Communication

Communication is one of those tricky subjects, once you think you have it all figured out you find out once again, your flat out wrong. Communication can be classified in so many different ways, and those have subcategory, then those come with foot notes. It seems like a grueling concept to grasp. Verbal and nonverbal are the two biggest types. Verbal communication consists of conversations, emails, fliers, anything said or written in words. Verbal only represents about 20% of communications. While the majority of the rest of the communication is non-verbal. This includes body language, groans, looks on faces, open or closed body,etc.

Communication happens all the time, multiple times a minute even. There are even a few moments that stick with you for a few weeks or so. For instance, I was at work a few days ago and I walk up to a table with two children and two adults. I gave both of the children stuff to color with and crayons, immediately the one little boy pushed his coloring sheet away. Joking with him I kneeled down next to him and asked him if he was to cool to color, he responded with a duh. Then I informed him that I still color and I'm pretty darn cool. He then said 'I don't like to color baby pictures'. Not really having a response for that I decided to let it go but the cute 7 year old ginger kid hadn't planned on letting it go. She looked at him from her coloring sheet and said, 'Please! This picture is to complex for you to color it!'.

I laughed so hard as this young ginger reminded me so much of myself at her age, she wasn't going to let him make fun of something she liked doing. I gave her a high five and got their drinks, I don't believe the adults found my laughter appropriate and later stiffed me. It was ok though, that little ginger is going to do great things in life. It made me smile, already at 7 she was able to stand up for herself and give a decent burn. This is just one of the ways we communicate with each other. The ginger conveyed her message to the little boy and the message was received loud and clear.

As well as there are successful communications there are just as many if not more, miscommunications. It is so easy to have a message not be received properly due to the higher use of technology. Texting for instance, put a huge dent in face to face communications. Through texting you don't get the others body language or smaller hints so it's very easy for things to get jumbled around or for 2 meanings to get confused.

It is very important to communicate properly and successfully. When you have the ability to do this you are more likely to get what you want and are more likely to be heard.