Communication’s true essence is commonness,
the mutuality of understanding and connectedness.
Sender and receiver, one in goal and harness,
where message channeling is handled with correctness
Communicate. Communicate. Communicate.
Send and receive, receive and send – love or hate messages.
Reasons and emotions measured for appropriateness.
Sounds of joy, of resignation and hopelessness,
will ring in our ears and pierce our consciousness.
Communicate. Communicate. Communicate.
Go for advice, or give advice. Propel feelings with kindness
to ears ready to listen to outpourings of happiness and mournfulness.
Jump in gleeful triumph in the comfort and lightheartedness,
of patiently listening people who bring creative radiance and mindfulness.
Communicate. Communicate. Communicate.
Body and soul, heart and mind – in harmony and togetherness.
Listen, not just talk. It is a gift, a great task towards effectiveness.
Listen to the silence of the heart, it will lead to happiness.
Listen, and listen well. It is the key to an excellent communication process.
Communicate. Communicate. Communicate.
Every day, each of us makes an effort, sincere or otherwise, to communicate thoughts, feelings and ideas to one another. We speak on the telephone, send e-mail, fax memos and make presentations. But do our communications fully connect us with those to whom they are directed? Do we really get through to one another? Even when we do, does the right message get through, or some distorted version of our intended message?
Communication alone means nothing unless it forges a connection. Whether parents seek to connect to a child, advertisers to targeted markets, PR people to their respective publics, coaches to their athletic teams, the efforts achieve little if they fail to connect to their audiences. Without connection, we cannot make things go right.
In all the communications we do, we sometimes see ourselves listening to another person’s words but feel that our body language tells a different story. In such situations, our challenge is to make sure that our actions do not belie our words.
There also comes a point that we believe so much in the soundness of a suggestion we wish to offer in a meeting, a forum, or a brainstorming, but feel too shy to bring it out, or too afraid to make it, lest we commit a mistake or generate oppositions from the other members of the group. Or on the other spectrum, we routinely seek out the opinions of others, but we don’t respond or listen objectively.
Whether we are in our workplaces or our homes, we oftentimes see ourselves making the mistake of believing that simply because we have made a statement, or we have printed or broadcast our ideas and views to the world, we have communicated. Candidates to political office can talk all they can, but it is no guarantee that they are getting the empathy, much more the votes of their constituencies. Mothers can blurt out lessons from their past, but it does not necessarily mean that their kids learn from them. Writers can craft stories, make opinions or scribble all the words they can muster, but all these may come to naught if the connection is not made right.
In reality, we may have lost our voices barking, and our ink writing, but we may still find ourselves fulfilling only the smallest, simplest step in the process of fully connecting with our audience. The question then is how do we connect with our audience when they seem to have lost the interest, or worse have no interest at all in what we are trying to communicate. Emmet Murphy, in his book The New Murphy’s Law teaches us some lessons on commonness and connectedness:
• Commit to a cause. Communication and connection begin with commitment. We must wholeheartedly believe in the message we hope to convey to family, friends and officemates. Clearly define our communication goals. They will set the direction and help us achieve the bottomline effect of the process. Make our words, both spoken and written, spring from an honest desire to improve relationships and benefit the recipients of our messages as much, if not more, than they do ourselves. Doing these, we stand a far greater chance of reaching, and connecting with our intended audiences.
• Couple our words with action. We must inculcate values that can drive actions. Appreciate the need for communications that is "talking the talk," backed up by "walking the walk." Let us not make the mistake of expecting those with whom we hope to connect to "do as we say, not as we do."
• Speak boldly and truthfully, or forever hold our peace. Don’t let our feelings of intimidation or shyness or lack of courage prevent us from saying what we mean, and meaning what we say. Holding our peace, expecting or assuming that someone else – perhaps someone with authority or eloquence – to do the communicating for us will be counter productive. How many times have we missed the opportunity to connect, and be respected, because we passed up the chance to speak our mind?
• Use our ears more than our tongue. We like to talk. Resist the urge. Our audience is made up of thinking and feeling people too, so they want to talk, too. Encourage them. Then listen. It’s hard to be a good listener. In fact, The Wall Street Journal has reported that, "Overwhelmed by the incessant, intrusive babble of the modern world, the skill of listening has fallen on hard times." It has been estimated that most people speak at a rate of 120 to 150 words a minute. That sounds fast, but the human brain can process more than 500 words a minute. Because of this gap, many of us engage in mental fidgeting, letting our mind drift off the subject, making us poor listeners.
• When we feel the impulse to think about what to say next while other people are talking, or the urge to grow impatient when the people we are conversing with start to ramble or repeat themselves, just be reminded of Epictetus’ musing – "Nature has given men one tongue but two ears, that we may hear from others twice as much as we speak."
• Tailor our message to our audience. Take the time to get to know the feelings, hopes or fears of those with whom we wish to communicate before we start writing or talking. Try very hard to put ourselves in the other person’s shoes. This will allow us to gain intimate knowledge about our audience, and choose our words more carefully to forge a firm connection and establish commonness every time we communicate.
What these lessons are telling us is that we must move beyond the position of communicators who send out messages hoping that our audiences will receive them, to connectors who build relationships with others that help make things go right. To do so, we must fully communicate our entire message rather than just speaking or writing the words.
There is no question that words are an important part of the communication process. They clarify and define human intentions and thoughts. But words, become stronger with the infusion of the extra verbal or extra written aspects that can provide emphasis, deeper meaning and believability to the message itself. This calls for the continued and consistent connection and reconnection of our true and sincere thoughts and emotions to our publics.