10 principles of communication

Ten advices from Mogens Jacobsen, a psychiatrist.

1. Speak in your own name - say "I can" or "I think ..." etc. - Speak in your own name. Do not say "everyone sees that", "many believe that" - do not hide behind others. You can only speak about your own views, not about others. You know best what you see, think, feel, experience, etc.
   
   
2. Ask for what you want to get - you are responsible for the climate of relations with other people. Treat others like adults who can make their own choices - say yes or no. Treat your boss like that. Don't play a guessing game, don't beat around the bush, don't use stalks to get something from others. Ask for what you want, express your wishes and needs clearly and precisely. You know them best, express them and tell others about yourself.

3. Don't pretend - if you think no, don't say yes. If you think yes, don't say no. Don't pretend to forgive, understand if you can't or don't want to forgive, understand. Don't say you support something if you can't or don't want to support it. Avoid falsehood. A definite 'no' also says something about youi.
   
   
4. Send a full message - do not say "you annoy me". Most often it is so that you are annoyed by something that the other person is doing. Talk about your feelings. You can say "I'm mad at you," but that doesn't go forward. If you say "I'm mad at you right now because I think it's unfair that you ..." then you can go ahead. Because you can talk about injustice or possible misunderstandings. No one can question your feelings.
   
   
5. Don't apologize, the proverb says, "The road to hell is paved with an apology." Apologizing is a way to avoid confrontation and learn the truth. By apologizing instead of responding to what has been done, changes are avoided. To be able to change something in your behavior, you must first understand that you are behaving badly.
   
   
6. Live here and now - do not waste energy on remorse. Don't worry about what happened. Don't justify yourself with the past. "I am as I am because it was the way it was." By default, you say that nothing can be done about it and you block the development of your personality. Surely you already know that not all fears come true, so do not be afraid of the future. Of course, you have to learn from mistakes and you need to plan the future, but it's not worth escaping from what is for fear of what will happen. If you do not live in the present, you do not live fully.
   
   
7. Be specific - avoid generalities. Don't say "no matter" because it's not true. Tell me what is indifferent. List a few things that matter to you. You see, everything is not indifferent.
   General sentence:
   

   "Everyone got into it."
   "Nobody counts with me:
   "We don't want to."

   Specific sentence:
   Name who got stuck with you.
   Who doesn't count with you?
   You do not want? Who does not want?

8. Speak up - don't ask for matters you know. Have your say. Often people ask questions not to get an answer, but to say. However, the question is to trap the interlocutor, lead him to a goat's horn, to bother or to show that he knows better. Instead of asking a question, you should rather tell yourself what you know, feel, think.
   
   
9. Listen to your body - the heart is pounding, dry throat, cramps. But let others see nothing. You are taught to play roles - give the impression of calm and knowing everything, even when you doubt and have no idea what to do. You can lose your personality, you can get sick through it. Stress. Nerves. Harmony is important. Messages, feelings and deeds must match.
   
   
10. Ask "how?", Ask "what?" - these are the questions that make it possible to receive an explanation. "Why" may seem inquisitive, requires explanations and justifications, and causes justifications, suppositions, difficult explanations. The question "Why are you behaving like this?" Can be replaced by "What are you feeling right now?”.