Communication
January 22, 2009
Successful communication is always a 2 way street between an active listener and speaker. It involves the 2 parties’ minds engaging in similar thoughts. I have always known that listening actively is very taxing on the mind. It drains me considerably because of the amount of concentration required to focus.
Truth be told, because of the strain it puts on my mind, sometimes I employ some methods that make me seem like I am listening actively but actually I am thinking “when is this person going to stop” or “when should I start listening properly?”. I have read books on body language and learned subtle ways to appear interested and open to the speaker. These tips have proven invaluable in helping me hold meaningful conversations with people. Sadly it also allows me to mask the times when i am not interested to what the speaker is saying and still come across as an interested party.
I have been convicted in my heart of those times when i pretend to listen. It shows a distinct lack of respect for the speaker who is willing to share something with me. It affects me most when it’s the people whom I care about that are talking to me and yet their words do not register in my mind. What kind of friendship am I extending if they speak and i do not listen?
Edited 30th Jan
January 24, 2009 at 4:59 am
This is a fairly clear and concise post. I like the way that you get right to the crux of the matter: your own listening. That’s a good starting point.
Still, I would suggest that you use capitalization conventions in a post published for this course, Kenneth. (Did your buddy approve this?) And you have to be aware of the need for parallelism in verb tense, which you do not use in this sentence: i have read books on body language and learn…
After all, we’re aiming for professional communication, even in these blog posts.
In any case, thank you for your effort!
January 25, 2009 at 11:46 am
Hey Kenneth!
Very much agreed about the 2 way approach to communication. And also I think all of us have had similar experiences where we are put in a situation where we need to fight to stay awake while listening to someone.
I was just thinking, maybe, is it easier to have an open mind and actually listen to what the other party may say? There’s no telling what you may gain from listening to another person (with his own wealth of experience). There and then you may actually be genuinely interested and there’s no need for pretense.. Of course its easier said than done, but at least it solves the root of the problem doesn’t it
And its cool that you think about the impact of one’s actions in a conversation. Food for thought for me.
Ah well. Happy Chinese New Year! :p
January 25, 2009 at 2:05 pm
dear brad,
could you explain a little more on what you meant by parallelism in a sentence? am i correct to rephrase it this way “i have learn subtle ways to appear interested and open to the speaker through books on body language”?
January 26, 2009 at 8:09 am
hi Kenneth, I totally agreed with you about how taxing it can be to our minds when we have to concentrate on listen actively to what the others say.
Maybe can consider picking up main points in the conversations will help? Although the meanings may vary a little but I guess we are just human and human do wrong things from time to time. In this way we learn as times goes by, making us a better person.
January 27, 2009 at 5:59 am
“when is this person going to stop” or “when should i start listening properly?”
This sounds really familiar to me!
While I agree entirely with Chong Yew that being genuinely interested in what the other person has to say really helps, sometimes the “effective” thing to do could sometimes very well be to disengage. It takes 2 to tango (or rather communicate), and when the other party is only interested in talking instead of communicating or perhaps when the other party is really in a private/negative mood, there is nothing much we can do but to politely walk away, or so I think. Any thoughts on this, or ideas to disengage?
January 27, 2009 at 6:10 am
Here’s what I mean:
“I have read books on body language and learnED(or LEARNT)….”
You need to have two past participle verb forms parallel after the auxiliary verb HAVE.
Thanks for asking!
January 27, 2009 at 6:12 am
I wanted to delete the first of the last two comments because I misspelled PAST, but couldn’t. How to with wordpress?
January 27, 2009 at 4:00 pm
I finally understand your comment. I was having trouble finding the correct word for the past participle for the word learn but the spelling looked odd to me so i dropped it.
As for your comment, i can delete one with the incorrect spelling. That’s not a problem.