Two key skills

Here are 2 of the most important skills to aid communication between us.

1) Listening.

Listening is actually a set of learnable skills. I’ll begin here. It’s been a common experience of mine that when people say they are or give the impression that they’re listening, they’ve actually disconnected from me (or whoever’s talking so I’m not taking this personally!) because they’re thinking of the next thing they’re going to say.
So actually, it’s not really true to say they’re not listening because they’re listening to their own thoughts. This requires us to develop something that runs underneath any communication: self awareness. This leads to another skill which may seem like it’s not a skill at all.

2) Presence

We know the difference, don’t we, when we’re in the presence of someone who is right there with us and someone who is distracted by their own thoughts, worries or whichever piece of technology has grabbed their attention & snatched it away from attention on us. You know what I’m describing here, don’t you?

How to increase the presence that you’re able to offer and the quality of listening that follows? Practice any type of quieting your mind like meditation, mindfulness, silent meal times to focus on your senses to heighten the awareness and enjoyment of what you’re eating, taking a ‘Praise Walk’ in nature, which focuses on gratitude for what you are seeing, smelling, hearing, tasting & touching, without talking to anyone, even if you’re with someone.

Here’s a way to find out how well you listen: rather than speak straight away after someone talks to you, either in your mind or out loud, sum up your understanding of what they’ve said with a lead phrase like, ‘So what you’re saying is…’ and listen carefully to the response. You may be surprised to find out that they’ve actually heard & understood something other than what you meant.
This may feel frustrating at first because it’s likely to slow a conversation from its more familiar pace (especially if you’re in a coffee house!), I have found it a really helpful habit and one that increases understanding & reduces the likelihood of one of the major causes of conflict: misunderstanding.

Give it a try, write a comment to let me know how you’ve found it.