Have a Conversation

How to Have a Conversation

Communicating in text or in person requires skill! Some things to think about!

Would a good conversation enhance your personal relationship? Your standing in the community? Your job or your friendships? How can you improve your conversation skills? Do you even know how to have a good conversation?

As an introvert, I usually try to avoid conversations. Being human, I realize the importance of good communications and their value to conversations. This puts me in an approach-avoidance situation on a daily basis.

I recently spent time in Europe, trying to survive in a culture I did not know and using a language I barely spoke. What a wake-up call to the importance of being able to communicate and participate in conversation! Asking where the bathroom is--is one thing, sharing thoughts and experiences is a whole different thing!

Today, people text, blog, Facebook, Linked-in, or IM. They used to exchange ideas and needs via conversation. Some fear that conversation skills are being lost, or at the very least, being dumbed down. Teenagers, for example, may exchange HUNDREDS of lines of text in a day, and never even SEE the person(s) they are communicating with. They are exchanging thoughts, communicating needs, and often do this in disjointed and incomplete ways. While in the case of teenagers, this may be preferable to sullen withdrawal or outright rebellion, it presents other challenges. We all face these challenges.

The drawbacks occur when these same texters are faced with situations in which their ability to communicate clearly, functionally and effectively are needed. This is where conversation skills become useful. Emotional connections are established. Interactions become fulfilling. Body language, facial cues, and tone of voice are part of the communication process. Open mindedness and willingness to learn become beneficial traits.

Conversation is more than small talk. It minimizes disjointed thought processes and misunderstandings. It is not an exchange between unseen participants. Isolation is dissolved. It is a full body, mind, and spirit experience. The skills used may not only enhance face-to-face communication but may also improve your text messages!

We think that a conversation and its skills come about naturally. We assume it is unconscious as soon as we learn language. Having a conversation involves not only the exchange of information but should also be meaningful, understandable, emotionally fulfilling and pleasant. The following skills may enhance your conversations and even your life.

1. Talk slowly. This is the simplest of conversation skills. If you hear “Say that again.” Or “What?” you know that you are speaking too fast to have your speech understood. Obviously, if what you say is not heard, it is not understood.

2. Make eye contact. Again, a simple skill. In the following paragraphs that list more complex skills, the use and importance of this will become apparent. Eye contact helps to show your conversation partner that you are interested in them. Wandering attention and multitasking during a conversation sends the opposite message.

3. Create a two-way street. Every conversation requires at least two people. The subject of the conversation should not be about either of the participants exclusively. It’s not all about YOU! Or all about the other person. That kind of conversation is a monologue or a lecture. Picture yourself in a lecture hall.The person on stage talks, you listen.This is NOT a conversation. Social media unfortunately promotes this kind of exchange. One person speaks (types, comments) and others read (listen). Rebuttals to rants are possible, but that is not a conversation! Positions are stated, not discussed. Little conscious attention is paid to how the comment or rebuttal is received by the reader, and the exchange does not require an open heart, or a learning mind. There is no eye contact or cues.

4. Be friendly and polite. This is easy to overlook in a social media exchange. Both parties are unseen and perhaps, even unknown. Vitriol and insult can be spewed with immunity.

5. Build rapport. Little if any thought is given in COMMENTS or text responses to building rapport between the poster and the commenter. In conversation, participants seek to build rapport. This happens through choice of words, body language, facial expression, tone of voice. Unpleasant comments are rarely hurled in a conversation. It then becomes an argument—not a conversation! In a conversation, the use of redirection may come into play. Through the use of a shift in body position, a change of tone, an avoidance of trigger topics, a conversation can find a safe landing place and build rapport and connection.

6. Eliminate misunderstandings. Practicing all the conversation skills can largely eliminate the possibilities of misunderstanding. You can stick to the subject, pay attention to unspoken clues, redirect when necessary, and seek to build rapport. These might be overlooked or unavailable in text and lead to misunderstanding.

Using conversation skills may result in a greater emotional high as a result of the exchange. You have listened, you have communicated, you have exchanged, shared and built connection. Your conversation confidence has increased You may find your self, inspired, impressed, or intellectually fulfilled. And if your conversation is returned in kind, it becomes a win-win experience.

Apply Conversation Skills to Text Communications

The skills of person-to-person conversation can improve your text messages and written communications. Replying to text and thinking of the other person applies the principles of speed in response and eye contact. When you take the time to read and contemplate what has been texted before replying in text, you have given yourself the opportunity to consider what has been said and how your reply will relate to the original texter. Off the cuff replies that ultimately come back to haunt you or offend the other party are avoided. They rarely reflect your full intellect and may even misrepresent your thought process.

Taking time also helps to create the two-way street that gives each party a chance to participate. The replies are about “we,” not just “you” and your response. It helps your texting experience to become more of a conversation.

Is your reply or comment friendly and polite? Once again, taking the time to think about what you are typing, and how it will affect the recipient, helps to create an environment of conversation and avoid misunderstandings and dysfunction. Name calling, and other negative verbal actions can be avoided altogether as you seek to be understood and engage your recipient.

Yes, you can build rapport through text. When approached as a conversation without face-to-face interaction, a text message or comment can address the subject, communicate a position, pass information, AND build rapport between the parties. Confusion and misunderstandings are less likely to occur. Your position can be stated clearly and be readable and well considered.

Please post, text, chat, tweet, Skype, Facebook, Link-in, or whatever your media access of choice is. New methods of communication may not facilitate face-to-face contact. Put your conversation skills to work. Your verbal and texting interactions will be elevated with the application of these simple conversation skills.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The object of this piece is as a jumping off place for you to do your own thinking and practice on the subject. In that role, it seeks to give you "A Place for the Eye to Rest". For more thought provoking places, visit https://www.wix.com/website-1 and select BLOG. You can email us directly at Karenmac1999@hotmail.com.