I have lost count of the number of people I’ve coached on communication.
Some women come to see me with the very intention of working on their communication skills, while others realise during our work together that if their communication truly represented their feelings and core needs, they’d be more fulfilled in their relationships.
Communication really is the foundation of every relationship, and we start learning how to communicate from the second we’re born.
We’re always communicating things, from our body language and eye contact to the spoken and even unspoken words we use.
Not all communication is effective though. Bearing in mind we learn the fundamentals of communication from our primary caregivers from infancy, some of us may have adopted styles of stonewalling when we’re under duress or screaming and ranting to deliver a message. These ineffective techniques may solve immediate problems of “sending a message”, but ultimately do a lot more damage in the long run.
We have the perfect model of communication from our beloved Nabi Muhammad (SAW), who emulated perfection in every aspect of our daily lives. He (SAW) would turn his (SAW) entire body to face the person he (SAW) was speaking to, speak audibly and concisely, knew when to joke and when to ask questions. I shared many examples of the prophetic style of communication on my Instagram.
To strip spoken communication to the very basics, there are two parts; Listening and Speaking (or giving and taking). When we further unpack both elements, we realise that Speaking involves “what I say” and “what I actually mean by what I say” while listening creates a space for “what I hear” and “what I make it mean to me”.
I hope this didn’t fly over your head, because we’re going to go a little deeper.
We all have our unique experiences that essentially create a map of our worlds. No two maps looks the same. Not even for siblings that have grown up in the same household and went to the same schools. Our experiences and responses to the experiences, create this unique framework for the way we think, behave and process information.
This means that when we aren’t communicating effectively, we’re usually projecting our past experiences into the conversation.
We do this when our egos are charged and our centres for productive communication shuts off. Let’s unpack the ego real quick. The ego is often referred to as the “lower self” because it’s made up of our sensory experiences and relates mostly to the outside world. It is this part of us that looks around and says; ‘The world works like this, so to get what I want, I have to do that’. It lacks perception and intuition and uses past experiences to draw conclusions that usually send us into a victim or victor mode when communicating.
When we communicate from an ego-centred place, we tend to communicate to be right or listen to be respond (without actually listening to anything with merit).
This state sucks and doesn’t deliver us our inherent needs of being seen, heard and understood.
When we communicate effectively, everyone involved feels satisfied and accomplished. By delivering messages clearly, there is little to no room for misunderstanding or mincing messages. This decreases the potential for conflict. In instances where conflict does arise, effective communication is a key factor to ensure that the conflict is resolved in a respectful manner. How we communicate can be a make or break factor in maintaining a healthy relationship and healthy self expression.
I have fantastic tools that I share with clients when we delve into effective communication. When you work with a coach to tweak your communication, essentially, you’ll learn how to un-learn the unhealthy ways you’ve been communicating. This isn’t counter intuitive. In fact, it’s more like going back to the very basics to reframe your needs and enable you to communicate them confidently.
