mentioned was that he loves the variety of bus driver life. He gets to see the seasons change, he gets to see new buildings get put up and old ones get torn down, he gets to talk to different people all the time. He couldn’t imagine living the monotonous life of an office worker, going into the same office every day, sitting at the same desk every day, seeing the same people every day.

Keep in mind that this driver drives the same 1-hour circuit, over and over and over, day in and day out, 5 days a week, month in and month out, for years on end. When the driver said he sees variety in his work, and monotony in an office worker’s, it made me think, many office workers would say the same thing, except in reverse. They would see variety in their own work, and monotony in his.

Where the bus driver sees the monotony of office work, the office worker would see the challenges of staying on top of rapidly evolving business practices and negotiating the ever-changing, choppy waters of office politics.

And where the office worker would see the monotony of bus driving, the bus driver sees the excitement of watching the evolution of a community and the changing of the seasons.

So the opinion each group holds towards the other is, “My work is interesting, yours is boring.”

The opinions are the same. The opinion Group A directs at Group B is the same as the opinion Group B directs at Group A.

Now, just for the fun of it, we’re going to grab a concept from physics, throw it into the mix, and see where it takes us.

Back in university, I learned about this thing called “Doppler shift.” Doppler shift is the way an object changes colors depending on whether it’s moving towards you or away from you. If an object is moving towards you, it looks bluer than usual. If it’s moving away from you, it looks redder than usual.

For example, in the drawing above, a white ball is speeding towards Guy A’s face. Guy A and Guy B are both looking at the same white ball, but neither guy thinks the ball is white. Guy A thinks it’s bluish, and Guy B thinks it’s reddish.

That’s Doppler shift. An object moving towards you looks different than the same object moving away from you.

You don’t see Doppler shift on an everyday basis. If I walk towards you from across the room, I don’t look blue. And if I walk away from you, I don’t look red.

But when things are moving really fast, like in outer space, the change is noticeable. If you look through a telescope at a spaceship flying away from the earth at a gazillion miles per hour, the spaceship will look redder than it really is. But if the same spaceship turns around and starts flying towards the earth at a gazillion miles per hour, it will look bluer than it really is. The spaceship itself isn’t really changing, but someone looking at it with a telescope thinks it is.

Communication with another human being is the same way. The object you are sending towards your counterpart (whether that object is an opinion, or an attitude, or an action) might be exactly like the object your counterpart is sending towards you. But communication undergoes a Doppler shift of its own, so to you, the communication you are sending will look different from the communication you are receiving, even though the two are exactly the same.

Here’s an example: You and I have been fighting. I decide to end the fight by sending out a peace offering. I send the peace offering towards you, and I perceive it as red (because it’s moving away from me), but you perceive it as blue (because it’s moving towards you). I meant to be nice, but you misread it and think I’m still being hostile. You, in turn, think to yourself, “I’m going to end this”. So you send me a peace offering. To you, it looks red (because it’s moving away from you), but to me, it looks blue (because it’s moving towards me).

We both want peace, and we’re both trying to say we want peace, but we’re both misunderstanding the other person, thinking he wants to continue the fight.

This happens a lot in interpersonal communication, but you can see it happening in communication between nations, too. Both countries will think they are sending out gestures of peace, and they can’t understand why the other country responds with so much hostility.

You can see what’s happening when you shuttle back and forth between the two countries. Nation A will pull you aside and ask, “We just want peace, why do they hate us so much.” And then you’ll go over to Nation B, and they will pull you aside and ask the exact same thing.

The other party isn’t really hostile. It just looks like it to you.