Communicating in Relationships

 This week I learned a lot of information about communicating. I have always valued communication, and I have loved learning more about communication this week. 

One thing I have found interesting this week is talking about how there are different ways of communicating rather than just words. 14% of communication comes from our words, 35% comes from our tone, and 51% comes from body language. When you are talking to someone, you are not just listening and encoding their words, you are also encoding their tone which they are speaking to you in and you are also encoding their body language. I found it interesting how little percent words make up and how much body language makes up, but it also makes a lot of sense to me. If my fiancé for example was telling me how much he loves me, but he said in an angry tone and was facing away from me, I don’t know if I would believe him. Our society has changed so much, where a lot of our communication comes solely from words. Most kids only text or snapchat their friends. The risks of this is that we don’t get to see the 51% of communicating, and this leads to misinterpreting people’s meanings. It’s also a lot easier for people to lie with their words, and it is a lot harder to lie with our tone and our body language. 

This week I learned about this process that can help improve communication. This process is called The 5 Secrets of Effective Communication. The first step in this process is called The Disarming Technique, the purpose of this technique is to find the “kernel of truth” in what someone is saying. The purpose of this technique is to acknowledge why the other person is mad and instead of defending ourselves and getting mad at them it is to say they are right. For example, if my roommate was angry with me and told me “you never clean”, even if what she said is not true, by using the disarming technique I would say you are right, I should help out more and I’m sorry. The second step is to express feelings of empathy. In this step you repeat what they told you and use emotional labels to understand how they feel. In my example if my roommate got mad at me for not cleaning up, I could say when I don’t clean up does it make you feel like you have to clean up after me?, does it make you feel used when I don't clean up? The next part of the process is to inquire. Ask them, am I getting that right? And then also ask them to expand on their feelings, express that you want to know how they are feeling. The next step is to come up with I feel statements. The template for “I Feel” statements looks like this when __(event)__ I feel ___(emotion)___ because __thought__ I would like ___(request)__. With the example of my roommate I could say when you get angry with me to clean up I feel sad and mad because it makes me think you don’t like me I will try and clean up more and I would like it if you could try and be a little more patient with me. The last step in this process is called the stroking method. In this step the purpose is to tell them something you honestly and authentically love about them. For example with my roommate, I would tell her I am so grateful that you always try and keep the apartment clean, thank you. 

This process can help fix any problem/ disagreement that you are having with someone. It doesn't have to just be your spouse, it can help arguments with roommates, friends, family and coworkers.


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