Effective Communication
A human mind contains a model of reality that helps you to function in the world by understanding it and how to interact with it. Spoken language is a protocol of information exchange that helps us to change this model. Lots of people don’t embrace this, and this results in ineffective ways of communication.
In current society, there is an abundance of information thrown at us. Humanity has not learned how to filter this information effectively yet.
Everybody has their own ‘filter’ that converts new external information into behavior, actions and a change of mindset. The filter - many people call it walls around somebody - prevents all information to have a too big impact.
This is the river of spoken language. All human minds are somewhere in the river. Every human mind has a different filter. That's why they appear in the river in three different ways: they're either sheep, rocks or fishes.
Some people are like a sheep in the river: they can't swim. They embrace all spoken language and go with the flow: they end up where ever the river of spoken language brings them, they cannot determine where they are going.
Some people are like a rock in the middle of the river of spoken language and aren’t affected by anything that people say to them. Everything that is said goes one ear in, the other ear out.
Some people choose wisely and look from a meta-level on the spoken language that reaches them. They filter uninteresting information and choose to use the interesting information to their advantage. I call these people fishes that go upstream in the river of spoken language. They convert information effectively into a change in actions, behavior, and mindset.
Be the fish. Don’t float to much down this river!
Effective communication Another point I like to make is the point of often occurring ineffective communication. People often keep having the same conversations over and over again without consequences. This is ineffective communication. There is nothing wrong with this except for that it encourages people towards being a rock in the river, and it wastes their time.
If you are too much of a rock and you don’t let the spoken language affect you, it will be harder for you to change.
If you are too much of a sheep, you let all spoken language affect you, it will be harder to you to reach your own habits, goals, mindset, and even lifestyle.
Be the fish and swim upstream the river of valuable spoken language.
Spoken Language Exchange:
- If a rock talks to a rock, much is said, but little changes. The information exchange has little effect on the model of reality in the mind.
- If a sheep talks to a sheep, little valuable is said, and both people change. The exchange is effective, but the information itself isn’t valuable; the same sheep can say something completely different the next time, because it just imitates other sheep, rocks or fishes.
- If a fish talks to a fish, they both choose whether or not this information is valuable for them and use it to go further upstream.
Conclusion Be a fish if you want to decide for yourself what's going on in your mind. Learn like you were to live forever. Swim back to where you were born, or go even further.The further upstream you go, the more clean the water gets.