Category: communication

communication, Complexity, Learning, questions, reflection

Conviction kills

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Doubt begets understanding, and understanding begets compassion. Verily, it is conviction that kills.

R. Scott Bakker, The Thousandfold Thought

When we get too certain of what is right, what we know, and how things should work then we stop asking questions and trying to learn. We need to question ourselves and our situation to grow.

When we try to understand ourselves, others and their situations then we start to empathize and connect.

It’s not about questioning everything, but to keep reflecting. Especially when we feel most certain or when someone says or do something that seems stupid to us. To ask ourselves, why does this make sense to them and not me?

As a side note: I had to check what begets mean before I understood what I read and maybe you do to: begets mean to cause or to produce an effect.

Brain, Collaboration, communication, Conflicts, Meetings, Trust

Same reality different views

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There is but one reality; that is true—but the two of you experience it in slightly different ways.

-The Cinder Spires by Jim Butcher

Based on your experiences, goals, and personality you will experience the world in a different way than all other people you meet. The difference might be really small or very big. But we all focus on, see, and remember different things. This will cause a lot of conflicts and frustrations. But it will also create amazing solutions, make us learn new things and see problems in a different way.

We often need the similarities to start collaborating and getting to know one another. Then we need the differences to creates something unique.

 

Coaching, communication, Leadership

Are you really asking a question?

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“Would you like to come inside,” she said. It wasn’t a question. For a sentence to be a question, you had to care about the other person’s answer.”

–Full Fathom Five by Max Gladstone

Lots of leadership courses focus on teaching people to ask more and better questions. The challenge with asking questions is that you first must want to listen to the answers, and then you have to have the time and will to use it.

Many people have already decided what to do, but still try to include people by asking for their opinion. Other people don’t want to hear the feedback and will change the questions to make it very clear what they want to hear: Was the presentation good? Do you like it here?

You first have to make it ok to fail and be wrong in your organization, before people will start asking better questions.

communication, Mindfulness

Leave if you would rather go all in somewhere else

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“I think I was afraid to go all in,” she says. “Because all in is terrifying. With all in, you lose everything.”

– Dept. of Speculation, Jenny Offill

It can be a project, a meeting, a coffee break conversation, playing with your children, or talking to your loved one. You can try to be fully present in that moment or you could check your phone, read your emails, or plan the next day. There is something scary about being fully present in most things, because if you are then you might miss out on something else. You might not respond to that email fast enough, or be the last one to share a funny video on Facebook. What else is scary about being present it that it might require a bit more of yourself to stay present; that you actually speak when you don’t agree, and that you actually take the time to really think about and feel what is happening with the people around you.

And that you leave if you would rather go all in somewhere else…

Coaching, communication, Leadership, questions

The most important thing

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“You could find out most things, if you knew the right questions to ask. Even if you didn’t, you could still find out a lot.”

– Iain M. Banks, The Player of Games

The important thing is not that you ask the perfect question that will reveal everything or that the person you asked the question completely changes their view of the world. The important thing is that you ask questions, and listens to the answers. Then based on the answer you could ask another question and slowly get to the heart of the matter. Or you could choose to go and ask someone else questions.

communication, Learning, Personality

The circle of life?

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“it had been briefed that when Culture people didn’t speak Marain for a long time and did speak another language, they were liable to change; they acted differently, they started to think in that other language, they lost the carefully balanced interpretative structure of the Culture language, left its subtle shifts of cadence, tone and rhythm behind for, in virtually every case, something much cruder.”

– Iain M. Banks, The Player of Games

What we say and how we say it shows who we are and also makes us more of that person. Our brain will focus more on the things we talk about and then we will see more of those things and then we will talk more about them. Is this the circle of life? 🙂

Action, Collaboration, communication, Decisions, Meetings

What is perfectly obvious might not be the same thing for everyone there

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“Sometimes what goes without saying is best said anyway.”

– Iain M. Banks, The Hydrogen Sonata

One of the most common mistakes that I see other people do, and my self quite often as well: It is to end a meeting or a conversation without summing up what was decided upon. It might seem perfectly obvious to you, and it probably is perfectly obvious to all the other people there. The problem is that in many cases what is perfectly obvious might not be the same thing for everyone there.

Collaboration, communication, Failing, Love, Uncategorized

Who will love you regardless?

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I know that when ye think o’ love you’re supposed to think of kissy faces and scented soap and hummin’ happy songs together, but there’s another vital part to it that people rarely admit to themselves: We want somebody to rescue us from other people. From talking to them, I mean, or from the burden of giving a damn about what they say. We don’t want to be polite and stifle our farts, now, do we? We want to let ’em rip and we want to be with someone who won’t care if we do, who will love us regardless and fart right back besides.

– Kevin Hearne, Staked

There is nothing else to add. The quote explains love perfectly! 🙂

Brain, communication, Emotions

Was that a thought or a feeling?

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‘Hand speak expresses things that are either too basic to waste words on or too personal.’ ‘Too personal?’ ‘Yeah, stuff that’s really important or hard to say. Like about love or hate or stuff you’re scared about. You know how when you have something big to tell someone, you stammer through it or sit in front of your mirror practising what to say? Aandrisks don’t bother with that. They let the gestures take care of all the awkwards. They figure that big, deep feelings are universal enough to be defined with just a flick of the hand or whatever, even though the events that cause those feelings are unique.’

– Becky Chambers, The long way to a small angry planet

Research by Paul Ekman states that we have six basic emotions that are recognized across all human cultures: anger, disgust, fear, happiness, sadness, and surprise. It’s interesting that four of them are negative, only one positive, and then one that could be either positive or negative (surprise).

I can’t remember where I read it but someone explained that the difference between emotions and feelings is: emotions turns into feelings when we become conscious of them and stark thinking about them. I like this distinction because it can make it much easier to think about my basic emotions and differentiate them from all the stories I create in my mind based on what happened.

Another good distinction is made in non violent communication where they separate thinking and feeling in a similar way.