6 keys to "having the gab" and communicating more and better

The ability to speak and the agility to speak are attributes that can be trained. Do you dare to try it?

Fear of conversation is a factor that can limit the quality of life of many people.. Some people tend to be secluded and isolated in their own mental universe simply for fear of not knowing how to manage dialogues or of giving a bad image of themselves, blocking themselves without knowing what to say, or simply being visibly nervous.

Of course, there are different degrees and intensities in which the fear of speaking can occur, but the truth is that staying anchored in a counterproductive shyness can limit our options and our freedom, making our lives unnecessarily complicated.

Recommended article: "10 tricks to be more sociable and fun".

How to have more lip? Learning to speak without fear

Solving these learned fears requires effort, time and, above all, practice, but having some theoretical references can help make this process easier and more bearable. but having some theoretical references can help to make this process easier and more bearable.. Reading the keys presented below can be a good way to face this challenge during the first stages of improving your ability to "have a gab".

1. Becoming cultured

This is a step that requires years of dedication and whose value, of course, goes far beyond its implications for the way we relate to people... as well as being very stimulating and fun. Quite simply, we can make our world of references wider by learning about new subjects and soaking up things you didn't know before.

Remember that a good conversation is almost always enriched with cultural references that have to do with elements that are not present in the immediate environment in which the dialogue takes place. Why not start by loving what we like in order to expand our knowledge?

Thus, a conversation about our interests or areas of study and work can gain in value and relevance if there are many topics that interest you and about which you know things. But, in addition, our self-esteem will improve if we believe that we will always have topics of conversation in almost any situation, which will make it more difficult for us to block ourselves for not knowing what to say.

2. Get out of the comfort zone with self-instructions

If we start from a situation in which starting a conversation or participating in one that is already in progress usually makes us nervous, it is necessary to assume that improving our lip skills will entail effort and moments of some initial discomfort.. This fact will make us, if we do nothing to remedy it, adopt a passive attitude when we could be talking, avoiding initiating dialogues with other people or responding with monosyllables and short sentences so as not to jeopardize our image before others. So, in short, we don't get to know ourselves too well.

If we want to break this dynamic, we need to "force ourselves" to participate in complex dialogues, giving up short-term goals (not exposing ourselves to nerves and the risk of looking bad) in favor of long-term goals (having a richer social life and improving the way we relate to people). The simple fact of starting to create situations of fluid communication in complicity with our interlocutors is, in itself, the basis of what it is to be a good conversationalist.

Self-instructions

The self-instructions are part of this solution.. Their application consists, simply, in setting personalized and very concrete objectives and goals to be achieved sequentially at the beginning of the process of talking to someone. For the self-instructions to be simple, we must have them in mind when we want to start talking, and we must also learn to relate what happens to us and what we experience with these instructions that we have memorized.

Giving up excuses

A first group of self-instructions should be aimed at detecting the excuses we use for not having to speak and, thus, neutralizing them. Thus, if we realize that we are clinging to an idea that allows us to continue without dialoguing with someone and stay in our comfort zone (e.g., "he looks tired, better not to bother him"), being forewarned against this form of rationalizing excuses will force us to stick to the plan.

Using self-instructions to break the ice

The second group of self-instructions can be applied in order to start the conversation, forcing ourselves to address the person we want to talk to and engaging him or her in the dialogue.. However, it should be said that self-instructions should be left aside once the dialogue has already started, because following a script to talk to someone will make it artificial and not very spontaneous.

3. Learning to listen

One of the easiest facets of participating in a conversation is to let the other person take the reins of the dialogue and the topic of the conversation. So, if we are starting to take steps to let go of our fear of conversation and there are still things that we are struggling to do, adopting the role of "the listener" is a very good option and then progressing from there.

In this way you will get used to relax and simply follow the thread of the conversation. This way, since you won't experience the nerves that sometimes arise when you constantly doubt whether it is best to say something or not, you will be able to pay attention to what is being said and have more opportunities to come up with creative ways to use the information you are receiving to in the form of appropriate, witty, or generally meaningful responses to others. to others.

In fact, the ability to know how to listen and contribute interesting elements from what the other person has said is a typical characteristic of a good conversationalist. Do you know the concept of active listening?

To learn to converse, we must learn to forget about the image we are giving and simply immerse ourselves in what the other person is saying, directing almost all our attention to his or her speech. This can be complicated if we start the dialogue being very nervous, but with practice we can achieve it..

You may be interested in reading this article: "14 main social skills to succeed in life".

4. Losing the fear of creativity

If we change our philosophy of life so that the most creative and strident elements can have a place in it, our conversations can gain in naturalness and ability to entertain. To do this, it is good to start with our close friends.

Rather than using jokes, which are often typical and not of our own invention, what we can do is to communicate, directly, those ideas or associations that have occurred to us and that we find amusing. Regardless of whether they are funny or not, normally the humor with which we communicate them will be contagious to others by our smile and the way we say it. and the way we say it.

Seeing that others react positively to these little spontaneous verbal inventions will, in turn, make us gain more self-confidence, which will make it easier for us next time, boost our self-esteem and allow us to converse more fluently.

5. Avoid false monologues

When it comes to losing the fear of speaking, a part of us may ask that, since we are going to have to interact with someone, we at least act as if that someone does not exist, adopting the role of monologuists ourselves and overwhelming our audience with a torrent of (memorized) phrases without expecting too much feedback from those who listen to us. That is why we must keep in mind that in every dialogue there must be a space for naturalness and empathy.

If we are planning to participate in a dialogue and we realize that we are preparing long sentences or directly a paragraph of what could be our biography, the best thing to do is to change the way we speak, the best thing to do is to change our strategy and go for the short-termismsimply start a conversation in a simple way and make it possible for the other person to participate immediately afterwards, to establish an empathetic connection.

In this way, we will have already done the most difficult thing: initiated a dialogue. We will then turn this exchange of ideas into something meaningful; this usually happens naturally if we have something to say and are not blinded by fear.

6. Pay attention to what is happening in the context.

Part of the conversation is always related to the context in which it takes place. That is why, when speaking you have to take into account that there are certain conventions and expectations related to the space and the moment in which the dialogue is established. It is necessary to take this into account in order to be able to adapt to the situation, but beyond very formal contexts such as those related to the professional and work environment, it is not worth getting obsessed with the subject, as this can kill our creativity and our ability to surprise.

But, in addition, paying attention to what is happening around us in real time will give us opportunities to keep the conversation flowing based on what we observe. Seeing the environment in which we speak more as an accumulation of possibilities to feed the dialogue rather than as a limiting aspect of it will make it easier for us to lose our fear of conversations.