Letter_of_Advice

Letter of Advice Amanda Page COM200: Interpersonal Communication (GSL1147A) Marcia Wynn December 19, 2011 Dear Tim and Amanda, I understand that you all were just recently engaged and are looking for some advice for your all’s relationship. Well, I will be telling you more about the following throughout the letter. 1. I will describe the process by which self-concept is developed and maintained. 2. I will give you some strategies for active, critical, and empathetic listening. 3. Then we will discuss how words have the power to create and affect attitudes, behaviors, & perception. 4. I will define emotional intelligence and it’s role in effective interpersonal relationships. And last but not least 5. We will discuss how self-concept and defensive and supportive messages and behaviors create positive and negative communication climates. So, first off, it has been studied by many philosophers that self-concept starts pretty much at birth. Your self-concept is what people around you tell you about yourself and it is your outlook on all of your own attributes. Your self-concept usually stays with you for the rest of your life, it all depends on you. If you have a high self-concept then the people around you will see how you feel about yourself, and treat you as how you feel. The people around you can see how you feel about yourself by your body language and it is maintained through out the rest of your life. If you have a low self-concept and the people around you have done nothing but put you down all of your life, there is a good possibility that you can bring that low self-concept into your relationship and bring you partner down with you. It could also cause a whole lot of stress on you relationship. So try to make sure that if you have low self-concept work on bringing that up about yourself and know that YOU are the one that is engaged to your partner no one else. Now I am going to give you some strategies for active, critical, and empathetic listening. There are many strategies for active, critical, and empathetic listening. You can start out by keeping eye contact with a speaker, if you ask any questions make sure that you restate they key point to let the speaker know that you were listening and understood what they were trying to say. For the empathetic listening you also always make sure you keep eye contact and constantly make sure that the speaker knows that you feel where they are coming from. If you do not have these strategies for listening in your relationship it is easily mistaken for you not listening to that person. And it could cause many arguments over something that could have been prevented due to the fact of you facial expressions and body language. Always try and keep eye contact and restate the message so you all know that you are on the same page. It will be a lot less stressful on you both and your relationship. Words can a have a huge affect on people, all depending on your tone of voice and your body language. For instance the word “AND”, depending on how you use that word it could affect the other person’s attitude or even perception to what you are trying to say. Here is an example of how a conversation could have a negative outcome. ”Well, I have some good new AND…” Many people look at the word “AND” and feel that it is a negative word that something bad is fixing to be said. I would recommend that you should never start out a conversation with the word “AND” or use the word “BUT” following to far behind due to the fact of the way that people look at it which is negative and can cause a whole lot of stress on the other person in the conversation. You do not want to have that sort of stress and negative approach in your relationship with each other or anyone else. It will keep the impatients and frusteration out of the air for a better relationship for the both of you. Emotional intelligence is a set of skills that can be learned. Understanding emotions and how people express them is very important in interpersonal relationships because people who are aware of others emotions and are sensitive to emotions are able to deal with life’s ups and downs. They will also have a better self-concept, and look at others with care. Your self-concept or self-image can make a huge impact on others. If you behave in a positive manner and give supportive messages than people will be able feel positive themselves and not have as bad of a self-concept. If you were to give a negative behavior or say something that sounds negative it can cause your communication with that person seem to take the negative road. I hope that after each of you have read this letter, it soon helps you to both work on your communication skills with each other and can improve your relationship more than what it already is. Reference: Alarez, J. (1990). Self Concept. Found in http://social.jrank.org/pages/554/Self-Concept.html Hoope, M. (2006). Active Listening: Improving your ability to listen and lead. Found in http://site.ebrary.com/lib/ashford/docDetail.action'docID=10193835&p00=active%20listening%20skills Sole, K. (2011). Making Connections: Understanding Interpersonal Communication. San Diego, CA: Bridgepoint Education, Inc. found in https://content.ashford.edu/books/AUCOM200.11.1/sections/sec3.1