Some secrets to communication

              This week in-class we talked about communication and how important communication can be in a relationship. I was excited about this week talking about communicating and how we can better communicate with people around us and one of the things that we learned this week was the five secrets to better communication. now the secret is kind of a buzzword right now we all want to know this secret to perfect skin the best hair how to buy the best car we all want the secrets. so here we go talking about the five secrets to better communication.

These secrets were published by David B Burns and these secrets really help communication and any conversation that you will have with somebody. The first part of this communication is empathy. David Burns created an acronym for these five steps and the acronym is EAR in this first part of the communication is about empathy. The first step is to use the disarming technique. now that might sound a little scary disarming somebody, but this really means finding something or some truth and what somebody is saying.  You are just trying to make them feel like they still have somewhat of control over the situation. you were trying to find a small nugget of truth for the other person to know that you are listening to them. The next part is the empathy part, which puts yourself in their shoes seeing the world through their eyes. When we step up to the plate with this empathy in hand, stepping into their shoes and looking at the world through their eyes, they know that we listen to them and feel what they feel. Everybody just wants to be heard it does not matter if we are four or if we are 84, we want to feel heard, and somebody took knowledge of us.  the third step in this process is inquiry or asking gentle questions about whatever the person is feeling, and these do not have to be complicated questions they can be like “ am I hearing you right?” they do not have to belong questions they just have to be there to make sure that they know that you're hearing them.

The next letter in the acronym is a which is represented by assertiveness. now, this is one of the most important steps in the five secrets to effective communication. the step is I feel statements. now, these are hard to master but with lots of time and practice we can have these I feel statements down like the back of our hand. these statements are like I feel angry, I feel upset, I feel happy, I am excited, and so on and so forth. these questions let the person you are communicating with see your side of the story. for example, “ I feel so upset that you think that.” Or “ I feel upset when you say things like that” these really help people understand what is happening and where we can improve and know where we are coming from.

The last letter R in this file with secrets to communications is respected now what he's talking about here is stroking or conveying an attitude of respect even if you feel frustrated or angry with the other person. this is like finding the positive in this situation even in the heat of battle. This is being respectful in this situation not screaming yelling pointing fingers blaming everything else we just need to respect the situation in what we are talking about.

it is hard to communicate with somebody. we have all been there struggling to understand where this person is coming from and why they are so angry at you. communication takes lots of time and practice. I am not the greatest communicator, but I am working on it and learning how to communicate better with friend’s family, and people I work with. when everybody is an OK communicator and can get their point across, we would all be better off no more fighting no more pointing fingers if we all learn how to communicate everyone would be happier.