In our current times of social media and cameras recording our every move, we need to be especially careful with what we choose to say and do. Beyond just the obvious, we want to talk about the language you choose to speak on a daily basis. Not your dialect or country of origin but rather your psychological and emotional language. What you choose to say, who you say it to and how you say it are being scrutinized at an all-time peak more than any other time throughout human history.
So what do we mean by “language?” We all have a past regardless of your age and your background. You may have been raised by very strict, devout parents or perhaps you raised, or not raised, in a particularly negative environment. Some were raised by being shown daily how not to raise children. Regardless of your upbringing, you have ingrained in you a certain personality matrix which controls your thought patterns, optimism or pessimism and the majority of the “language” you think in and speak in every day of your life.
You may be a child to a parent, a parent to a child, a spouse to a spouse, a friend to a friend, a teacher to a student or a coach to a player. All these scenarios will result in both verbal and non-verbal communication on a regular basis. It is the speaker’s job to understand the other to a point to where they know what “language” the listener hears in. They must be able to get outside themselves and make sure they relay their message in a way the listener can understand what is being communicated.
Imagine you are the greatest motivational speaker in the world and you gave a speech in English to an all Non-English speaking crowd? How motivated do you think they would be having not understood one word you said? Yet many of us do this repeatedly wondering why no one understands us.
There are many books on this topic and one of the top ones ever written is called The Five Love Languages by Gary Chapman. Whomever your audience might be and whatever relationship you are in where you feel misunderstood and frustrated – please do yourself a favor and pick up this book and read it very soon. You may find that all the misunderstandings may be coming from your end rather than the listeners end. The next time you want someone to change, work harder or give more…..start by making a change within yourself and begin speaking a message that your audience can actually understand!