Empowering your Habits Part 1 with Tracey Bosch
Communication is undoubtedly the greatest gift we have as human beings because it allows us to convey our feelings in various ways. However, being misunderstood is the common denominator when a communication breakdown occurs. Often, we find ourselves either being upset or disappointed at the results.
On the 5th of October, The ORT SA CareerHub sought to aid this problem by hosting a webinar with facilitator, assessor, moderator, non-denominational marriage officer and NLP practitioner Tracey Bosch. In the webinar, she centred her discussion on Empowering your Habits when communicating with others. In this article, we will highlight the fantastic insight she shared with her audience.
First impressions are often just a mask, and we make assumptions based on that mask that the person is wearing as a pose to who they are.
Therefore, we need to ask ourselves: How do we eliminate making assumptions?
- Be in the moment: Often, assumptions come from the past and come from the future. The place that we forget to live in is in the present, and that is right now. The word ‘Present’ is a gift, and we are given a gift in every moment of this life, and we need to savour it and enjoy it. Living in the moment will allow you to be ultimately able to communicate without assumption.
- Repeat what the person has said to make sure that you are on the same page: It is one thing to listen to someone, but it is different to understand what they are saying. Therefore we need to ensure that we understand what we are hearing.
- Acknowledge what you have heard: We don’t do this enough because we are so self-absorbed with our things, but we need to acknowledge and be certain of what people say to us.
How is this helping in improving our communication skills?
Eliminating assumptions in conversations will help improve insight and comprehension, increase self-awareness, reduce tension, resolve conflict, provide information, make realistic choices, and improve interpersonal relationships.
It is wise to also keep in mind that it is never a good idea to play the blame game when things go wrong because the results amount to nothing.
Instead, deal with the situation rather than the person you are in conflict with. Hopefully, by applying this advice, we will yield the best results when communicating.
To listen to the entire webinar, you can go to https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tcvom0tck4I&list=PLTMEi8yeV-Ct0WiejP9JVF4bky_OMy5my&index=14 or, to find out more about ORT SA, go to www.ortsa.org.za.
