Communication should come naturally and flow smoothly like a gentle river, right? The other person should know implicitly what you are meaning, no matter what you say, right? Not so much and not always. Some people seem to be born communicators, at least in their own eyes and possibly in the eyes of others, but some people have a much harder time. Some people have a self-image that is perfect, yet others around them see things quite differently. The person with the perfect self-image tends to have a skewed idea of how they behave. They will tell you the perfect way to communicate and yet not follow their own rules. (I hate to say it, but we can all be lumped into this category at some time or another any time in our lives).
The most difficult people I find to communicate with are those who won't listen. Remember, we all want the floor and lots of it, right? Personally, I want people who will listen to me and so do you. Selfish, you say? In the training to become a nurse, communication lessons take up a fair chunk of the curriculum. We are taught that we should listen more than we talk. After all, we were given one mouth and two ears for just that reason. As a result of this type of training; teaching communications classes; doing health counselling; being a manager/supervisor/mother/daughter, and friend, I tend to have attracted certain people in my life who want me to listen to them. Apparently, they find my therapeutic listening skills helpful in some way. I'm not saying I know anything about communication more than the average person, I'm only saying I know when it feels good and when it doesn't. Unfortunately, a minute number of the people I have attracted don't seem to understand that their communication style although working for them, is not working for me. This is called immediacy and needs to be addressed when it happens. Immediacy describes what's happening at the moment between the two communicators. If you don't say anything, you become part of the problem. What happens when I want to have a say? Can I get what I want to say in when I know I'll be interrupted before the end of the first sentence? What happens when I need some empathy? If the person has no idea what the word empathy means, then it's pretty tough to get them to try to walk in my shoes. What happens when I just need support and encouragement and not have them taking over my whole problem and telling me what to do and how to do it? If I don't get my needs met, this is when the friendship/acquaintance/relationship could begin to break down.
To communicators out there, please ask yourself some simple questions. Do you find people who seem to stiffen around you? Do they sometimes get mad at you for no real reason, or avoid you altogether? Have you ongoing relationship issues with coworkers for instance? Perhaps you are one of these types of questionable communicators. Do you seldom let the other person finish a sentence, let alone a story, before you interrupt to get back to your own words and train of thought? Do you find yourself not hearing what the other person is saying because you are too busy planning what you are going to say next? To me this could be a sign of poor self-confidence or over-confidence, but I'm not sure which. Worse yet, do you consider others stupid? Listen to yourself. Do you actually talk about people and say they are stupid out loud? Do you "suffer fools all around you" so to speak so that nobody seems to know anything but you. You don't have to say this out loud because actions speak louder than words.
When you do allow the other to speak, are you criticizing their every action and topic to the point that only your way is the right way? Do you hold yourself out as the most experienced on a subject such as finances, or the most educated on the law, or the best judge of everything including child rearing, driving, which restaurant to go to, purchases, or how to act in public? (What about the best at communicating?) As for you and I, who appointed either of us judge and jury over anything? Do you discount your friend or child to the point that they quit telling you anything of importance or interest? If you are overly talkative, do you notice your friend or others withdrawing from you? If you are usually the listener, do you find yourself withdrawing from the speaker or speakers because they are becoming too large in numbers and you are withering away? God forbid any of us are like that, but sadly we all need to take a good look in the mirror and see if we are that person. Are you the type of person that upon meeting up has to update your friend/coworker about everything that has happened in your life since you saw them last, even it takes two hours of you talking non-stop? Although you might get away with it, you might not. Sometimes whoever you are talking to is considered a captive audience because they are too polite to walk around you to get out of the situation. After all, they are your friend, right? They don't want to hurt your feelings. If it's a social setting and you are hilariously funny, you might get away with it,. The practice gets old fast in the workplace, and especially if it involves running others down.
Another type of person not only does not allow you to finish your sentence, but goes off on a tangent of their own. They may not be admonishing you, but simply making sure that they 'one-up' you at every turn. Your story, in every single, solid instance reminds them of one with someone in their life. They talk over top of you and louder than you in order to get you to stop and give it over to them. I find people from large families tend to have developed this strategy in order to be heard throughout their lives. The only difference is their story is much richer, their situation much more grave, much more interesting, their illness much more profound, their accident far more emergent than yours. After awhile, there's not much point in sharing, because you can predict the outcome and may find it laughable or have your nerves jangled one more time.
If you like story-telling as a way to teach a lesson (as many women do), remember this needs to be done in moderation. After awhile, one more story especially from some remote time in your life might just be enough to send everybody over the edge..Teachers are really bad for this and I should know, I was one of them.
Even though I've been trained to listen to you, remember, I am a person too. Conversations and communication need to be two-way. Just because you like to hear yourself talk and know you know far more than most other people, please don't discount the other person's input. I agree, some people talk out their you-know-whats....they're full of b.s......they distinctly have no clue what they're talking about, but they deserve a chance to have their say, just like you. Sometimes you meet someone who rants and raves about life, society, or current events. They are racist and bigots and offend you with their language and swearing. Others seem to have a type of verbal diarrhea...not the bacterial type that you can take an antibiotic for, the viral type that has to run its own course (Just kidding). You couldn't get a word in edgewise if your life depended on it, because they don't appear to stop for a breath.
If you are this type of communicator, why not try a pause at the end of your sentence? Just calm down and see what happens. Try not to be so filled with anxiety and/or rage and disgust for others. From my experience hard-core, red-necked comments about the plethora of others in our society that don't fit your bill tend to do more harm than good. Try to stay off of band wagons, since you get left stranded when the wheels fall off. Conversations about personal choice including politics, religion and sexual preference to name a few are best left alone. They are inflammatory to say the least, and usually offensive and hurtful to someone listening to you. Remember, you don't know the entire story of every person in your audience. This type of talk could be considered rude and mean-spirited and taken the wrong way, even if your intention was not to harm others. Keep these feelings and ideas to yourself.
Don't be afraid to take a short break from talking. Remember, if the person has listened to you this long, they will let you have another turn in a little while. Perhaps the other person would like to interject something here other than a grunt or a nod. The bobbing head is generally a dead giveaway that you are with a "conversation hog". Just because they're nodding or even making eye contact doesn't mean they agree with what you're saying! If you could stop long enough to take a couple of breaths, it might give the other person a chance to collect their thoughts and make a reply. By talking non-stop, you take away the thoughts of the person trying so hard to listen to you. This is a strategy used by some people to dominate others, so don't let it be you by default. The intent and effect is to suck the other person's energy dry, and it works. The listener in this case almost always has to become a broken record to try to have their say. This takes the fun out of it altogether. Maybe the conversation is not that important to the listener, so it's no big deal. In fact, if you're on the phone ranting and raving, you might be put on speaker phone so the listener can go about their business while you ramble on...did you ever consider that? I guarantee though, that if the listener has told you something personal that is important to them, THEY want to talk about it, not the other way around. When the other person is talking, try forcing yourself to be quiet and respectful and to actively listen. Active listening means to to listen between the lines to try to understand what the person is REALLY saying. It's a bit of an art, but you will never develop that skill if all you do is talk.
Shut off your own self-talk for awhile and just listen to what they are really saying to you. If you will notice, they might give a short pause at the end to let you reply. That's how a normal conversation works. Ask anybody. Do not be afraid of silence, it gives everyone a breather and a chance to think of what they will say next. It's not a time when someone has to fill in the void...please, and especially not you!! I promise, nothing bad will happen!
Practice S-O-L-E-R......it means, face the person squarely, have an open posture (not crossed legs and arms), lean towards them showing your interest, make eye contact and relax. My biggest beef with a communication hog is that even if they do give the other person a chance to speak, they will go off on a tangent of non-verbal behavior that shows they absolutely could care less about what the other person has to say. If they don't interrupt, they will check their watch, they will tap their foot, or drum their fingers. They will turn away, look away, read something, check their phone, or overdo it on the grunts and non-verbal responses, or the worst which is to keep saying "no" in order to divert you back to something else they have to say. These types of disrespectful communication techniques are very obvious to the person trying to get the message across. Ask any teacher, any chairperson of a meeting, or any minister...they know when their audience is raptly listening and when they're not. If you can't even recognize non-verbal behavior because you are too busy talking then this is exactly what I am talking about. Learn to recognize the signs that you have talked too long and that now it is someone else's turn. If you go to a workshop and you notice you are the only one asking questions or imparting information...It may not be because you are the only one who thinks outsie the box, you just might be talking too much. Remember, if you get a chance to talk, don't hog the floor. These are basic rules we should all have learned as children, but just like math and spelling, some did and some didn't.
Some people don't know how to control their own voice volume. They are turned up on "high" for everything. You might have to resort to out yelling them and then softening your voice by gradually dropping it down to almost a whisper so they will unconsciously mirror you. This is a behavioral strategy used that might work if you can get the chance to use it. It's often done with music, depends on the environment. It does tend to work on children and some folks suffering from dementia.
They say there are differences in communication styles between the genders, but both styles are needed and lead to some very satisfying interactions. Women want to talk out their frustrations and have someone listen to them. Men think women are telling them the problem so they can fix it. Women can fix their own problems and men can generally survive without sharing all their problems. If we need each other's help, we will usually ask for it and neither one of us is a mind reader. Communications across cultures can also be challenging but can work when we remain respectful. Some make far more eye contact than we do, some find it rude with too much eye contact. Some use alot of touch, some use none. Some cover their face and believe you should address their husband, some want to speak for themselves. We can do this, we just have to understand where the other person is at and not take anything for granted. We need to address the immediacy of the situation. For example, "In my culture, we do this....., so that when you do such and such from your culture, I find it difficult to communicate with you".
I have met communicators that are warm and loving that I absolutely want to pour my heart and soul to. I know men, women and children from my culture and others where I find myself hanging on to their every word. I want to hear what they have to say, because they are so full of knowledge and wisdom and I desperately want to model myself and my life after facets of them. They are mentors, who will teach me. They are the kind of person I aspire to be. They walk beside me as my friend. They say wonderful, insightful things or let their actions amaze me. Their feelings match their body language. They don't say one thing and do or mean another. Their actions match their words. They convey a soft-spoken demeanour and are respectful of me and the life I have lived and am living. They are non-judgmental, and very genuine. They know how to laugh and how to make me laugh. They know how to empathize and forgive. They do not lie or attempt to be underhanded in any way. They do not think that they are the only ones who know anything. We all make mistakes...even those who have ranted and raved about what they don't like about others....including me at times in my life when I thought I was holier than thou. I empathize with these mentors and the majority of the population who may be in the same boat. I understand the frustrations everyone feels when poor communication occurs. It causes a great deal of stress and problems when it doesn't need to.
If you recognize yourself as being in any of these communication dilemmas, don't despair, there is plenty of time to work on what has probably become a bad habit. Bad habits can be broken and this too shall pass. These situations tend to move along on a continuum and eventually disappear. Just like a kidney stone, they're painful, but they do go away. Unlike the kidney stone we want to rid ourselves of, communication is here to stay and something we can improve if we really want to. Most of us will do whatever it takes to make ourselves loving and lovable, we just need the tools to do a better job and lots of love, forgiveness and respect to move forward to a better place. Remember, communication remains the key, like it or not.
The most difficult people I find to communicate with are those who won't listen. Remember, we all want the floor and lots of it, right? Personally, I want people who will listen to me and so do you. Selfish, you say? In the training to become a nurse, communication lessons take up a fair chunk of the curriculum. We are taught that we should listen more than we talk. After all, we were given one mouth and two ears for just that reason. As a result of this type of training; teaching communications classes; doing health counselling; being a manager/supervisor/mother/daughter, and friend, I tend to have attracted certain people in my life who want me to listen to them. Apparently, they find my therapeutic listening skills helpful in some way. I'm not saying I know anything about communication more than the average person, I'm only saying I know when it feels good and when it doesn't. Unfortunately, a minute number of the people I have attracted don't seem to understand that their communication style although working for them, is not working for me. This is called immediacy and needs to be addressed when it happens. Immediacy describes what's happening at the moment between the two communicators. If you don't say anything, you become part of the problem. What happens when I want to have a say? Can I get what I want to say in when I know I'll be interrupted before the end of the first sentence? What happens when I need some empathy? If the person has no idea what the word empathy means, then it's pretty tough to get them to try to walk in my shoes. What happens when I just need support and encouragement and not have them taking over my whole problem and telling me what to do and how to do it? If I don't get my needs met, this is when the friendship/acquaintance/relationship could begin to break down.
To communicators out there, please ask yourself some simple questions. Do you find people who seem to stiffen around you? Do they sometimes get mad at you for no real reason, or avoid you altogether? Have you ongoing relationship issues with coworkers for instance? Perhaps you are one of these types of questionable communicators. Do you seldom let the other person finish a sentence, let alone a story, before you interrupt to get back to your own words and train of thought? Do you find yourself not hearing what the other person is saying because you are too busy planning what you are going to say next? To me this could be a sign of poor self-confidence or over-confidence, but I'm not sure which. Worse yet, do you consider others stupid? Listen to yourself. Do you actually talk about people and say they are stupid out loud? Do you "suffer fools all around you" so to speak so that nobody seems to know anything but you. You don't have to say this out loud because actions speak louder than words.
When you do allow the other to speak, are you criticizing their every action and topic to the point that only your way is the right way? Do you hold yourself out as the most experienced on a subject such as finances, or the most educated on the law, or the best judge of everything including child rearing, driving, which restaurant to go to, purchases, or how to act in public? (What about the best at communicating?) As for you and I, who appointed either of us judge and jury over anything? Do you discount your friend or child to the point that they quit telling you anything of importance or interest? If you are overly talkative, do you notice your friend or others withdrawing from you? If you are usually the listener, do you find yourself withdrawing from the speaker or speakers because they are becoming too large in numbers and you are withering away? God forbid any of us are like that, but sadly we all need to take a good look in the mirror and see if we are that person. Are you the type of person that upon meeting up has to update your friend/coworker about everything that has happened in your life since you saw them last, even it takes two hours of you talking non-stop? Although you might get away with it, you might not. Sometimes whoever you are talking to is considered a captive audience because they are too polite to walk around you to get out of the situation. After all, they are your friend, right? They don't want to hurt your feelings. If it's a social setting and you are hilariously funny, you might get away with it,. The practice gets old fast in the workplace, and especially if it involves running others down.
Another type of person not only does not allow you to finish your sentence, but goes off on a tangent of their own. They may not be admonishing you, but simply making sure that they 'one-up' you at every turn. Your story, in every single, solid instance reminds them of one with someone in their life. They talk over top of you and louder than you in order to get you to stop and give it over to them. I find people from large families tend to have developed this strategy in order to be heard throughout their lives. The only difference is their story is much richer, their situation much more grave, much more interesting, their illness much more profound, their accident far more emergent than yours. After awhile, there's not much point in sharing, because you can predict the outcome and may find it laughable or have your nerves jangled one more time.
If you like story-telling as a way to teach a lesson (as many women do), remember this needs to be done in moderation. After awhile, one more story especially from some remote time in your life might just be enough to send everybody over the edge..Teachers are really bad for this and I should know, I was one of them.
Even though I've been trained to listen to you, remember, I am a person too. Conversations and communication need to be two-way. Just because you like to hear yourself talk and know you know far more than most other people, please don't discount the other person's input. I agree, some people talk out their you-know-whats....they're full of b.s......they distinctly have no clue what they're talking about, but they deserve a chance to have their say, just like you. Sometimes you meet someone who rants and raves about life, society, or current events. They are racist and bigots and offend you with their language and swearing. Others seem to have a type of verbal diarrhea...not the bacterial type that you can take an antibiotic for, the viral type that has to run its own course (Just kidding). You couldn't get a word in edgewise if your life depended on it, because they don't appear to stop for a breath.
If you are this type of communicator, why not try a pause at the end of your sentence? Just calm down and see what happens. Try not to be so filled with anxiety and/or rage and disgust for others. From my experience hard-core, red-necked comments about the plethora of others in our society that don't fit your bill tend to do more harm than good. Try to stay off of band wagons, since you get left stranded when the wheels fall off. Conversations about personal choice including politics, religion and sexual preference to name a few are best left alone. They are inflammatory to say the least, and usually offensive and hurtful to someone listening to you. Remember, you don't know the entire story of every person in your audience. This type of talk could be considered rude and mean-spirited and taken the wrong way, even if your intention was not to harm others. Keep these feelings and ideas to yourself.
Don't be afraid to take a short break from talking. Remember, if the person has listened to you this long, they will let you have another turn in a little while. Perhaps the other person would like to interject something here other than a grunt or a nod. The bobbing head is generally a dead giveaway that you are with a "conversation hog". Just because they're nodding or even making eye contact doesn't mean they agree with what you're saying! If you could stop long enough to take a couple of breaths, it might give the other person a chance to collect their thoughts and make a reply. By talking non-stop, you take away the thoughts of the person trying so hard to listen to you. This is a strategy used by some people to dominate others, so don't let it be you by default. The intent and effect is to suck the other person's energy dry, and it works. The listener in this case almost always has to become a broken record to try to have their say. This takes the fun out of it altogether. Maybe the conversation is not that important to the listener, so it's no big deal. In fact, if you're on the phone ranting and raving, you might be put on speaker phone so the listener can go about their business while you ramble on...did you ever consider that? I guarantee though, that if the listener has told you something personal that is important to them, THEY want to talk about it, not the other way around. When the other person is talking, try forcing yourself to be quiet and respectful and to actively listen. Active listening means to to listen between the lines to try to understand what the person is REALLY saying. It's a bit of an art, but you will never develop that skill if all you do is talk.
Shut off your own self-talk for awhile and just listen to what they are really saying to you. If you will notice, they might give a short pause at the end to let you reply. That's how a normal conversation works. Ask anybody. Do not be afraid of silence, it gives everyone a breather and a chance to think of what they will say next. It's not a time when someone has to fill in the void...please, and especially not you!! I promise, nothing bad will happen!
Practice S-O-L-E-R......it means, face the person squarely, have an open posture (not crossed legs and arms), lean towards them showing your interest, make eye contact and relax. My biggest beef with a communication hog is that even if they do give the other person a chance to speak, they will go off on a tangent of non-verbal behavior that shows they absolutely could care less about what the other person has to say. If they don't interrupt, they will check their watch, they will tap their foot, or drum their fingers. They will turn away, look away, read something, check their phone, or overdo it on the grunts and non-verbal responses, or the worst which is to keep saying "no" in order to divert you back to something else they have to say. These types of disrespectful communication techniques are very obvious to the person trying to get the message across. Ask any teacher, any chairperson of a meeting, or any minister...they know when their audience is raptly listening and when they're not. If you can't even recognize non-verbal behavior because you are too busy talking then this is exactly what I am talking about. Learn to recognize the signs that you have talked too long and that now it is someone else's turn. If you go to a workshop and you notice you are the only one asking questions or imparting information...It may not be because you are the only one who thinks outsie the box, you just might be talking too much. Remember, if you get a chance to talk, don't hog the floor. These are basic rules we should all have learned as children, but just like math and spelling, some did and some didn't.
Some people don't know how to control their own voice volume. They are turned up on "high" for everything. You might have to resort to out yelling them and then softening your voice by gradually dropping it down to almost a whisper so they will unconsciously mirror you. This is a behavioral strategy used that might work if you can get the chance to use it. It's often done with music, depends on the environment. It does tend to work on children and some folks suffering from dementia.
They say there are differences in communication styles between the genders, but both styles are needed and lead to some very satisfying interactions. Women want to talk out their frustrations and have someone listen to them. Men think women are telling them the problem so they can fix it. Women can fix their own problems and men can generally survive without sharing all their problems. If we need each other's help, we will usually ask for it and neither one of us is a mind reader. Communications across cultures can also be challenging but can work when we remain respectful. Some make far more eye contact than we do, some find it rude with too much eye contact. Some use alot of touch, some use none. Some cover their face and believe you should address their husband, some want to speak for themselves. We can do this, we just have to understand where the other person is at and not take anything for granted. We need to address the immediacy of the situation. For example, "In my culture, we do this....., so that when you do such and such from your culture, I find it difficult to communicate with you".
I have met communicators that are warm and loving that I absolutely want to pour my heart and soul to. I know men, women and children from my culture and others where I find myself hanging on to their every word. I want to hear what they have to say, because they are so full of knowledge and wisdom and I desperately want to model myself and my life after facets of them. They are mentors, who will teach me. They are the kind of person I aspire to be. They walk beside me as my friend. They say wonderful, insightful things or let their actions amaze me. Their feelings match their body language. They don't say one thing and do or mean another. Their actions match their words. They convey a soft-spoken demeanour and are respectful of me and the life I have lived and am living. They are non-judgmental, and very genuine. They know how to laugh and how to make me laugh. They know how to empathize and forgive. They do not lie or attempt to be underhanded in any way. They do not think that they are the only ones who know anything. We all make mistakes...even those who have ranted and raved about what they don't like about others....including me at times in my life when I thought I was holier than thou. I empathize with these mentors and the majority of the population who may be in the same boat. I understand the frustrations everyone feels when poor communication occurs. It causes a great deal of stress and problems when it doesn't need to.
If you recognize yourself as being in any of these communication dilemmas, don't despair, there is plenty of time to work on what has probably become a bad habit. Bad habits can be broken and this too shall pass. These situations tend to move along on a continuum and eventually disappear. Just like a kidney stone, they're painful, but they do go away. Unlike the kidney stone we want to rid ourselves of, communication is here to stay and something we can improve if we really want to. Most of us will do whatever it takes to make ourselves loving and lovable, we just need the tools to do a better job and lots of love, forgiveness and respect to move forward to a better place. Remember, communication remains the key, like it or not.
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