In part 1 of this articles I went over the importance of words, rehearing things out loud so that you can hear and feel the impact and tips on how you can harness your belief in your words through mental rehearsal in a light trance state.
I hinted that in order to do much of this you needed to realize something crucial. We have two ears and only one mouth and there is a very good reason for this.
Often people get into conversations and it is almost like "The Good, The Bad and the Ugly" where each person is waiting to quick draw their revolver and be the fastest shot and be the last person standing. Getting the last word is often a symptom of something more.
There are situations where someone actually does have great advice to share and they really want to help and yet the person is not really asking for help. They simply want to be heard, listened to and ideally understood.
So even with the best intentions of wanting to help it is really just making them more frustrated. They would feel so much better if you simply sat or stood still and looked at them and listened to what they were saying. Every so often you could nod your head or ask a question yet for 90% of the time you would simply be a sounding board for them.
Much like one of the tips in part 1 they get the benefit of hearing and feeling what they are saying and because you are listening they feel better about talking out loud.
For some reason talking to yourself in public or anyplace tends to be questioned ;) I do it anyway if I do not have someone I trust to share thoughts and ideas with.
Sometimes my cat, Snoozy becomes my sound board and I work certain details out in my head and then out loud and she can listen and I get to feel better.
She actually came to us because she heard me practicing out loud and liked the sound of my voice. We adopted her ( or rather she adopted us LOL ) and so she really does like my voice as many of my clients have mentioned a certain smooth, soothing quality they enjoy hearing both live and on my recordings.
So I often practice things out loud and that is one of my secrets as to how I can flow so easily and naturally during sessions or even over the phone during consultations. It is as if I have already practiced so many variations of situations that I feel more comfortable and confident because I know how well it turns out. They feel this and so it helps them and I am glad to be able to help.
Now if I was just tossing advice their way without listening to them they would not get this benefit and would not feel so good while talking with me and afterwards.
So how do you get more control of this tendency that we as humans seems to have?
How to do you shut off that negative, whining self talk and clear the way to better listening skills and deeper understanding?
Read on and find out how you too can quiet your mind and become a better listener and greatly improve your communication skills.
In part 1 ( and the title of this article series ) I mentioned that this communication secret is something that you can learn from jet pilots. The reason is that they have a very stressful job where they are steering a jet plane towards its destination and because of wind currents they are off course about 90% of the time.
Imagine if they do not possess a certain amount of mental discipline and control over the "monkey chatter" that invades most of our thoughts from time to time. A great way to help yourself reduce this annoying negative self talk is to devote a few hours a day to being totally silent and still.
Stillness is something I will go into more in future articles and hand in hand these two characteristics or behaviors can help you to become a much better listener.
So pick a day that makes sense with your schedule and focus on just quieting the mind and listening to some soothing music or motivation tapes. Do not talk with anyone for that day for as long as possible.
I start with 12 noon to 6 in the evening where I do not call anyone back or make any phone calls and even if I am shopping or doing chores I barely speak for that time. Your nonverbal communication becomes more clear and you may find yourself becoming more direct when you do speak.
From there you can increase this silent time and notice the results.
Of course during sessions I also work with a person to find some positive self talk that they do believe and that will help them. So you can read these articles and find your own positive self talk that you can focus on to balance out the negative self talk. Eventually the not so positive self talk gets bored and you will hear things more clearly and silence will start to feel more comfortable.
It has become fairly easy to go two or more days in almost complete silence. If I am home that day taking care of chores around the apartment or writing articles I do it in silence and in between I clicker train my cat ( this is something I may write articles about soon because it goes so well with rewards, hypnosis training and using your own behavior to help yourself and others. It is a positive reward type training that using a small clicker to sound when the pet does something you want. Along with this sound they get a treat and so want to do more of what you want them to do. It helps to bridge the language barriers between animals and humans and this concept helps you to communicate better with your own subconscious mind )
So focus on what you hear and it may pleasantly surprise you how much more you start to understand. It is as if you have opened a channel between you and the universe ( and your subconscious mind absorbs all this information and now you have more access to it )
Play with this for a few weeks and notice how much better your listening skills grow and you learn to speak less and listen more.
