21 DAYS OF EFFECTIVE COMMUNICATION: A Practical Guide to Enhancing Your Interpersonal Skills and Building Lasting Connections (2023)

Day 1 : Listen

You need to improve your listening abilities before you even consider how you will respond to other people. Have you ever spoken to someone whose body was present but whose mind wasn’t? It’s annoying, isn’t it?

Poor communicators believe that listening is just waiting for their chance to speak while prepping their response in their minds. This is a serious error. Listening can be used to establish emotional connection, demonstrate empathy, and provide others the opportunity to express their views and ideas.

You will study the fundamentals of effective listening today, followed by a task that will let you put what you have learned into practice.

Giving someone the chance to express themselves verbally is an important part of listening, but it is not the only benefit. The first step in undergoing personal change is listening.

We begin to realize the best way to change our thoughts and behaviors when someone gives us the chance to talk about what has happened to us and how we feel about it, according to psychotherapist Carl Rogers, one of the most significant psychologists of the 20th century.

Although getting advice from others can be helpful, we are most likely to change for the better if we work through our problems on our own. One of the best ways to do this is to be able to speak openly to someone who will listen to you.

Keep quiet and give your conversation partner the room they require if they ramble or seem to be thinking illogically. Before putting a strategy into action, they could wish to consult with a number of other parties. Alternatively, they might require some alone time to consider the situation. Try not to lose patience! The patience you would wish to receive in return, extend to others.

The best advice for improving your listening:

1. Encourage them to continue talking by using non-intrusive verbal and non-verbal cues. For example, nodding and saying Uh huh or I see are quick, unobtrusive cues that encourage additional disclosure. It’s acceptable to remain silent at times when someone needs a minute to gather their thoughts before continuing the conversation. Give them space.

2. Let them continue until they exhaust themselves: When I learned how to listen properly, I was shocked to see that many individuals fervently desire for someone to take the time to listen to what they have to say. This is particularly true if they are irritated, agitated, or need to solve a problem.

One of the most important, fundamental, and challenging listening techniques is to remain silent and give the other person the floor. When you are dealing with someone who is furious or agitated, they won’t be able to think straight until they have let everything out.

3. Don’t act like an armchair psychologist; everyone has some degree of psychological knowledge. We all enjoy formulating our own theories about why people behave in certain ways, such as why our cousin always chooses to be with abusive men, etc.

Analyze away at your own pace.

Don’t guess about someone’s personal motives or the reasons behind their behavior when they reveal critical information to you. You’ll, at best, come out as a little too nosy. Worst case scenario: Your conversation partner will experience anger and pity. You.

4. Don’t interrupt or offer unsolicited advice: Even if you’ve had the same difficulties or situations as the other person, wait until you are specifically asked for your thoughts or suggestions. Few things are more unpleasant than unwelcome ideas or advice.

Do not feel compelled to tell them that you understand everything they are going through. Quite simply, you don’t. Even while two people may share a similar encounter, their personalities, upbringings, and prior life experiences will prevent them from feeling the same emotions.

Go ahead and provide your opinion if your conversation partner requests it, but pay attention to how they react. Continue if they seem receptive to your criticism. whether they begin to scowl, cross their arms, or otherwise indicate that your advice is unwelcome or unhelpful, halt and ask whether they still want you to go on.

Keep in mind that nobody has to heed your advice. Leave your ego at the door. After you have contributed, the other person must plan their next course of action. Additionally, they could not be telling the whole story, so while formulating a strategy, they will need to take other information and factors into account.

5. Rephrase another person’s statements rather than repeating them back: You may have heard that responding to someone’s comments by repeating them back to them demonstrates your attentiveness. To a point, this is accurate. There is a thin line between expressing comprehension and paraphrasing another person.

I’ll give an example to clarify the idea. Let’s say your friend said, "I’ve been feeling quite lonely lately. My family doesn’t appear to be interested in what I’m doing or whether I’m even pleased.

Here are two possible answers. Which one, in your opinion, would make your friend feel truly heard and which one would actually irritate them?

So, do you think they’re not paying much attention to you right now?

You’ve been feeling alone recently and like your family doesn’t care what you’re doing, or something similar?

The second reaction confirms that you indeed heard what was said, but it also sounds extremely strange! Your acquaintance might be confused as to whether she has been speaking to a parrot or a regular person. I like the first response better since it shows that the words themselves as well as their meaning have been absorbed.

6. Validate your presumptions: We all have a tendency to see things through the prism of our individual tastes and experiences.

For instance, if you have a close relationship with your parents and love calling your mother once a week, you might feel bad for someone else if they tell you that their own mother is seriously ill.

However, if your conversation partner has a distant relationship with their parents, they most likely won’t anticipate a particularly sympathetic response. In fact, your compassion can make people uneasy.

What can we learn from this? Do not impose your emotions on another person. Let them explain to you the implications of a scenario for themselves. Never, ever tell someone how they should feel.

Recognize that people differ from one another and that no two people will respond in the same manner to the same