How to learn to communicate correctly with people in modern society: 6 rules and 7 tips

Good day! Lyudmila Redkina is with you, and today we are studying the most important human function. Without what will a person not be a person? Without what is most of the information around us lost? What is it that a woman especially cannot live without for a day? Of course, without communication! Communication helps us develop, become smarter and satisfy all our needs. Excuse me, you can’t even go to the toilet in an unfamiliar city if you don’t find out where it is. What can we say about the need for recognition or respect if a person does not communicate?! So, in this article we talk about how to communicate with people correctly, and what we get in the process of communication.

COMPLETE LIST OF HUMAN SKILLS

Why is it worth making acquaintances and communicating with people?

Do you think our environment greatly influences us? Remember how carefree we were as children and how easy it was to make acquaintances. But then they began to unconsciously learn from others and the media how to behave “correctly.” How much have we changed? 100%, with rare exceptions. Our environment has a huge influence on us. As one popular business consultant says:

“Show me the 5 people you spend the most time with and I'll tell you how rich you are”.

The same applies to health, relationships, level of education and other areas of life. Therefore, it is very important to know how to communicate with new people in order to make acquaintances with those who will be useful to you and will make your life better.

Of course, you can resist the influence of your environment. But still, the people with whom you spend your time influence and change us more strongly. And that is why you need to choose your environment yourself, and not leave everything to chance.

Books

Competent communication is now at a premium. Already from school, children absorb applications on smartphones faster than communication skills, or even basic expression of their thoughts. Therefore, in our technological age, it is important not to forget to read books. Use a selection of useful books:

1. Mark Goulston “I can hear right through you. Effective negotiation technique.”
2. Philip Zimbardo “How to overcome shyness.”
3. Jack Schafer “We turn on the charm according to the methods of the secret services.”
4. James Borg “Secrets of Communication. The magic of words."
5. Dale Carnegie “How to Win Friends and Influence People.”
6. Robert Cialdini “Psychology of influence”.
7. Larry King: How to Talk to Anyone, Anytime, Anywhere.

Why do we sometimes have “nothing to say”

Sometimes the question arises: “How to start communicating with new people if I don’t know what to say to them after “Hello!”.” We've all encountered this problem. We want to make a positive impression on a person, but all words and thoughts seem to evaporate. Because of this, we experience discomfort and feel somehow “wrong.”

In fact, we always have something to say. It is fears that block your communication skills. Because of fear, we limit the topics we can talk about in order to:

• Don't seem stupid
• Don't insult your interlocutor
• Do not make a negative impression about yourself, etc.

As a result, it turns out that we either cannot say anything at all, or we say mediocre questions like “How are you?” or “How was your day?”, which don’t really mean anything. They are asked simply to fill the void.

But give up these inhibitions and allow the conversation to go in an unknown direction. Do you know what kind of conversation goes on a straight line? Boring. So just talk about everything that comes to mind. Ask questions and then it is important not to speak yourself, but much more important to be able to listen to your interlocutor. Remove all blocks! Even if you accidentally offend your interlocutor, there is always the opportunity to sincerely apologize.

On the issue of speech defects

Beautiful speech is inextricably linked with expressive and clear pronunciation. Burr, stuttering, and difficulty pronouncing certain letters correctly create difficulties when communicating. It is mistakenly believed that these problems must be solved in childhood. Allegedly, if a person does not develop correct speech with a speech therapist at an early age, then the help of a specialist will be useless.

In fact, modern speech correction techniques are successfully applied to adults. The main thing is to contact an experienced speech therapist-defectologist who is familiar with the field of neurology and neurophysiology. He must have medical knowledge in the field of pathopsychology of speech.

Such a specialist will evaluate all physiological aspects of word pronunciation:

• Muscle tone;
• Articulation;
• Features of breathing.

Next, he will select exercises that will gradually eliminate the defect.

Don't be afraid to take the conversation in your direction.

How to communicate with new people correctly? The way you want it: you can listen to your interlocutor, or you can conduct the conversation yourself. If everything is simple with the first option, then what about the second? What does it mean to have a conversation and how to do it effectively?

Let's talk about it.

Are you interested in listening to people who passionately talk about something? Surely yes. We usually get caught up in the enthusiasm and energy these people exude when talking about their favorite topics. Even if the topic was not too interesting to us initially.

Therefore, if you want to seize the initiative in the conversation and lead it in your direction, feel free to do so. Unobtrusively take the conversation in a direction that interests you and talk about it with enthusiasm.

Developing positive communication skills

An empathic statement expresses empathy for another person.
First understand the other person's situation or feelings, and then confidently express your needs or opinions. “I know you’ve been very busy at work, but I want you to make time for us too.” Growing self-confidence can be used when your first attempts are unsuccessful. Over time, you become more decisive and assertive: your statement may communicate specific consequences if your needs are not taken into account. For example, “If you do not comply with the agreement, I will be forced to go to court.”

Start practicing assertiveness in less risky situations, which will help build your self-confidence. Or ask friends or family if they will let you practice assertiveness techniques on them first.

Elizarova Lilia Apr 09, 2018

Where can you find topics for an interesting conversation?

The most interesting conversation happens when you don’t even know what you’re going to talk about with the person. Because such a conversation is like a roller coaster: it goes up sharply, then flies down, and then turns sharply to the right at great speed. This is not the same as having a boring conversation according to a plan.

But how to communicate with people so that it is interesting? Where can I get topics for conversation? And how to develop the conversation in an interesting and exciting direction? How to make contact?

1. Look around and find something interesting. Let's say you are at a meeting with a lot of people. At such meetings there are a huge number of potential interlocutors, so: go up to a stranger or your friend and ask him for what purpose he came here. At the same time, share your thoughts to keep the conversation going.

1. Remember fascinating stories from life. If you want to be a very interesting conversationalist, memorize some of them. Having worked on pauses in the right places, changes in intonation, etc. When you start a conversation you will worry less.

1. Ask yourself: what could I ask the other person? And try to repeat it until you find something interesting. Our brain is designed in such a way that initially it gives the simplest and most obvious solutions, but over time it begins to dig deeper and deeper. Using this question will help you have a meaningful dialogue.

1. As a last resort, use standard questions: cinema, music, sports, etc. These topics can also be developed in an interesting direction.

How to develop a conversation and make it interesting? Listen to your interlocutor and ask about the details of the story, you can ask clarifying questions. It's all in the details - that's usually the fun part. Plus, you'll show the person that you're listening to them and not just standing in front of them and nodding. The ability to listen and hear your interlocutor will give you a lot of topics for communication with a new interlocutor.

First, let's figure out what personality types exist?

Paul McGee, author of the bestselling book Mastery of Communication. How to find a common language with anyone,” gives his own classification of personality types:

Type 1. "Cheerleader"

An extrovert who acts spontaneously takes on several things at once.

Type 2. "Guardian"

A sociable, conflict-free person. He will tend to give in most of the time, thereby wanting to get along with everyone.

Type 3. "Captain"

He tries to gain universal recognition. Such a person is impatient, decisive, prefers to talk rather than listen.

Type 4. “Thinker”

The same introvert who loves solitude, he likes to do statistics, analysis, planning.

How to make friends with strangers

We talked about what we talked about above, now a little practice. How to start communicating with people, making acquaintances at work, school, various events, or just on the street? How to appear attractive to other people?

There are several rules for this:

• Use not only words, but also voice intonation, facial expressions and body language

Agree, it is much more interesting to communicate with a person who, during the conversation:

• speaks loudly
• changes the intonation of the voice in interesting and significant places in the story,
• uses hands to show something
• and openly expresses emotions on the face through facial expressions.

Pay attention to this important skill, it will significantly improve your speech. By applying these simple tips, you will be able to conduct a dialogue more lively and interesting than those who speak monotonously and are in tense positions. People willingly make acquaintances with such active people.

• Smile

Everyone likes to see sincere smiles on the faces of people around them. Smiling requires you to make an emotional investment in the conversation, but you will be rewarded.

Therefore, when making acquaintances, smile more often - this way your appearance will seem more friendly to others, and they are unlikely to refuse to get to know you.

• Talk to strangers as if you were talking to loved ones

Don't stress when you want to talk to a stranger. Imagine that you have known him for a long time. Do you think this is strange? But put yourself in his place: would you really be pleased if people around you were afraid of you and were nervous when talking to you? Of course not. And the people around you don't want it either.

• Making eye contact will help you succeed in a conversation.

Look the other person in the eye when you communicate. Only occasionally look away so that it doesn’t look strange.

In order to make acquaintances, you can use several more reasons:

• discuss the purpose of the meeting (if you are at the event);
• find out how things are going in the company,
• what kind of people are here (if this is your first day at work);
• what brought your interlocutor to this educational institution (if studying).

Don’t ask yourself the question “How to communicate with people correctly.” It is untrue in itself. After all, there are no prohibitions and no right ways to develop a conversation.

Just be active: constantly communicate with new people. Then you will have an interesting circle of friends and you will develop your communication skills.

Barriers to effective interpersonal communication

Stress and uncontrollable emotion

When you are nervous or unable to cope with your emotions, you are likely to misperceive other people, send confusing or intimidating nonverbal signals, and begin to act like an unstable, mentally ill person. Take a moment to calm down before continuing the conversation.

Lack of attention

You cannot communicate effectively when you are multitasking.
If you're daydreaming, checking text messages, or thinking about something else while planning your next response, you'll almost certainly miss nonverbal cues in your conversation. You should always take your life experience into account. [media=
https://youtu.be/BWBh9L_nTjg
]

Illogical gestures and facial expressions

Nonverbal communication should support verbal communication without contradicting it. If you say one thing, but your body language says something else, your listener will likely feel that you are being deceitful. For example, you may not be able to say “yes” while shaking your head in denial.

Negative facial expressions

If you don't agree with or like what is being said, you may use negative facial expressions and gestures to express disagreement with the other person's message, such as crossing your arms, avoiding eye contact, or tapping your feet. You don't have to agree or even approve of what is said, but communicate effectively without putting the other person on the defensive; It is very important to avoid sending negative signals.

All our days pass in communication, but the art of communication is the destiny of a few... Mikhail Vasilyevich Lomonosov

How to stop being afraid of public opinion

Why can't we make acquaintances and just chat with a stranger? This can happen during your first day at school or work, while attending an event, or just while walking if you meet an attractive man or woman you would like to meet.

As soon as we have the desire to go and talk to a person, we are attacked by thoughts like these:

• What if this person refuses to meet me?
• What if I look insecure?
• What if I have nothing to say, etc.

In order to remove these thoughts, you need to know a little communication psychology. Namely: how to stop being afraid of the opinions of others.

Nobody wants to look like an insecure person, but the problem is that if you constantly think about it, that’s exactly what you will look like.

What to do about it?

Go towards your fear and understand that nothing bad will happen to you. No one will beat you for trying to get to know each other, no one will remember every day and laugh at the stupid thing you said or anything else.

When you make enough attempts to get to know each other and realize that the opinions of others mean nothing - and that no one thinks about you - you will relax and your fears will simply disappear. You will become a confident person and will be able to easily start a conversation with anyone.

No one will film your unsuccessful attempts to meet each other on their phone and post them on the Internet. No one will tell this to your acquaintances and friends. Because the focus of every person is on himself. You are the center of attention for yourself. And each person is exactly the same center of attention for himself. We are preoccupied with our own problems and have no interest in judging other people.

“All people think that others evaluate them. But this is an illusion: everyone is preoccupied with themselves and does not think about you ”.

On the one hand, it may seem a little sad that no one cares about you. But look at it this way: you can do whatever you want. Meet and calmly communicate with new people if you want. Many will enjoy your company.

Recognize the emotional content of words by training the muscles of the middle ear

By increasing the muscle tone of the tiny muscles in the middle ear (they are the smallest in the human body), you will be able to recognize higher frequencies of human speech that convey emotion and better understand the true meaning of what people are saying. Developing these tiny muscles isn't just about focusing entirely on what someone is saying; They can be trained by singing, playing wind instruments, and listening to certain types of music (high-frequency Mozart violin concertos and symphonies, for example, instead of low-frequency rock or rap).

Exercises to erase fear of public opinion

Your fear of communication is your “monster”. Only when you get rid of this “monster” that takes away all your conversation topics and makes you feel uncomfortable, will you begin to easily meet new people.

It is important for you to create the right attitude towards other people. What exercises will help you with this?

1. When walking down the street, say “Hello” or “Hello” to strangers.

1. If the first exercise is too easy for you, ask people for time or directions to a place.

1. Give compliments to strangers. You can stop them by saying something like this: “Hello! Please stop for a second. I wanted to say that you have great style!” Then you can say have a good day and just move on. Remember that by doing this you are not doing anything bad to the person, but on the contrary, you can lift his mood.

If these exercises are uncomfortable for you, then you definitely need to do them. Why? Because first of all, it will show you that most people are friendly and don't mind chatting with you at all. And secondly, that you have realized your problem and really want to overcome your fears

Of course, not everyone will answer. But the problem is usually not you: most people are so immersed in their thoughts that they don’t hear anything around them. Or they don't have the energy to respond to you at all.

So don't worry about being ignored. This is the whole point of the exercise - to feel discomfort and understand that nothing bad will happen to you if you talk to strangers. Be a polite and tactful interlocutor, then the maximum that can happen to you is that you will be ignored.

Tips to help you better interpret nonverbal communication

Keep in mind that everyone has their own individual characteristics.
People from different countries and cultures tend to use different non-verbal communication gestures, so when analyzing body language it is very important to take into account the person's age, cultural background, religion, gender and emotional state. An American teenager, a grieving widow, and an Asian businessman, for example, may use nonverbal cues differently. Analyze nonverbal signals comprehensively. Don't look for too much meaning in one gesture or nonverbal signal. Consider all nonverbal cues you receive, from eye contact to tone of communication and body movement. Anyone can sometimes make a mistake and look away, for example, and let the eye contact slide, for example, or briefly cross their arms, without implying anything negative. To better understand a person's true thoughts, analyze his nonverbal signals comprehensively.

Work on yourself

Constant communication is one of the important components of developing communication skills. But sometimes the problems that make us afraid to communicate can be deeper. Therefore, it is worth working on the following points:

• Accept yourself as you are. If you can't make a drastic change at the moment, then why worry about it? Will being overly concerned help you? Of course not.

Learn to love yourself. The following will help with this:

• Praise yourself more often
• do not give control over your self-esteem into the wrong hands;
• keep a success diary in which you write down each of your victories

By doing this, you will stop dwelling on your mistakes.

• Don't run away from hard work and fear. If you encounter something that you don't think you can overcome, just tell yourself: “Yes, it will be hard, but it is possible. At least I’ll try and if it doesn’t work, I’ll gain communication experience.”

This will be useful if you want to get to know someone, but you are caught by one of the fears that we described in previous chapters.

• Learn to be patient. You can develop your communication skills endlessly. It's like sharpening a sword: no matter how much you sharpen it, it will never be perfect.

You should want to develop communication skills, but at the same time, do not care about the result. Because it will prevent you from developing in communication. Just work on yourself and praise for every achievement: a new acquaintance, an exercise completed, an interesting conversation with someone, etc.

• Read more fiction. The more vocabulary you have, the more interesting and competent you will be able to conduct a dialogue. What to read? Whatever you like: you can have classics, you can have detective stories, or you can have novels.

The main thing is that reading brings you pleasure - this will help you not to stop and learn to communicate with strangers.

• Learn to be cheerful and open. Why is this so important? Because when approaching people, the main value you can give is positive emotions. And you can call them if you are an open and cheerful person.

You can share your failures in conversation and laugh at them - this is one of the best ways to win over your interlocutor and relax.

Quick Ways to Relieve Stress to Continue Effective Communication

To cope with stress during communication, do the following:

1. Notice when you get nervous. If you're nervous while communicating, your body will let you know. Are your muscles or stomach tight and/or sore? Are your hands clenched? Is your breathing shallow? Do you “forget” to breathe? Take a moment to calm down before continuing the conversation or putting it aside.
2. Ask your mind for “help” and quickly pull yourself together by taking a few deep breaths, squeezing and relaxing your muscles, or, for example, remembering a calming, positive image that evokes positive emotions. The best way to quickly and reliably reduce stress is to listen to your senses: vision, hearing, touch, taste and smell. But each person reacts differently to sensory sensations, so you need to find what works for you in a calming way.
3. Look for a drop of humor in the current situation. If you approach it correctly, humor can be a great way to relieve tension during communication. When you or others start to take things too seriously, find a way to cheer everyone up by telling a joke or a funny story.
4. Be willing to compromise. Sometimes, if both you and your interlocutor are able to give in a little, you can find a middle ground that will suit and reassure all parties concerned. If you realize that the subject of the conversation is much more important to the other person than it is to you, it may be easier for you to compromise, while laying a solid foundation for the future relationship.
5. If necessary, stand by your opinions. Before returning to the situation, take a break so everyone can calm down. Take a short break and step away from the current situation. Take a walk outside if possible, or meditate for a few minutes. Physical movement or rest in a quiet place to restore inner balance can quickly relieve stress and calm you down.

Completion

The most important thing to remember about learning how to communicate with people is to try to meet new people. Reading useful material like this article is just a help. You need to constantly take action to develop communication skills.

• keep starting conversations,
• be tactful
• polite,
• smile,
• take initiative
• maintain eye contact,
• ask questions
• The main thing is to listen carefully to your interlocutor,
• think about him
• be relaxed
• move forward and don't expect results.

So forget about what other people think about you and learn! Remember: we learn valuable lessons not only from successful attempts, but also from failed ones. Please share your experience in the comments.

If the interlocutor is unpleasant

The world is not ideal, and not all people are kind and sympathetic. There are individuals who carry negativity in communication. You need to learn how to talk with this category of people. Psychologists have certain tips.

What helps people communicate? This includes the following:

1. You need to start with yourself.
2. You should be neutral.
3. Look for the good in an unpleasant person.
4. Distance yourself from an unpleasant person.
5. Openness and directness.

If you apply the above tips, life will seem much easier.