How Often Do We Engage in a REAL Conversation?
We can’t live without interacting with others. Yes, even though nowadays we do it mostly through online channels. Despite making lives easier, connecting people all over the world, nothing beats conversing with others in person. A REAL conversation.
A REAL conversation with thoughts and emotions that flow instantly, that allows you to see reactions and body language and connects everyone intuitively. That is REAL conversation. Ask yourself, are you being real when you communicate? Or are you being real selectively depending on who you are with? If so, have you ever thought of why?
Mostly, people find themselves wearing different masks with different people because:
a. They find it hard to communicate with certain people
b. They are not comfortable with difficult conversation
c. They often felt frustrated to repeat themselves before anyone actually got them
d. They are very concerned about what others' think of them
The consequences? These people ended up avoiding confrontations and agreeing with the other party, which in the end causes dissatisfaction within themselves. Unresolved frustrations and dissatisfaction often lead to low motivation, negativity, and low sense of self-worth, which will have a bad impact on their personal lives and career.
How to fix this?
First, have the courage to be real, to yourself and others.
Yes, courage. The courage to stick to your beliefs, the courage to admit when you are wrong, the courage to discuss for solutions when you are facing problems, the courage to meet halfway when you are in conflicts, the courage to talk to those your feel superior to you, the courage to get people to understand you, the courage to accept what others think of you, the courage to feel contented instead of bottling everything up, the courage to be rational instead of emotional.
It takes time and practise to be real, especially for those who have the habit of masking their thoughts and emotions. You’ve got to start breaking the habit. Practice being real for a day, then a week, a month, and continue. Change in the way we communicate will change how we look at things and even our lives!
Second, be R.E.A.L - reflect, emotion, aware, learn. Have you ever found yourself replaying a situation in your mind over and over again? Does this situation usually involve dissatisfaction, frustration, anger, conflict? And having that keeps on replaying in your mind makes you feel? Better? I supposed no, right? Then why do we keep doing it? It is great that you are reflecting on what happened, but why not learn from it and move on as well?
We say experience is the best teacher. But we often ponder on how the past affected us instead of learning from it, bad ones or good ones. Bad ones teach us what we should do differently in recurring events, while good ones teach us what we should improve. Here is how you could use R.E.A.L tool to process that experience, learn from it and move on:
First, you reflect on what happened, what did you do, what did others do, how did you react to it? Second, check your emotions - what do you feel and acknowledge your feelings. Third, be aware of why you felt and reacted the way you did. Ask yourself why. Fourth, think about what you learn from it, how would you respond or approach things differently moving forward.
You can practise the same tool when communicating, managing people, solving conflicts, dealing with difficult people, handling negative situations and even making tough career or life decisions. It all depends on how real you are with yourself and others around you.
REAL People leads to REAL Result.