Communication

...we always get good response. Sometimes students are a little harder in evaluating, but we go out and we give out evaluations. I didn't bring any for me. I don't know if Mr. Dr. Dunkle had any or not for the whole program. I usually give them out and have people evaluate me and let me know what they think, but I...

Anyway, I'm sorry, I didn't bring it because I'm not running this program anymore, but that's okay. They always rate us really highly because they love having us come and do it. Now, students are used to us a lot of the time. They get very more discriminated. You know, you didn't do this or you had that. I didn't like this and you didn't like that. But overall, they still give us decent ratings, but the brethren give us great ratings when we come out and do these. And we've done a lot of them over the years, and it was our aim to try to bring Ambassador Bible Center, now Ambassador Bible College, to the brethren to give you a sampling of it because we know everybody cannot go.

But we tried what our aim was to take portions of our classes and actually give them to the brethren. So in Cincinnati, where we've had every year a week-long session, I just finished the last two books, three books, I think, 2 John, 3 John and Jude. I just finished those this time. So everybody who's gone on a regular basis to Cincinnati has had the entire General Epistles class. So I went through the whole class, whether in the different years I brought in different things, but over the last 15 years, or 16, 16 years that ABC has been in existence, I have tried to cover different portions.

Sometimes I'll cover General Epistles, sometimes I'll cover Minor Prophets. But I've covered every book in the General Epistles there. So they have said, now if you keep going long enough, if you go about 20-some years, we should give you a degree. Give you a diploma for doing that. So it's really nice to be with you. And I'm going to cover today an issue. There are handouts that we've given. Has anybody not gotten a handout if you want any? Kenny Shoemaker can give you one. I brought, I made 75, so you're welcome to have one.

I did not copy the PowerPoint presentation for you. Sometimes I do, sometimes I don't. So you'll have to take notes off the screen. But I left one smaller version of this, all the PowerPoint slides and all the information. I gave it back, and it'll be available to you. If you're interested in checking something that you missed, it'll be there for you as well. There will be about four exercises I'm going to have you do, and that's why we have a microphone in the middle.

So what we will do on the exercises, we'll have you pair up with somebody, or threesome or a twosome, get together, you can turn, you can change aisles for a moment. And you're going to write down some information, and then one of you, whoever you want, can come up and represent. Not everybody has to do it, but it'll give you, not everybody has to speak. But we can have a number of you speak and give information on this. So it's a way of learning.

We're not trying to embarrass anybody. We're just trying to give you a chance to talk with others about some key issues of communication. Communication is one of the most important areas of marriage. And in fact, if asked of counselors, they would say, communication is the most important. Now, if you're not married, or you were married, and you no longer married, or if you are a widow or widower, this still can apply to you. If you're not married, this still can apply to you, because communications are vital in every area of life.

And so this, I'll be covering a lot of basic principles on communication that are important to you. I am a trained marriage and family therapist. I'm an independent marriage and family therapist, licensed in the state of Ohio. Part of my training is on communication. I've taught speech class in Ambassador College for about 11 years, 12 years, 11 years, in Pasadena.

When I moved to Big Sandy, Texas, I taught other classes, and they were moving toward accreditation, so they were... I did not have a degree in speech. Although I've taken a lot of speech classes, although I've directed spokesman clubs and ambassador clubs for years, I've taught speech class for years, but I don't have a degree in that. But I do think I know something about communication, and since it is important to marriage, I also have studied it relevant to that.

So let's take a look. I've got my PowerPoint here so I can know what you're looking at, and make sure that you're looking at the same thing I'm talking about. So let's see what to expect from this seminar. Here are the objects. Here's what I hope you get from it. You will explore and learn what communication is. What does it mean to communicate? You'll be surprised to learn, I'll show you that in a moment, the 65 to 70 percent of the time of your life you are communicating. I'm not speaking 65, you don't have to speak.

If you sit there like this while I'm doing a presentation, you're communicating to me without saying a word. You know what you're saying? This is dull and boring and I wish I weren't here. I wish I were back home watching the Reds play the Cleveland Indians on TV today. If you just sit there with a smirk on your face, you're communicating something. If you sit there with a smile on your face, you're communicating something. If you sit there with a forward lean, you're communicating something.

If you sit there with a layback, you know, put your head back, you're communicating something. In fact, we had one guy who came to ABC and he traditionally, and it's hard, I grant you, it's hard to do seven hours a day. Sit there, Lisa can tell you. It's hard. Lisa didn't do this. She was one of my favorite students.

She would sit fairly right in the middle and she was always bright and cheerful and glad to have her as a student. And we certainly appreciate the ABC students and what they've been and how they can either, even though he fought his migraines and all the rest, I can see it in his face, his eyes, when he had a migraine today. Yep, he had a migraine. So, but he still, they were diligent. For this one fellow, he would sit there and one day he'd head back.

And I don't like people sleeping in my class. I don't let them sleep in my class. If you want to sleep, you're welcome to leave the room. I will mark you absent and you can sleep as long as you want, out in your car, or lounge, or whatever you want to. You're not welcome to sleep in my class. So he is... Somebody wake him up. Try not to embarrass my students. So one time he was back to sleeping, I said, Would you please wake up or something to him?

You're sleeping back there. And he kind of came out of it, but he just said, I guess. Sleeping like that right in the cloud. They didn't even try to hide it. You know, some people can sleep with their eyes open. So I can't really tell. So you're not communicating anything badly there, at least through facial gestures. We do communicate 65 to 70% of the time. We're sending off signals. We'll see a definition of... I'll give you my definitions of communication after you give me yours. Next you're going to learn what components are.

What makes up communication. Then we're going to learn... That's number two. And then number three, we're going to learn what are some of the impediments or roadblocks to communication. So many times you give a speech and a spokesman's glove and a person said, Well, I thought you didn't say this. You look back at your notes. You know you covered that, but they missed it.

Why did they miss it? Well, maybe they were daydreaming. Maybe they were thinking about something they needed to do at home. Maybe there was a noise. Maybe somebody dropped his books right in front of them and BAM! on the floor and they looked down. They missed your point. So there are times when you say the right thing, but the person heard it or didn't hear it. They either heard another thing or they suppose they heard it. So what are some impediments or roadblocks? And number four, what is the importance of communication for successful marriage? Why is this so important? You will see all that in this particular seminar.

Take a look at this Peanuts cartoon. And here you see Schroeder playing with Lucy. He's playing his piano. Apparently, I looked up on Schroeder. Schroeder is supposed to be a really phenom, wanting to play the piano, and he liked Beethoven. So there he is playing the piano. And Lucy says to him, I think I have a very cute smile. And he's just playing the piano. And she said, I have never heard you say I have a cute smile, Schroeder. Do you think I have a cute smile?

Now listen carefully. He says, oh yes, I think you have the cutest smile of anyone since the world began. Now he makes this outlandish statement. And she says, even when he says it, he doesn't say it. See, sometimes we say things in an insincere manner that even though the words may be correct, the attitude and the mood that is behind it, which he clearly read, in other words, he was distracted. He didn't care. He was prompted. He was nagged. And so he said what she wanted to hear. But he didn't say it sincerely. So she heard that.

She could tell. Even though the words may have been charming, and even though the words may have been endearing, the way it was said is no good. Somebody says to you, I love you. Of course I love you. Does that sound like love?

The words said, I said, I love you. If somebody's having problems, you say, how are you doing? They say, I'm fine. I'm fine. I'll be okay. I'm okay. I'm fine. Are they fine? They said they were fine. Now you're taking the words, but you're forgetting some of the other part. So Proverbs 18 verse 21. How important is it to communicate? Proverbs 18 and verse 21.

Wonderful Proverb. Proverbs are, by the way, a lot about communication. Did you know that?

The Proverbs are a lot about communication. In fact, much of it is about communication. But verse 21 of Proverbs 18, he says, Death and life are in the power of the tongue.

Death and life are in the power of the tongue.

You have it in your words, you have it coming out of your mouth as formed by your tongue.

The ability to give people life, not only eternal life, but to give them hope, to give them liveliness, to give them energy, to give them strength, to give them encouragement. And you also have it in you to dash them down, to depress them, to discourage them, to slam them to the ground with your words. Death and life are in the power of the tongue. A very powerful scripture. James chapter 3 verses 1 to 8. James talks about the tongue and how evil it can be. Really, it's not your tongue, it's your brain. It's your brain, it's your mind. Your brain sends signals to the tongue what to say. So don't blame the tongue. The tongue just forms the words. And the larynx, the voice box helps project it, and your breathing system helps. You have either powerful words or lacking thereof in power, but James 3 verse 1, My brethren, be not many masters or teachers, knowing that we shall receive the greater condemnation. The more you speak, the more you can do wrong. The more you can say the wrong thing, the more you can get in trouble.

Verse 2, For in many things we offend all. We all offend. If any man offend not in word, the same as a perfect man, able not able also to bridle the whole tongue. If he's able to keep himself in check, he's a man who's got some character. But sometimes things slip out that you don't intend to slip out. And they call that Freudian slip, you really meant it, but you didn't want to say it. So sometimes you say things, and sometimes you say things amiss.

Verse, and he says you're able to handle the whole body, keep the whole body in check if you're able to control the tongue. Behold, we put bits in the horse's mouth that they may obey us. We turn them about, turn about their whole body. Just that little control in the mouth, the bit. You can pull that horse back and stop that huge beast from its travels. He said, Behold, and then we turn their whole body around. Behold also the ships, which though they be great, and are driven of the fierce winds, yet they are turned about with a very small realm, a small rudder, and a steering wheel that's a whole lot smaller than that big ship. He said, and you're able to turn it wherever he wants it to go, wherever the captain says take it. Even so, the tongue is a little member, boasts itself great things, and behold how great a matter a little fire kindles.

Little matchstick. They have an advertisement on television this show, all these matchsticks, maybe you've seen it going in different. They use a bunch of matchsticks, and they show all different things you could form with it. A house, you know, a spider, different things about putting them all together. Then it says it just takes one, just takes one to ruin a whole forest.

Just one matchstick. So again, that tongue can cause problems. He says the tongue is a fire.

It is a world of iniquity, and so is the tongue among our members, that it defiles the whole body, and sets on fire the course of nature, and is set on fire of hell. And words, words can cause problems. You ever notice when people get in, argue about something, it's usually not, if you take it right back to the root beginning, it's usually not very important.

But once it gets started, you did this, and you did that, and you did, and it starts going back and forth, and starts this cycle of problems. He says in verse 7, For every kind of beast, and of the birds, and of the serpents, and of the things in the sea is tamed.

So they've had tamed little birds that could walk across a wire riding a bike, or what a little bicycle they have on this little wire. You've seen that. They've had elephants that they've trained. They've had horses, whatever else. All these things can be trained. He says, But the tongue, verse 8, can no man tame, it is an unruly evil, full of deadly poison.

If the tongue is used the wrong way, it causes bitterness, discouragement, discontent, and depression. The wrong kind of tongue. It's really important that we learn, say the right thing. And again, 65 to 70 percent of our time, we are communicating, whether we say anything or not.

So if my wife asks me something and I go, Huh, what am I communicating? Didn't say any words. She'd say, Oh, you're not interested in what I'm saying, eh? Yep, I'm not interested.

So I didn't say an exact word. I said, Huh? I'm saying I'm not interested, or I would have responded better. So it is important to communicate, to know that our communication, whether it's said or not, can cause problems. So here were the many ways of communicating. Of course, modern communications, you have all these modern means of setting up multiple services at the same time with satellite dishes. And here you see open door communication. Communication is the key to opening doors. The type of language, the fluency, the accent, the articulation, all that has to do with specific words of communication. There again, some methods, some people communicate through email, some people communicate through telephones. Not quite as good. Skyping is better, you could actually see the person, which is really a modern thing now, or FaceTime on... FaceTime doesn't cost anything if you've got the right phones. And you can just see that other person over there. We were having dinner at one of the restaurants in Cincinnati, and our granddaughter Samantha was over in Italy on a month tour over there, and she called us. We're sitting at this restaurant, and she's speaking to us from Italy. And we see her face, they passed her on the phone, say hi to her, and she can see you. So it's amazing what communications there are. So it's not a matter, there aren't the means to communicate. The issue is, how do we communicate, and do we communicate effectively? Another way of communicating is vertical communication, where we communicate with God. Again, don't transfer to God the same things that you do to people. Don't hide yourself. Don't be self-covering, but rather be open. God wants you to be open with Him and talk to Him, and He wants you to talk from your heart. Psalm 6 verse 8, He says, When you pray, God expects us to be praying. Psalm 62 and verse 8 talks about pouring out our heart before God. Psalm 62 and verse 8. I'm doing this all by heart because I already know it, but I've got my notes here too. But I want to make sure I don't leave anything out. But Psalm 62 verse 8, we read here, My soul follows hard from you. Let's see, is that the right one? My soul follows hard after you. Your right hand upholds me. In other words, I go to God with deep. My soul follows hard after you. I'm really interested in what I'm saying. Psalm 62, that was 63 verse 8. 62 verse 8 says, Trust in Him at all times. You people pour out your heart before Him. God is our refuge for us. Psalm 62 and verse 8. So in our prayers, it's another way of communicating. How do you communicate with God? Do you try to cover over your sins or, like David, you open as a book?

So let's take a look. I'm going to read you one more thing about communication. This was a wife expressing her needs. Here's what the wife said. One morning as I went to open the freezer, this man said, I asked my wife, What shall I take out for dinner?

Without a moment's hesitation, she replied, Me.

He asked for it. He got a Toyota. Okay, so there you go. Let's take a look at what breaks a marriage.

What breaks a marriage. And out of this list of issues that break marriages, you know what one of them is? What breaks a marriage? Three of them are having to do with communication. Number one, unfaithfulness breaks a marriage. Number two, lack of trust. I can't trust you anymore. I can't trust you anymore. Number three, financial woes. We are creditors closing in on us. Number four, a lack of positive communication. One reason marriages fail is because there's not enough positive communication. Number five, various vices or addictions can bring the marriage down. Number six, jealousy. Hard to work through jealousy. Number seven, family interference. Where the family's interfering with their relationship. Number eight, inability to solve problems. And if you're going to solve problems, you need to have good communication. Number nine, good communication needed on this one. Irreconcilable differences.

You know what? There are no irreconcilable differences. There are only irreconcilable people.

If people want to solve an issue, they can. If people want to work through an issue, they can.

But it takes being able to communicate. And the reason there are irreconcilable differences is because people have shut down their communication system. They won't talk anymore.

One couple wants to counsel with me. In fact, I have a schedule for this Wednesday. They're not in the church, so you won't know who they are. I wouldn't say anything. But the problem that they have is the man announced he wants a divorce.

You know what? There's no chance to talk much when he's already set in stone.

I want a divorce. I don't love you anymore.

But they still want to help for their children, because there are children in that relationship.

And they want help. How do they deal with their children? How do they work with them?

But see, you can't be helped if you've already shut the door. If you've already closed it off, I don't want to talk about this. She said, can't we go in for counseling before we make you make? No, I don't want to go. So we cut off the sources, the opportunities. So there are no irreconcilable differences, only irreconcilable people.

Number 10, unreal expectations. Many times, marriage is break because a person marries and says, make me happy. Let me tell you something. If they weren't happy to start with, there's nobody that can make them happy. All another person can do for you is add to your happiness. If you're not a happy person, they can't help you. They can't help you. There's a lot of people, if I just get married, I'll be happy. No, you have to be happy and then get married, and then let somebody add to your happiness and maintain it.

We all desire to have happy marriages. We remember couples walking down the island seeming so joyous and happy. I remember some of them that I've done, and I know their state now.

Some of them no longer together, and yet they look like the one on the left, and they look like the one in the center, and they look like the one on the right after their first child. But somehow, that didn't last. The one marriage I think of was a totally beautiful couple. The woman was beautiful. The man was handsome. He was talented. She was beautiful. A little flighty, but she was beautiful. And they told him, you know, he'd have to understand this, and she'd have to understand that. They'd have counseling with them all. Get a call after I left the area. This is in Canada. Left the area. He went to Pasadena. We're having marital problems. He doesn't come home at night because she nagged him so much. She became so jealous of him, and yet she was beautiful.

But somehow, she didn't think she was. And if he just walked driving down the street, and there was a woman just walking down the street, and he happened to just look that direction, he got it.

She nagged him so much about that. He couldn't even watch television. If he didn't switch channels, if there was some woman advertising a car or whatever else, didn't switch channels right away, he was in trouble. So consequently, he became a workaholic, and he wouldn't come home till late. And he stopped after working late. He'd stop at a bar with some of his buddies, and then he would come home later. So the less time he had with her, the better for him. Finally, they just closed off their communication. By the time they called me, I said, it's too late. I should have called when it first started happening, and maybe we could have helped you. But you see, couples start out like this. They all want to have a happy marriage, and what happens? They don't learn to communicate. So we need to become communications experts. We need to put on the communication life jacket and become communication experts. So we're going to do our first exercise right now, workshop exercise. This gives you a little bit of work, and that is, how do you define communication? So pair up with somebody. It could be two or three of there. Two of you together over here, two over there, three over there, whatever. But pair up with somebody. Don't do it by yourself. If you need to move to do it, and then come back, and I'll give you about 10 minutes, and I'll have you come back and take volunteers to give what you think. And you put several definitions. You don't have to just have one definition. Try to have a definition that will actually help you. A definition that will actually help you.

A definition that will actually help you. And one that doesn't have to be real long, and one that encompasses everything. Okay, go for it. I'll give you 10 minutes. Just talk to each other.

I'm sorry. Okay. Do what now?

Okay. I want you to try to cover as much as you can, involve as much as you can in communication, in your definition. But it doesn't have to be real long. Okay, so try to keep it pithy, but try to encompass it all. You can talk a lot about what you'd be in it, and then try to come up with your statement.

So how are we doing? Are we about ready? Try to bring it to a conclusion and get whatever statement or definition you have, and pick one person to share. And I'll just take some volunteers. It doesn't have to be everybody. Probably do about three of them now, maybe four, depending on how long your definition is. Okay, so I'll give you another minute to wrap it up.

Okay, are we ready to go? Then we can have your attention. Everybody can either return to your seats or stay where you are. And let's give our attention. Do we have any volunteers?

Okay, Lisa has her hand up, and then I'll have Steven. Any other volunteers?

Okay, Jim. And Lisa, can you... Okay, so Lisa, you're first. You step up to the microphone.

Hello. Okay, Mrs. Antion and I came up with that. First, the word communication comes from the Latin word communicaro, which means to share. So that means that it's the imparting or exchanging of information or news via verbal and nonverbal connections between people. Very good. Thank you. Can I... can you give me that at the end so I can have that? Thank you. Who's next? Steven.

Lisa is the Latin queen. She does everything in Latin. Anyway, we came up with three different types. Visual type, like a smile or your facial expressions, frowns, your eyes communicate a lot, whether they're gleaning or they're sad. And then, obviously, you have verbal communications, where words are strange between two people. There has to be listening and speaking. You can't have two people speaking at each other at the same time. One has to speak, the other listens. And then, once that's done, you have to make sure the communication was received properly, that you understand what was said and is, you know, that type of thing. Then there's also physical type communication. Hand signals, like a crane operator, you know, up or down or stop or, you know, go left, go right. So, communication is multifaceted, I guess. Okay, thank you. A multifaceted way of sharing information. All right, let's see. Jim, you're a third, and then this Lisa.

Yeah.

All right, well, Lisa's going to be a tough act to follow.

Anyway, we started actually going through all these different ideas, and they ended up... It sounds like some of them are actually components of communication, but the basic definition we came up with, and you always heard the old phrase, kiss, keep it simple, you know, stupid, but we put down the art of listening, not just hearing.

Okay. Is the basic definition. Of course, that includes components such as body language, eye contact, undivided attention, when talking, be open-minded, don't interrupt, know where the other person's coming from, don't assume, things like that. So, it kind of flows into the second one as well, you know. Thank you. Yes, ma'am. Last one.

We were trying to keep our simple, but it was... We said it was a way of verbally or non-verbally expressing ideas and concept by both listening and feedback to let people know that we did hear what they said. Okay. But without being predisposed.

Okay, good. They're all good. You want to do one more, Darlene? Go ahead.

Okay.

What we decided is it's the ability to convey one's thoughts and feelings to another in an honest, gentle, and sincere way. Okay, good. All right, let me share with you what some...

And this is a compilation of some people, but some of them are official from articles. This is from After You Say I Do. I have the book Before You Say I Do.

And by the way, After You Say I Do is always a good one to study. This is quite similar. Before You Say I Do. My After You Say I Do is packed away somewhere in the books as I've transitioned from the home office home. I've got a lot of books still packed up that I'm trying to find space on the bookshelf to do. So I'm now working out of my home at my basement. But Before You Say I Do has some nice comments in it about communication, a whole section on communication.

It says, communication is the process of sharing yourself, both verbally and non-verbally, in such a way that the other person can both accept and understand what you are sharing.

So it involves two people, right? It involves the one who's the giver and it involves the receiver. So let's look at the next slide.

The interchange of ideas between two or more persons.

The interchange of ideas between two or more persons. Because you can't communicate with nobody else to communicate with. All right, here we go. The second one, sharing one's thoughts and feelings with another through words, gestures, or touch. Again, sharing comes into this very much.

And then finally, look at this last one. I thought this was really a good one, too.

Any behavior that carries a message perceived by someone.

Any behavior that carries a message that is perceived by someone. So someone sees it.

Any behavior that could include your speaking, it could include your gestures, or whatever else. So I think that's quite a good one, too. All right, let's give you the next one.

And I have one other comment about communication that I did. Did I skip over this one?

I'll give you another one that's even that I'll add to this one.

Communication, this is after you say I do, communication is to love what blood is to life.

Communication is to love what blood is to life. It is impossible to have any kind of relationship, and that means friendships, too, unless there is communication.

It's impossible to have any kind of relationship unless there is communication.

That comes from before you say I do and after you say I do.

All right, here's another exercise that I'd like you to do.

And you notice on the sheet that I gave you a handout of, you want to use that for writing some information in there, you can, but that's all up to you. That's for you.

This one I'd like you to do. What are the components of communication? In other words, what does it take to make up communication? So let's see what you come up there. And I have three that I'll share with you, but there could be more, but I have three that I'll share. So if you get three of them, you're probably doing good. But anyway, what are the components? You just want to list three components of communication. So I'll give you five minutes on this one. So start at almost 25 till. You can do till about 22. So go ahead and join together. If you're not happy with your group, you can join to another group. Now I'm teasing you. If you're not communicating well with your group, you could go to another one.

Okay, everyone, if I'm ready to share again, we can take three volunteers who didn't do it last time. Three volunteers who didn't do it last time.

Do I have any volunteers? Are you ready? What are the three components? What are the components of communication? Anybody? Yes, ma'am. But they can't hear. They can't hear when you're online, so it would be good. Sometimes some people are doing it online. You can go do it. Microphone won't bite. I understand that it's been trained.

And even if it bites, it doesn't have rabies.

Okay, we put down listening, speaking, eye contact, and body language. An example would be to roll your eyes if somebody's talking to you, and also your tone of voice. Okay, very good. Thank you.

Do I have another volunteer? Alisa can come up since we don't have one more after.

Are you volunteering? Yes, come on up first, and Alisa can do less.

We came up with this, have to have a subject to work on, have to have somebody receive the message, and somebody that delivers the message. Okay. Three. Thanks. Thank you. Alisa? We actually came up with a four-part cycle of communication that the order would be listening, processing, filtering, and expressing. Okay. Because they have to be in that order, because you're going to list it, and you're going to process it, you're going to filter whether you're going to accept it or reject it, and then you're going to express yourself. And then the other person starts listening and processing and filtering. Okay, good. That would be from the receiver's point of view. Okay, from the receiver. Okay, good job. Let's take a look and see what we have here. By the way, I share some of these. We have, in time's past, we've had sender, message, channel, receiver, writing, listening, gestures, seeing, hearing, touch, and so on. These are the three components that are identified by those who work in the field. Number one, content. Content. It's what is being said. What is being said? Will you take a look?

What percentage of communication are the words? Only seven percent tone. How it is said. The tone of voice in which it is said. Of course I love you. Doesn't sound like you love me. Sounds like you're mad. You're agitated, irritated.

The tone of... but the words could be accurate if they were followed by the same tone. So tone, how it is said, is 38 percent. And 55 percent of components of communication are the non-verbals. Your body position, your face gestures, whether it's wrinkled or whether it's tight, your body, how you're standing, how you're looking, whether you're interested or not, you're laying back, you're not interested. Again, the body language and the gestures, the gestures that are used. 55 percent. Isn't that incredible? So in a sense, when you speak, all of you speaks. But I remind students in speech class, the moment they are introduced, the moment they get up... so if I say, now to give this, give a speech, here's Barbara Antion. And so Barbara gets up and she looks down and she kind of saunters up here real slowly, gets up to the lectern. What do you think? She's already sent you a message. She said, I don't know, this is a very important message. I'm not really sure I want to give it. I might not even be well prepared.

She said that on her way up without saying a word. I tell them, you are the speaker from the time you were introduced, from the time you get up from your seat, from the time you walk up here to the lectern, from the time you return to your seat. So if I give this message to you, it seemed like a really good man. What do you think? Well, I was happy with it. You're an audience. I thought it was a pretty good... he wasn't. Maybe it wasn't as good as I thought it was.

It's, again, your whole body speaks. So again, the components, three components of communication, content, tone, and the non-verbals. Virginia Satir is a book called People Making.

And when I was doing my counseling training, there were certain counselors who were teaching instructors who were specialized in this. And they specialize in touch. They specialize in trying to get people in touch with their feelings particularly, and help them try to teach them how they should be, how they react to people. Now, there are four models she gives here of how people react under pressure. The first one is the placator. They're under pressure. They're constantly what can I do? I'm sorry. I'm so sorry. Let me read to you what the placator does. Here's the placator. The placator placates, I am helpless.

Inside, they said, I feel like nothing. Without him, I am dead. I'm worthless.

The placator talks in an ingratiating way, trying to please, apologizing, never disagreeing, no matter what. He or she is a yes person. He or she talks as though she could do nothing for herself. Must always get someone to approve of her or him. You will find later that if you play this role for even five minutes, you will begin to feel nauseous and want to vomit. Big help in doing the placating job is to think of yourself as really worth nothing. You are just lucky to be allowed to eat. You owe everybody gratitude. You really are responsible for everything that goes wrong, and you know you could have stopped it, stopped the rain if you just used your brains, but you don't have any. Naturally, you will agree with any criticism made about you. You are, of course, grateful for the fact that anyone even talks to you. No matter what they say or how they say it, you would not think of asking anything for yourself. After all, who are you to ask? Besides, if you can just be good enough, it will come by itself. So here's what they say. Be the most syrupy, martyrish, boot-licking person you can be. Think of yourself as being physically down on one knee, wobbling a bit, putting out one hand in a begging fashion, and be sure to have your head up so your neck will hurt and your eyes will become strained so that no time at all you'll begin to get a headache. When you talk in this position, your voice will be whiny and squeaky because you don't keep your body in such a lowered position you don't have enough air to have a rich, full voice. The placating stance is the body position that matches the placating response. So that's what she says some people do that when they're in trouble. Some people do that as a style, as a way of dealing with difficulties, dealing with people, dealing with circumstances, a placating approach.

Look at the next one. That one is the blamer. The blamer. He reads you about the blamer. The blamer, his words are, you never do anything right. What's the matter with you? His body blames, I'm the boss around here. I'm lonely and unsuccessful. I'm going to prove to you that I am successful. The blamer is a fault finder, a dictator, a boss. He acts superior and seems to be saying, if it weren't for you, everything would be all right. The internal feeling is one of tightness in the muscles and organs. Meanwhile, the blood pressure is increasing. The voice is hard, tightened, often shrill and loud. Good blaming requires you to be as loud and tyrannical as you can. Cut everything and everybody down. As a blamer, it would be helpful to think of yourself pointing your finger accusingly and start your sentence with, you never do this or you always do that, or why do you always or why do you never, and so on. Don't bother about the answer. The answer is unimportant. The blamer is much more interested in throwing his weight around than really finding out about anything. Whether you know it or not, when you are blaming, you are breathing in little tight spurts holding your breath altogether because your throat muscles are so tight. Have you ever seen a really first-rate blamer whose eyes were bulging, neck muscles and nostrils flaring out, who was getting red and whose voice sounded like someone shoveling coal?

Think of yourself standing with one hand on your hip, the other hand extended, and your index finger pointed straight out, your face screwed up, your lips curled, and your nostrils flared.

As you tell, call names and criticize everything under the sun, and that's the way the position looks. That's the blamer. It's another way of coping with issues. Third one is the computer.

This is the John Wayne silent type. Strong and silo. This one, I don't know if this person is necessarily strong. Let me read to you about the computer. The computer, these words are, if I were to observe carefully, one might notice the work-worn hands of someone present here.

His body computes. I'm calm, cool, and collected. Inside, he says, I'm very vulnerable.

But he doesn't want to show that. The computer is very correct, very reasonable, with no semblance of feeling showing. He's a calm, cool, and he's calm, cool, and collected. He could be compared to an actual computer or a dictionary. The body feels dry, often cool and disassociated. The voice is dry, monotone, and the words are likely to be abstract. When you are a computer, use the longest words possible, even if you aren't sure of their meanings. Just use it. Throw them out there.

After one paragraph, no one will be listening anyway. To get yourself really in the mood for this role, imagine that your spine is long, is a long, heavy steel rod reaching from your buttocks to the nap of your neck, and you have a 10-inch wide iron collar around your neck. Keep everything about yourself as motionless as possible, including your mouth. You will have to try hard to keep your hands from moving, but do it. When you are computing, your voice will naturally go dead because you have no feeling from the cranium on down. Your mind is bent on being careful not to move, and you are kept busy choosing the right words. After all, you should never make a mistake. Sad part of this role is that it seems to represent an ideal goal for many people. Calm, cool, collected, don't get rattled, don't get excited, don't get upset about anything.

He says, say the right words, show no feeling, don't react. Your computer position looks like this. How would you like to be married to a computer? No feelings. You go, I just got to raise and pay! Good. Again, reaction. And here's the last one is the distractor. If you look carefully, she appears to have three arms. Look at how her legs are formed at an angle, and she's always moving and always off-target, off-topic. Distractor. Words are irrelevant. The words make no sense.

The body is angular and off somewhere else. Inside, her feelings. Nobody cares. There's no place for me. Whatever the distractor does or says is irrelevant to what everybody else is saying. Hey, what did you think about those those killings down in South Carolina? Isn't it beautiful weather outside? They're distracting. They're totally off-target. Okay. He never, he or she, never makes a response to the point. His internal feeling is one of dizziness. The voice can be sing-song, often out of tune with the words, and can go up and down without reason because it is focused nowhere. When you play the distracting role to help you to think of yourself as kind of a lopsided top, constantly spinning but never knowing where you are going and not realizing it when you get there.

You're too busy moving your mouth, your body, your arms, and your legs. Make sure you are never on the point with your words. Ignore everybody's questions. Maybe come back with one of your own on a different subject. Take a piece of imaginary lint off of somebody's garment, untie his shoes, and so on while they're talking about something serious to you. Think of your body as going off in different directions all at once. Put your knees together in sort of a not-need fashion. This will bring your buttocks out and make it easy for you to hunt your shoulders and have your arms and hands going in different directions. At first, this role seems like a relief, but after a few minutes of play, the terrible loneliness and purposelessness arise. If you can keep yourself moving fast enough, you won't notice it so much. You will look like this. Now, those are how people react. Now, here's the key. We can all react like all of those sometimes, if you choose to.

But the way you should normally be is open and level. They call it a leveler response.

The person who's on target with what's being said, who's genuine and leveling, levels with people.

That's the kind of a person you want to be. You can choose to be any of these.

If I'm tired and I come home from work and my wife says to me, so what about this? How about this? What do you think? Why about if we go shopping? Let's go. And I may be a distractor. I may say, oh, okay, look what's on TV now.

I may be a distractor. There may be times when you want to blame.

Somebody left their little toy car in the driveway and I ran over it.

Who did that? Blame it, okay. Who put it out there? Who left it out there?

There could be a time when you blame. There could be a time when emotions are really running high that you want to become like a computer, that you step back and you become calm, cool, and collected.

But the ideal way to be is a leveler, as one who speaks openly and straight with people, who's on target, who has feelings, who cares. All these others you can use when you choose to, but it should not be your mode of operation. That's what she says in her book. She actually as people do these exercises, I wasn't going to have you do that today. Let's take a look then at the process of communication. Here we see on this screen, we see a woman who has a thought, a stimulation, an idea, that thought is encoded in her brain and it's put into words.

Those words then are transmitted. That message is sent, let's say, Jane sends it to Dick.

So Dick receives this thought that's internalized. He decodes that what she says into his thought.

So I said, when I was coming here, I saw a cow. Now, cow could have different meanings.

He could think of milk. Milk comes from cows. He could think, well, I'm thinking of a steak tonight, a nice steak. He could be thinking about his leather coat, perhaps, that he has.

So a word, the words that you say don't always have meaning, the same meaning of what you intended the meaning to be when you said it to the person who receives it. He's got to decode what you said. So take a look at this slideshow. Help you understand the communication process, and then I'm going to stop and give you a break once we finish this process. Here's a communication process. So in a communication process, if you'll note, there is always a sender and a receiver. Note, when people are face-to-face, each person is a source of information. Why? Because they're also reading what that person feels like when they get the message. But normally, if somebody sends a message to you, you're not face-to-face, they might write it, they might call you, whatever. There's always a sender and there's a receiver. Encoding the sender then encodes the message in his head.

Encoding means he prepares the message for transmission. So you think about this idea, think how would I put this into words, and then you're ready to say the words. Coding means preparing the message for transmission. Then the sender sends the message.

Again, the receiver gets the message from the channel, and this is called receiving. And what's the channel? It's the airwaves, the sound waves that go to him. Sometimes things can happen, right? You're watching television and storm outside. It goes off and goes, your TV goes fuzzy. Something happened. There's a blockage. Sometimes when people talk to each other, there's a blockage.

We'll talk about blockages. It's your next exercise. We'll do it a little bit later.

This is called receiving. It takes the receiver time to decode the message, depending on how long it is. People take too long. You say, hi. Hi, Jane. Hi, Dick. I took you that long to say, hi, back. You know, something's amiss there in that brain. But anyway, it takes the receiver time to decode it. No, decoding means making the message that is sent, understood by the receiver. So he has to decode it. You said it. You know what you said. And I've had people say, you said this. Now look at mine. I never said that. How did you get that? Well, either I was unclear, and therefore in their mind they translated and put it into a different form than I had idea, than I had transmitted. So again, they have to be understood. They have to take it and they have to decode it so that they can understand what is said. And then if the message is available to more than one usage, there must be a storing. If you're going to use it again and again, something that's told you, you have your memory to store it in. So let's go back to this one again. After the receiver, and by the way, your memory is so awesome that people who even are getting older, if they keep their mind active, your mind, your brain, stores information in different parts of your brain, but not complete information. So sometimes, even if your memory is seems to be lacking a little bit, if your mind is active, something back here, oh, that'll spark an interest or spark a point, and the idea comes back to you. Your brain is fantastic. So after the receiver gets the message, the receiver provides feedback, which means they understood what was said, so that the sender knows that the message is received. Hello, Bob, his response. Hi, Joe. So again, the response that people have. But communication can be blocked. Look at this woman. Looks like she's on her honeymoon or whatever, or just their wedding night, and she doesn't want to hear what this guy has to say. She is blocking him. She's closing her ears to him. So our next exercise will do when you come back. Take a 10-minute break. Come back at 10 after, beyond 10 after, a minute or two beyond. Get a chance.