Talking with people plain & simple

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11 years ago

We are all talkers. At least most of us are unless we’ve been holding grudges for years upon years. Many impressions of us stem from how we converse. How we talk is how others perceive us in terms of our personality, educational level, intelligence, character, honesty, values, and many other personal attributes.

First and foremost, we all need to be heard and listened to in the way we want or intend to be heard and understood. Fine. But just what are those skills? And once clarified, how do we develop them?

You’ve just asked yourself a very critical question. Talking to another person is not usually a single act of saying “No”, “Yes”, “Stop” It is a process employing a number of skills in unison. They are: Clarity, Precision, Concreteness, Logic, and Vocabulary. In this blog we’ll look at the first 4 and in the next blog in this series of Communication give special attention to Vocabulary.

CLARITY

What you say is transparent. Have you ever been scuba diving or in a boat looking over the side into crystal clean clear water. The fish are alive with detailed movement and coloration. You can watch their gills billow in and out.

The water has no observable impurities; it is not muddied up. Your speaking is not rambling on with irrelevancies. You are maintaining your focus. Usually when people ramble they are buying time to reorder their thinking or come up with something else to say.

PRECISION

Precision is being consistently accurate – right on the money. It states only what is important with some explanatory detail and sticks right to the point. It does not add to nor embellish the point. Neither does it take anything away from the point. Precision is balanced and targeted.

CONCRETENESS

Being concrete is to be pouring the concrete to make your purpose a solid, firm foundation for what you have to say. It is naming your objective. It is made clear enough so that the listener never needs to say “What are you talking about?” "What I would like to talk with you about is whether it will rain over the rhubarb tonight."

LOGIC

To be logical is to be rational. And so, from the Master of the Obvious, to be illogical is to be irrational. And who on earth would want to listen to my irrational blubbering? Prithee, do tell.

A logical approach should be used in all our conversations but are essential in those dealing with controversial issues such as politics, religion, philosophy, sports, law, or argumentation (debate)..Notice, we are talking about argumentation and not argument. They are different. Arguments are contests of will characterized by stubbornness and emotions. Reason vaporizes and emotions take over like a playground bully. .

Logic is built on progressing building blocks of points made in a logical sequence.

Deductive builds from a conclusion and develops towards a result. “All humidifiers hydrate the surrounding air. This thing that looks like a toy alligator, when filled with water and tuned on moisturizes the surrounding air. Therefore, it is a humidifier." Inductive builds from a result and develops towards a conclusion. “Smoking cigarettes cause me to cough. Therefore, each time I start smoking, I begin to cough almost uncontrollably.

We learn and develop these four skills one at a time. By reading and re-reading them. We consciously act by using them in all our conversation. It takes some effort because it means becoming aware of our lack of skill and replacing the old habits with new ways of verbally expressing our selves. The successful attempts could well change your life and reliably improve all your relationship in and out of WA

The next blog in the series will be devoted to Vocabulary. Please, do not take this one for granted and skip it. It will surprise you and may give insights you never before encountered.

Please leave your comments. Critical comments are sometimes the most valuable. Thank You.

Al Hurley