2 situations to ponder about:
1. a couple quarreling on the streets, yelling and screaming at each other.
2. same couple, arms folded across their chests, walking an arms length apart, looking in separate directions.
Anyone who sees them in either situation would be able to tell you straight away, they are fighting. What about? Your guess is as good as mine, but they're definitely not in the best of moods.
Both situations are examples of communication, but why is neither effective? In situation 1, both parties are obviously trying to get their point across.. but neither is getting the message. In situation 2, now they are using their bodies to communicate their unhappiness to the other. Again, neither of them is paying attention.
I believe that there had to be something that was preventing them from being effective at communication. And that something is called NOISE. Not just physical sounds that drown out their screams and thoughts, but NOISE - physical, mental and (more importantly) emotional.
Noise is that which distracts, distorts or even blocks out the message that is being sent to you. A physical sound could draw your attention away from the speaker. A mental prejudice could distort the meaning of a comment. And your emotional status could very well shut out everything else.
Now, this couple is obviously in the most heated throes of an argument. Emotionally, neither is able to accept a negative statement. Mentally, they distort every comment directed at them into something that is the original intent. It is a situation I'm sure we've all experienced. They can only wait until they've cooled down before they can settle the issue.
And that is the moment that is ideal for communication. When noise is at a minimum, so that it cannot distort or block out the original meaning of a message, such that it can be communicated to its receiver, with the intent whole. Successful communication.
Anyway, after my girlfriend and I cooled down, I had a good talk with her about this, and we decided that if we got into another argument, we'd both wait until we cooled down before we talked it over.
share your comments and similar experiences. it'd definitely be useful for me. =)
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2 comments:
noise certainly plays an important role in restricting effective communication. like you mentioned, we should always try to eliminate this factor should we wish to get our message clearly across. matters will only get worse when it is very noisy and lots of information is coming your way.
I think that the most difficult part about communication is eliminating noise. Noise may not just be distractions around the communicators, it may also be the frame of mind that thay are in. Where physical distractions are concerned, we can easily eliminate them by going to a quiet place however where mental noise is concerned, it will have to depend on the receiver to reorganise their thoughts and priorities and for the sender to be able to intrigue and engage the receiver.
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