Orange Spinning Frozen Snowflake Smiley face

Friday, May 26, 2017

Being a mute


During lesson yesterday, we had a very engaging activity which was for us to maintain a conversation with our partners while back faced each other. It was really a challenge especially if the number of people increases. That was when we all realised how important non-verbal communication is. Without looking at the gestures or ques from our classmates we were unable to know whose turn it was to speak up, also we had to pay a huge amount of effort to identify from the tone of the speaker. For example is the speaker slowing down or coming to an end, is someone going to continue from his end, whose turn is it to speak now. Actions speak louder than words, does this relate to you?


Thursday, May 25, 2017

Descriptive Reflection: Strengths and Challenges in Communicating (EDIT2)

 What is communication? To me, words are merely a medium for us to relate meanings which leads to communication. Instead of using a river as a metaphor, I would use a magnet to describe communication. For interpersonal communication, the image of two magnets with like poles that repel symbolises the idea that both parties in a communication situation cannot be speaking at the same time. To build relations, only one party should be speaking while the rest are listening. The constant magnetic field surrounding the magnet would be the environment and the noise, which symbolise intra-communication.

Personally, I feel that one of my strengths in communicating is that I am very open-minded as I can talk to anyone about anything under the sun. I love to interact with people especially strangers as I find joy in making new friends. By doing so I will be able to start a new journey with them and also know myself better. An analogy would be a girl going down to the dance floor and survey how much attention she could get to know her self-worth or market value. I love having heart to heart talks with anyone under the sun as it acts like a reflection process to me. Another strength in communication would be being a good listener. Stories make me ponder and like a sponge, I absorb every bit of information from the speakers. Through these stories, I am able to learn and gain vicarious  experiences, without having to physically go through them myself. Yet I would know the outcome and even the precautions to take when I encounter such events.

However, my strength can be posed as challenges too. Being equipped and exposed to these experiences, sometimes I feel that I am actually “entertaining” my friends when they share their common stories with me. This is because right after I know what they are implying or suggesting I already relate to their stories and already know how to advise, console or react to their actions. This way even before they could finish their stories, I would have made some assumptions which is rude. Thus, the challenge is I would have to constantly remind myself not to do make assumptions before the speaker finishes his story. Another challenge is that I feel after years of experiences in the sales and marketing industry, being overly convincing and having a magnitude of influence, I tend to manipulate others, sometimes even without me knowing. Thus I have to constantly remind myself to put myself in the shoes of others. However most of the time I face a dilemma: what if my decision and the results are for my audience’s own well being but he could not see the it? Should I still enforce it or let him regret only when he finally realised? For me, I am the type of person that I would rather you hate me now, than to go against my morals and let you be. An example would be during a gym session, I confronted someone to correct her form as she was doing her squats wrongly. Maybe to her, I should not have done that as it does not concern me or thinks I am flirting with her. But I would rather she hate me for intervening and misunderstanding me than to allow her to be inflicted with a lifetime injury. Sometimes though such incidents I would find out that it is me who has the wrong form, thus I was able to correct and improve myself.

Today, during the lesson, when discussing the topic on “meaning are words”, I thought of the example of person 'B' scolding person 'A', person 'A' should not react by scolding him, but understand that he is angry and at that point of time, words are not the real meaning whereas the reason behind his actions are. It struck me that being a hot-tempered person myself, I always fail to react appropriately. Thus, one of the objectives I would like to achieve towards the end of this module would be understanding and decoding others’ messages in as many perspectives as I can in the shortest amount of time, before my body or rage takes over my mind. All this while, I thought it was because of anger management but maybe it is because the message conveyed is unclear which leads to misunderstandings. Another objective would be to broaden my perspective and learn with an open heart. Thus I hope to be able to contribute as much as I could in class, to be able to induce thinking so that my classmates would be able to learn as much as I learnt from them. Lastly, I would like to end this post with this quote below, which I find very meaningful. Communication is hard to come by these days as we are living in a world where technology is very advanced. Wherever we go, we will be seeing everyone on their cell phones, living as a ‘phubber’, playing games or scrolling through social media. The opportunity to sit down with your love ones and focus on what they have to say requires so much effort. Most of the time, it is only possible after a certain degree of argument or reprimanding by their love ones. Nevertheless, to have an effective communication I feel that mutual respect plays a huge factor, wanting and having to communicate means world apart. Without the mutual respect, the audience would not be willing to listen, and the speaker would not keen to share as much. Communication that inspires, encourages people are always the best to me as I believe everyone at any point of time would need some form of motivation and seek help or escape the reality.





Tuesday, May 23, 2017

Take a knee

Taking a knee can have many meanings, the one most people know would be as the term used in American football. However, to me it means to stop, take a deep breath and think. When I encounter any situation which makes me lose consciousness, I feel that the most important thing to do is to take a knee. This action can also be known as reflection, reflection is essential in our lives, only through it will we be able to learn and prevent making the same mistakes in the future, accumulating experiences too.

Today, I was introduced to the four types of listening styles, people-orientated, content-orientated, action-orientated and time-orientated listening. I ticked every single box for all the listening types as I feel that all the statements applies to me. Different listening styles dedicated for various types of situation at that particular point of time. For example, people-orientated listening for heart-to-heart talk , content-oriented listening when learning from professor and mentors, action-orientated listening for someone working under me or to my children and lastly time-orientated listening for group meetings or when I encounter with promoters selling me something i do not need in my life, like tampons.

Finally, i would like to end off with a picture, have a good laugh guys! Stay tune for my next post.

Friday, May 12, 2017

Descriptive Reflection: Strengths and Challenges in Communicating

What is communication? To me, words are merely a medium for us to relate meanings which leads to communication. Instead of using a river as a metaphor, mine is a magnet. For interpersonal communication, two magnets with like poles that repel symbolises both parties cannot be speaking at the same time. To build relations, only one party should be speaking while the rest are listening. The constant magnetic field surrounding it would be the environment and the noise and could also symbolise intra-communication. Personally, I feel that one of my strengths in communicating is that I am very open-minded as I can talk to anyone about anything under the sun. I love to interact and I find joy in making new friends, having heart to heart talks. I also believe that I am a good listener. Stories make me ponder and like a sponge, I absorb every bit of information from the speakers. Through these stories, I will be able to learn and gain experiences, without having to physically go through them myself. Yet I would know the outcome and even the precautions to take when I encounter such events.

However, my strength can be pose challenges too. Being equipped and exposed to these experiences, sometimes I feel that I am actually “entertaining” my friends when they share their common stories with me. This is because right after I know what they are implying or suggesting I already relate to their stories and already know how to advice, console or react to their actions. Another challenge is that I feel after years of experiences in the sales and marketing industry, I tend to be overly convincing and with such magnitude of influence, it is easy to manipulate others, sometimes even without me knowing. Thus I have to constantly remind myself to put myself in the others shoes. However most of the time I will have a dilemma, what if my decision and the results are for his own well being but he could not see the it. Should i still enforce it or let him regret only when he finally realised? For me, I am the type of person that I would rather you hate me now, than to go against my morals and let you be.

Today, during the lesson, when discussing the topic on “meaning are words”, I came out with the example of person 'B' scolding person 'A', person 'A' should not react by scolding him, but understand that he is angry and at that point of time, words are not the real meaning whereas the reason behind his actions are. It struck me that being a hot-tempered person myself, I always fail to react appropriately. Thus, one of the objectives I would like to achieve towards the end of this module would be understanding and decoding others’ messages in as many perspectives as I can in the shortest amount of time, before my body or rage takes over my mind. All these while, I thought it was because of anger management but maybe it is because the message conveyed is unclear which leads to misunderstandings. Another objective would be to broaden my perspective and learn with an open heart. Thus I hope to be able to contribute as much as i could in class, to be able to induce thinking so that others would be able to learn as much as i learnt from them. Lastly, i would like to end this post with this quote below, which I find it very meaningful.