6165. Keep Moving Forward

As our core classes draw to a close I am sad to leave the people I’ve come to know. I looked forward to reading blog and discussion posts. It’s like making friends in the cyber world. I rely on my classmates to help me understand what we are talking about. I need the many perspectives to help me see beyond my own world.

Walt Disney taught me a wonderful lesson. There’s a great big beautiful tomorrow Shining at the end of every day. All of our tomorrows are beautiful. We rock.

Thank you for being a partner on this mad journey. 

6165 - You won't understand. It's a camp thing.

Once Upon a Time I was in high school. During this phase of my life I had some wonderful adjourning experiences. 

Every summer I would go to Tri Cities Workcamp in Petersburg, Virginia with my church. TCW is a camp where high schoolers from all over the East Coast come and we gather to fix up homes for those living in poverty. So the first day of camp we play all kinds of games and do lots of silly things to loosen us all up and get to know one another. Then we are divided up into crews. You spend almost all of the week with your crew. Obviously the crews bond like crazy over the week. So the last day of camp once the work is done and we return to base the rest of the night is reserved for adjourning. We gather in our crews and do affirmations. This is when everyone in the crew goes around the group and says positive things about one another. A gift they bring, what they like about a person, a specific memory…anything that will make the other person feel loved.  There is usually crying and hugging involved.

Another thing about TCW is throughout the week we write “care cards”. On the first day of camp every camper gets an envelope to decorate with their name and crew number. Those envelopes are then taped to a wall in the dining hall – like a giant mail wall. Anyways all week long people write these little notes to one another and on the last day of camp we are allowed to take our envelopes home.  This is one of the best things. We get to read all the notes people have given to us. It’s wonderful. 

I remember learning about the “termination process” in college when I was studying social work. To this day I think that is an awful phrase.  But the point is – the end of a process is important and needs to be given special attention. You recap all you've done and make a future plan.  Maybe a better name would be something more positive sounding like – future process, or the Yellow Brick Road process – something that doesn’t sound like a killing machine. 

6165 - War. Uh. What it is good for? Absolutely Nothing.

In 25 years of life I have been involved in conflict.  In some way. More often than I not I try to be as small as possible so I will not be dragged into conflict. I’m an escapist to the core (O’Hair & Wiemann, 2012). I realisize this is an unproductive way to be. Allow me to refer you to yet another Harry Potter quote, “Numbing the pain for a while will make it worse when you finally feel it” (Rowling, 2000).  So I know it is better to deal with conflict as it happens but still this is not my instinct.

Working on this week’s assignment it took a lot of thinking and help for me to come up with a solution. My imaginary world self wanted to just kick Mr. Little and his gang out of town and say, “Go use another library”! But alas that would not be real life. In the end my friend helped me see compromise. Then I had to convince myself that this was not catering to Mr. Little’s backward thinking. I am good at finding the compromise in other people’s conflicts but not my own. Anyways….

This week I reflected on my work related conflicts. I started thinking that when I had to engage with the admin I wanted to come across as both, sweet and confident. Like I wanted to feel like I was “equals” with them but I also wanted them to see me as someone to take care of.  I’m a pretty self aware person. I would talk about myself to explain my thoughts etc. and sometimes it would lead to trouble. I guess I’m not good at working with those higher up than me. Hopefully I will be better in my next job. [not gonna lie – I am dreading the future job hunt]

Ok so strategies…this is hard because I often block out past conflicts so I even though I know I’ve had them and strategies, recalling them is harder than I expected. Allright one thing I like to do is have a mediated meeting.  So many times people twist words or misunderstand or get super emotional and it disrupts the process of problem solving. I like mediators because they are an objective witness.  I also like to write things down ahead of time. I was thinking recently about how this action may come off as cowardly. [ you know, every one communicates differently] But I think its good because it keeps the angry passion away. It keeps me from straying off point. It helps me stay calm because I am not under pressure having to come up with thoughts on the spot. I wish more people took time to write down their thoughts and reasons when coming to a meeting.  

As I mentioned I am terrible at conflict. I enjoyed this week because it forced me out of my comfort zone and to think about how can I integrate what I am learning into my regular life. 

6165 - You with your words like knives and swords and weapons....

Deep Breath.

So I took the tests as I was told. The first two, Communicator Anxiety and Listening Style, were pretty in tune with what I think of myself. Then I took the Verbal Aggressiveness test. I scored very high. Blew my mind. The questions were about attacking people – I do not believe I attack people. The idea makes my tummy turn. {its why I get so stressed out during election years}  I had a strong reaction to these results.

I admit,  I have the thoughts of verbal aggressiveness but I keep my mouth shut and don’t say the things out loud. I retreat into my head – a safe place – if you will.  

But when I talked to my mom about it she said it seemed pretty accurate and that I get myself in to trouble because I have a “sharp tongue.” Again, blew my mind. What? That’s not true. So many conversation I have include the following exchange:  I will say, “I was like ____” the other person goes, “Omygosh! Did you say that?” and I end with, “No way, of course not.”But as per usual with moms, she was right. Well  to a point because I’ve been crazy wrestling with this all week and I am still not sure I have reached a conclusion/understanding.

I began to think about it. And I think I must have some kind of fuse that after it reaches a certain point, I can no longer keep it in and I say bad things.  Perhaps I have had these experiences in that past but don’t remember them so I have learned but don’t remember learning. I don’t say anything. I avoid talking to others because I am afraid of what I’ll say. The Thumper Rule I call it --“If you can’t say nothin’ nice Don’t say nothin’ at all”  It is as if I have two dialogues – the dialogues I imagine having that would wreak great havoc and the actual dialogue that comes out of mouth.  I would hope that people would tell me that I hurt their feelings and then I could work to correct it. 

I just realized that maybe I confuse courage to speak up with meanness? The thing this is – I don’t think or feel I am being aggressive. I know I can be sarcastic and  that is not always received well. I am at a loss for figuring this one out. I will definitely be on the lookout in future interactions for verbal aggressiveness. I do think that I sometimes tell the truth too much and that has gotten me into trouble but I don’t think I’m being aggressive. I don’t know. I’m kinda freaking out. 

*side note: every time I have written aggressive I have spelled it out in my head with the cheer, “Be Aggressive. B –E-A-G-G-R-E-S-S-I-V-E”! *end side note 

6165 Week 3 - Communicating outside my box

Do I find myself communicating differently with people from different groups and cultures? I say yes.  Obviously there are different groups in my life that I am different with. I don’t communicate the same with my family as I do with my church friends or work people, or old people or children. You know depending on the group I alter my communication strategy. 

One thing from the reading that really struck me was the section on gender (Beebe, Beebe, and Redmond, 2011. I have never been good at communicating with men. The world of men is something I know nothing about. OMYGoodness – it the worst when you have to talk to a guy you like. Oh boy. Anyways. This section said that when men communicate they want or are giving information. Mind. Blown. Me as a woman, like  the book said, is about relationship. (Beebe,Beebe, and Redmond, 2011). Now that I know this nice tidbit of knowledge I plan to apply to my everyday life.

When I am meeting someone new I rely on the strategies I have learned, typical of a middle class person in the United States.  Stand up straight, look in the eyes, firm handshake. I am received well by the person. Now that I have learned so much in this program I now to be respectful of touch sensitive cultures. Or cultures that don’t value eye contact as I do. And personal space issues. There are many factors that I know to consider now when meeting someone new.

 In truth I don’t meet many people that are very different from me. There is a lot of racial diversity and educational diversity; some economic, but overall most of the things that we are discussing are the same. When I went to Europe a few years ago for a big family trip I was hoping for some different cultures but I was saddened to find that Europe is pretty American.  Perhaps I will go to Taiwan or somewhere different when I save up enough.

A second strategy would be to apply what we learned about the platinum rule (Beebe,Beebe and Redmond, 2011). When interacting with others – take the time to see things as they do. Don’t force your ways on other people. Being open to others enhances all communication because it will break down judgements that we have and create a more open world.

And as I mentioned earlier –when interacting with men now I know to tone down the details and give the important information. I definitely think this will help both me and the man I am talking to on the same page. Dads at work, men in the world that I don’t know but have to interact with on a daily basis, even men in my own family.

Overall I say this week was a good week. I feel like the more I learn in this class the better I become because I can immediately apply what we learn.

References

 Beebe, S. A., Beebe, S. J., & Redmond, M. V. (2011). Interpersonal communication: Relating to others (6th ed.). Boston, MA: Allyn & Bacon.

A Random Thought for 6165

I Love Our Textbook!!!

 It is so fun! There have been several mentions of Harry Potter

* note the picture of the stack of books on page 38 are not stacked in order* This book is great because it think s like me and doesn’t make me feel like an idiot for understanding things in a non academic way. So thanks for listening. 

Mom! I swear I have to watch TV for my homework! 6165

The Middle. A show I’ve been interested in but have never watched so thanks 6165 for giving me a wonderful excuse.

Without sound I can tell this is a family show. There is a mom and a dad and three adolescent children.  The parents have scenes showing they are discussing something. The actors use lots of facial expressions and hand gestures that look like enthusiasm.  The teen children also use facial expressions however theirs note annoyance, boredom, and perhaps, confusion.  As in any sitcom there appears to be some kind of misunderstanding going on.  The characters are also making eye contact suggesting sending a quick, shared message.  The mom and dad show physical affection for one another.  From what I can tell this is a loving family with plenty of sitcom quirkiness.

Ok Sound on.

Well  I was definitely right about the family part. As it turns out the parents are bothered that the children want to stare at screens all summer and want to do something fun together as a family. So the children exchange concerned glances because they are nervous about what the parents are going to come up with. The parents decide to take them to a drive in movie. This explains both the enthusiasm and the confusion. The parents have to explain and then convince the kids that a drive in movie will be fun.  So they go to the drive in and it all works out as it usually does in sitcoms. 

This assignment was more difficult than I thought it would be. Perhaps if I had watched a show I know well, like Friends or 30 Rock, I would have been able to pick up on different things. 

Just now I thought…this would a really crazy assignment to do with say the first episode of the first season of The Real World.  There would be so many elements. Sigh. I will stick with my sitcom. Mostly because I don’t have a clue how to get my hands on an old Real Word episodes.

This assignment was cool because it shows how important non verbal communication is. We express feelings and share messages without words with those we are close to.