I did the 'Communication for Access to Power' course from the Landmark Education from Mumbai on 2, 3 and 5th October 2010 and it was awesome! It revealed to me the hidden patterns that controlled my communication and the blockages it created. There were two main reasons I wanted to do this course. The first was the personal and the other was related to my occupation. I had discovered that I was unable either to 'open up' emotionally as a person to people close to me and that I was not able to remain 'present' with the people communicating with me. This resulted in me appearing as evasive and uninterested and hence ultimately insulting. I could see how I communicated 'first hand' when I attended the Tuesday completion evening of this course in Ahmedabad. A powerful exercise exposed 'how I looked' when I communicated and was shocked. I would not myself have loved to interact with such a person. So I knew before hand that the course would be terrific and obviously it did not let me down. The other reason was that I am a writer and teacher and hence my bread, butter and chicken is dependent on communication!
The course used the distinctions we learned in the Landmark Forum and offered us some crucial new distinctions. The course enabled us to distinguish between the 'inherited'(default) old model of communication and the 'invented' or new model of the communication that this course provides. This distinctions is parallel to the default or inherited model of 'being' and living and the invented model of 'being' provided by the Landmark Forum which brings forth 'a new realm of possibilities and the new possibility of being calls us powerfully into action'.
Like in the Landmark Forum what we need is to 'distinguish' this limiting and restrictive model before we can do something about it. In the Landmark philosophy what it means to 'distinguish' is explained by an analogy: The fish in the water doesn't know what water is unless it takes a jump out of it. Until it knows that there is something like 'non-water', it wont understand that it has been living in what is water after all. Hence unless the fish 'distinguishes' and gets the 'distinction'- water, it has no idea what and where it is living. Hence until we are exposed to the non-inherited and non-default model of 'being', living or communication, we are not able 'to distinguish' between the default and the invented models.
The 'default' model of communication all of us inherit is built on the assumption that the world 'IS' 'out there'/'in here' and the function of language is to 'fit' the word into the already existent world. The function of language basically to 'describe', 'command' or 'express' the pre-existent world out there or in here ( in our mind).
In this model we realize that we are 'small, separate, weak and alone' in this gigantic world which exists irrespective of our existence. Hence within this default paradigm we are constantly trying to 'survive and fix' things, people, circumstances, people( including ourselves).In the default model we are constantly doing things needed to survive and fix like avoiding, withholding, controlling, manipulating, forcing an outcome and so on. Hence 'survive and fix' life is all that we have. As our coach Nirav Vyas put it,' Even when we get used to living in the dark and get expertise of living in the dark, we are still living in the dark.' Most of us live within this model and we don't even know that we are living in this model.
In the default model, we are revealed how 'the sentence' we have passed on ourselves when we were very young runs our life. This sentence is usually a statement like ' I am not x, I am y' which we said to ourselves when we were not even seven years. This 'sentence' is still active when we just look beneath upsets we experience in the day to day life. In my case I discovered that my sentence is ' I am not wanted, I am unwanted.' Hence, to use the coach's words again, if hundreds of people told me that they wanted me with thousands of flowers and even wrote it in the skies with an aeroplane, I would still not believe them because I was living from the context of' I am not wanted, I am unwanted' and looking at the world from this point of view. The coach also pointed out that this was not just 'A point of view' but I WAS that point of view and so if someone offered an alternate point of view it would be read as a threat to my survival ( as I WAS that point of view). Once I could distinguish this, I was able to give up this point of view. It also meant, in the words of the coach, ' a five year old upset child' was running my life till date.
In the default model of communication we also tend to ask, 'one unanswerable question' beneath ALL our communication. This unanswerable question could be ' Do you love me?' or 'Do you want me?' Once we can distinguish this question , we are able to see how absurd and meaningless this question is.
The new model of communication is simply exciting. It is based on the assumption that the world 'IS not simply out there or in here ( in our minds), it is created out of words. For instance, the sentence ' I am not wanted, I am unwanted' shaped my life and determined how I look at life and the world. What was the sentence but a speech act?The older model which was designed in order to survive and fix was also based on the hidden contexts which were purely linguistic ( e. g the unanswerable question). This means that the world is CREATED from our words. What we see, how we see, what we think or how we think is determined solely by our conversations which we have with ourselves and the others. The function of language in this new paradigm is no longer to 'describe', 'command' or 'express', but to 'create' the world. This new language is language of transformation and usually takes the form of 'declaration' ( e.g Declaration of Independence or ' I have a dream' speech of Martin Luther King). The power to create can come only when we honour our word ( the distinction known as 'integrity'- not to be confused with morality or ethics).
The new model of communication comes into existence when we bring forth 'listening from nothing', that is, listening from a space rather than listening from the older conversation ( 'already always' running within our mind). In this model, there is no need to 'survive or fix' anything. The communication is no longer controlled by the past discourses and concerns which are put aside. Hence the moment we put the internal dialogues about people aside and be present to the person's current communication, we bring 'everything' into our communication. The person gets freedom and space for expression in our listening which has come from nothing. The communication becomes a 'dance' and we can sense love and affinity running in the background.
This listening also allows us to enter the world and the point of view of the other. We can get to look at how we look from the other's point of view. And often what we see is not very flattering!
Some of the other very significant distinctions I got was that communication is not 'content' but 'intent'. 'Intent' not as purpose but in the phenomenological sense of 'intentionality' , the space where the self and the other are related and that communication involves creating 'being-in-communication' as against 'talking'.
During the course I called up my dad and told him how much I love him and how he is the most important person in our life. After good 38 years of life. I told him that it was because I used to live from ' I am not wanted, I am unwanted' that I did not open up my heart to him. I told my sister the same thing. I told them I give up this point of view. I told Amogh and Ashwini the same thing. After the Landmark Forum, I discovered the negative stories I was running and thus destroying my life, after communication course, I discovered what lay beneath these negative stories and blame games.
The Advanced Communication course teaches us how to dismantle and get rid of habitual modes of communication. It teaches us how to alter not just our communications but also the communications of one person in our life with another. It also teaches us how to resolve multiple concerns in a single conversation! The course starts November 20th and I am so very excited about it.
Parallel to these communication courses, I am also participating in the Landmark Action Seminar series which takes place on Thursday evenings. Each session strengthens the distinctions we have got in the Forum by giving us an opportunity to get them once again and practice them. Hence almost a year after doing my Forum , I am 'back in conversation' ( though I was never really out of it).
Showing posts with label communication skills. Show all posts
Showing posts with label communication skills. Show all posts
Monday, October 11, 2010
Tuesday, September 16, 2008
Being All Ears-A Beginner's Guide to Stop Being Dumb in English
BEING ALL EARS:
A Beginner’s Guide to Stop being Dumb in English
(But is Anyone Listening?)
Sachin Ketkar
We think learning a language is all about coaching that one mighty mouth we are blessed with and that two ears on the either side of our heads can take care of themselves. Remember what we did with our mouths when we were born? We let out a really big howl and hunted frantically for food. When it comes to using language, we have come a long way baby.
We started soaking up language first with ears. Remember all baby talk spoon fed into our ears when they cuddled us? We aped our elders and after many disasters, we started making right noises. Which means it all started with our ears. Listening always precedes speaking.
This is one of the important reasons why people classified as `dumb’ are those who can’t hear other’s speech. Therefore they cannot mimic human speech properly.
My argument goes like this: We cannot speak English properly because don’t listen to English properly. We are English Dumb because we are English Deaf.
One of the reasons we are English deaf is because we simply don’t have enough of it around us. English is used only in a few places in our society. We don’t buy our parathas or pumpkins in English and English cuss words sound pretty dehydrated and tame compared to the best and choicest of our home-grown abuses.
The other reason is our schooling. The only time they paid attention to our ears was when they planned to squirm them. Nobody told us that the two muscles on the two sides of our heads were actually antennas, for instance.
What was even more terrible was that in school they thought English can be learnt from a book. Trying to speak fluent English by reading a book is like trying to be a fantastic singer by simply reading about it. If you think really think you can speak English fluently by reading Rapidex or Wren and Martin, you can also try learning to sing that way. Not that I mind. But please don’t expect me to turn up for your concert.
Many among us feel that if we can’t speak English fluently we are backward, unintelligent and stupid. What’s even worse, many among us feel that they are progressive, intelligent and smart if they can speak English well.
Spare a moment about all those Spoken English classes which have run over our town. They pretend to give us exactly what REALLY WANT and we really want is to SPEAK ENGLISH WELL. That means speaking English is the question of life or death for us. In all desperation we want to learn to speak and if someone tells us he will teach him to do other things, we feel we are being taken for a ride. Listening? But why should I bother about it all? I possess an excellent pair of ears and to my knowledge they are working perfectly well. Why should I bother to learn how to listen? Nobody taught me how to listen to any language or even music, for instance, and yet I think I am pretty smart at these things. If you think like this, I would only politely point out: think again and have your knowledge about these things rechecked. A person who is mediocre in one’s own language is the person who does not take listening to one’s own language seriously. And vice versa.
Then there is that other guy whom you bump into almost every day. He says, ` I can follow English well’ he says, ` I merely don’t know how to speak fluently.’ My response would be `Mate, you don’t really follow English well and that’s why you can’t speak it fluently’. He is often the same the person who would say, ` I can understand written English but I don’t have enough vocabulary to express myself.’
And pray what do you mean by vocabulary and where would you find this vocabulary of yours? Vocabulary consists of words and words are songs. You have to hear them and learn to sing them. What’s the use of the dictionary for learning songs? The best way to learn a language is by learning to sing it. And to learn how to sing you have to hear the song properly. One of the quickest ways of picking up English is by using our ears.
So lets be all ears to English in all its tangs and tunes. Let’s enjoy Indians surfing languages like a bored teenagers surfing TV channels. Let’s toast those grammatical curiosities and exotic noises that pass solemnly for English. Let’s watch the sloth of clichés and threadbare expressions walk with exhaustion in our verbal forests. Let’s keep our ears pricked for a refreshing turn of phrase. Let’s tune ourselves into all clever and not-so-clever analogies and contrasts that surround us. Let’s carefully listen to how Barack Obama plunges into rhetoric and how Abdul Kalam serves his Masala Dosa English. Let’s notice how Laloo Prasad Yadav makes Bihari more interesting by speaking his imagination of English. Let’s pay attention to how Hermione Granger stutters and Harry hesitates or how James Bond speaks through his Scottish guns. Lets be curious cats with nine more lives asking why a particular speaker speaks in a particular way. The craft of listening is much more than improving English. After all, enriching our languages means enriching uranium of our lives.
So, by now if you feel listening is important please listen to what I have to say about listening itself.
I hold there is a deeper relationship between our personality and language and that acquiring a language almost amounts to acquiring a different personality. Listening is a dynamic process of understanding others and ourselves. It involves opening up to others as well as opening ourselves to ourselves. In short, listening is not merely a language skill but something more fundamental to our personality for our relationships. It is only when listening starts to fade away that a relationship is on its way out.
Though it may sound obvious, the listening artist is usually alert not only to what is being said, but is also alert to how something is being said. We should also listen with our eyes. The listening artist reads what is writ large on the speaker and his body language. She reads not only to the content of the speech but also the emotional overtones, undertones and fears. So let’s listen with undivided attention and multiplied curiosity.
I would like to end what I have said by pretending to be an expert in listening. I classify the dynamic process of listening into three types:
i) Listening to Spit: It is usually done to with a view to challenge, reject or question someone’s views. Much of the activity is premeditated and conclusions are drawn even before a speech begins. At its mildest it is listening with a Slant.
ii) Listening to Swallow is the opposite of the first type. It tries to absorb everything the speaker says without thinking much about it. It is a data grabbing mode, the mode of college students who start preparing late for their exams and very lately start attending lectures.
iii) Masticating is the superior and a very complex mode of listening. Listeners paradoxically involve themselves as much as possible while at the same time distancing themselves from the style and content of the speech. It is a balancing act which avoids the earlier two extremes and yet gets best of both the modes. Lazier ones and beginners can easily fall between the stools.
(A University Teacher by profession Sachin Ketkar is a fledgling amateur listening artist too)
A Beginner’s Guide to Stop being Dumb in English
(But is Anyone Listening?)
Sachin Ketkar
We think learning a language is all about coaching that one mighty mouth we are blessed with and that two ears on the either side of our heads can take care of themselves. Remember what we did with our mouths when we were born? We let out a really big howl and hunted frantically for food. When it comes to using language, we have come a long way baby.
We started soaking up language first with ears. Remember all baby talk spoon fed into our ears when they cuddled us? We aped our elders and after many disasters, we started making right noises. Which means it all started with our ears. Listening always precedes speaking.
This is one of the important reasons why people classified as `dumb’ are those who can’t hear other’s speech. Therefore they cannot mimic human speech properly.
My argument goes like this: We cannot speak English properly because don’t listen to English properly. We are English Dumb because we are English Deaf.
One of the reasons we are English deaf is because we simply don’t have enough of it around us. English is used only in a few places in our society. We don’t buy our parathas or pumpkins in English and English cuss words sound pretty dehydrated and tame compared to the best and choicest of our home-grown abuses.
The other reason is our schooling. The only time they paid attention to our ears was when they planned to squirm them. Nobody told us that the two muscles on the two sides of our heads were actually antennas, for instance.
What was even more terrible was that in school they thought English can be learnt from a book. Trying to speak fluent English by reading a book is like trying to be a fantastic singer by simply reading about it. If you think really think you can speak English fluently by reading Rapidex or Wren and Martin, you can also try learning to sing that way. Not that I mind. But please don’t expect me to turn up for your concert.
Many among us feel that if we can’t speak English fluently we are backward, unintelligent and stupid. What’s even worse, many among us feel that they are progressive, intelligent and smart if they can speak English well.
Spare a moment about all those Spoken English classes which have run over our town. They pretend to give us exactly what REALLY WANT and we really want is to SPEAK ENGLISH WELL. That means speaking English is the question of life or death for us. In all desperation we want to learn to speak and if someone tells us he will teach him to do other things, we feel we are being taken for a ride. Listening? But why should I bother about it all? I possess an excellent pair of ears and to my knowledge they are working perfectly well. Why should I bother to learn how to listen? Nobody taught me how to listen to any language or even music, for instance, and yet I think I am pretty smart at these things. If you think like this, I would only politely point out: think again and have your knowledge about these things rechecked. A person who is mediocre in one’s own language is the person who does not take listening to one’s own language seriously. And vice versa.
Then there is that other guy whom you bump into almost every day. He says, ` I can follow English well’ he says, ` I merely don’t know how to speak fluently.’ My response would be `Mate, you don’t really follow English well and that’s why you can’t speak it fluently’. He is often the same the person who would say, ` I can understand written English but I don’t have enough vocabulary to express myself.’
And pray what do you mean by vocabulary and where would you find this vocabulary of yours? Vocabulary consists of words and words are songs. You have to hear them and learn to sing them. What’s the use of the dictionary for learning songs? The best way to learn a language is by learning to sing it. And to learn how to sing you have to hear the song properly. One of the quickest ways of picking up English is by using our ears.
So lets be all ears to English in all its tangs and tunes. Let’s enjoy Indians surfing languages like a bored teenagers surfing TV channels. Let’s toast those grammatical curiosities and exotic noises that pass solemnly for English. Let’s watch the sloth of clichés and threadbare expressions walk with exhaustion in our verbal forests. Let’s keep our ears pricked for a refreshing turn of phrase. Let’s tune ourselves into all clever and not-so-clever analogies and contrasts that surround us. Let’s carefully listen to how Barack Obama plunges into rhetoric and how Abdul Kalam serves his Masala Dosa English. Let’s notice how Laloo Prasad Yadav makes Bihari more interesting by speaking his imagination of English. Let’s pay attention to how Hermione Granger stutters and Harry hesitates or how James Bond speaks through his Scottish guns. Lets be curious cats with nine more lives asking why a particular speaker speaks in a particular way. The craft of listening is much more than improving English. After all, enriching our languages means enriching uranium of our lives.
So, by now if you feel listening is important please listen to what I have to say about listening itself.
I hold there is a deeper relationship between our personality and language and that acquiring a language almost amounts to acquiring a different personality. Listening is a dynamic process of understanding others and ourselves. It involves opening up to others as well as opening ourselves to ourselves. In short, listening is not merely a language skill but something more fundamental to our personality for our relationships. It is only when listening starts to fade away that a relationship is on its way out.
Though it may sound obvious, the listening artist is usually alert not only to what is being said, but is also alert to how something is being said. We should also listen with our eyes. The listening artist reads what is writ large on the speaker and his body language. She reads not only to the content of the speech but also the emotional overtones, undertones and fears. So let’s listen with undivided attention and multiplied curiosity.
I would like to end what I have said by pretending to be an expert in listening. I classify the dynamic process of listening into three types:
i) Listening to Spit: It is usually done to with a view to challenge, reject or question someone’s views. Much of the activity is premeditated and conclusions are drawn even before a speech begins. At its mildest it is listening with a Slant.
ii) Listening to Swallow is the opposite of the first type. It tries to absorb everything the speaker says without thinking much about it. It is a data grabbing mode, the mode of college students who start preparing late for their exams and very lately start attending lectures.
iii) Masticating is the superior and a very complex mode of listening. Listeners paradoxically involve themselves as much as possible while at the same time distancing themselves from the style and content of the speech. It is a balancing act which avoids the earlier two extremes and yet gets best of both the modes. Lazier ones and beginners can easily fall between the stools.
(A University Teacher by profession Sachin Ketkar is a fledgling amateur listening artist too)
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