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This exercise will help you create a solid foundation to communicate with others in a vulnerable and grounded way. You’ll learn how to listen to other people without interrupting and to speak from your heart. It’s for anyone who is looking to improve their communication within their personal and business relationships.
Great for:
- Improving communication in personal relationships to avoid yelling, anger and frustration.
- Improving how comfortable people feel communicating honestly and authentically.
- Team-building and bonding in organizations and teams.
- Building trust between coaches and their clients.
The key to having clear communication starts with listening to the person talking. Learning how to listen properly will help you work through communication issues or barriers that leave you feeling unheard or misunderstood 먹튀검증.
Many people struggle to genuinely communicate, especially during stressful moments and when they’re feeling emotionally triggered. Expressing our emotions and feelings becomes more difficult to navigate if we don’t understand how to listen. People who struggle with communication have a tendency to react emotionally or lead the conversation into a debate or argument, rather than respond clearly.
This exercise teaches you how to listen, be present, patient, and compassionate towards both yourself and the other person expressing themselves. You will practice listening and speaking from a deep heart space to improve your communication in your personal and business relationships.
Exercise:
- With your partner (or client) find a comfortable and private space to practice with no distractions.
- Sit across from each other face-to-face, at eye level.
- Have a timekeeper/stopwatch with you (mobile phones have one in the clock application). It’s recommended to place your phone out of sight so you don’t get distracted.
- If you don’t have a person to practice this exercise with, you may use a mirror and look yourself in the eyes.
This exercise begins in complete silence.
Step 1: Eye contact
1. Sit and stare into each other’s eyes for 1 minute. No talking, just staring.
Explore and take turns sharing your experience with one another for 3~5 minutes. Was there any resistance you had keeping eye contact with your partner? What emotions came up for you? Did you break eye contact? If so, why? Did you struggle with the silence? How do you feel?
2. Keep eye contact with your partner in silence for 3 minutes.
Explore and take turns sharing your experience with one another for 5~10 minutes. How did this experience feel? How comfortable were you during that experience? What was more challenging, being the listener or speaker? Why so? Take a moment to reflect on where these challenges manifest in your everyday communication.
Step 2: Eye contact with Dialogue
1. Each of you will take 2 minutes speaking on things you are grateful for in your life while the other silently listens. As the listener you will not reply or respond to anything your partner is sharing. Keep your facial expressions at a minimum. Try to avoid nodding in reassurance, and simply keep eye contact. Just listen with your ears and heart, and hold an intention for your partner to feel safe when sharing.
- Explore and share your experience with one another for 3~5 minutes.
- What was more challenging, the listener or speaker? Why so? Take a moment to reflect on where these challenges manifest in your everyday communication. Would keeping eye contact or listening more help de-escalate arguments?
2. Now each of you take 3 minutes to share your deepest fears while the other person listens. If for any moment the speaker runs out of things to share or hits a mental or emotional block, the listener may prompt with the question “What is your deepest fear?” As the listener you hold the space for your partner to explore what they want to share.
- Explore and share your experience with one another for 5~10 minutes.
- How difficult was it for you to be vulnerable with someone willing to listen? How do you feel after expressing yourself in a vulnerable way?
Step 3: Eye contact in silence
Finally, you will sit again in silence, staring into each other’s eyes for 5 minutes. Take these 5 minutes to be present in gratitude for yourself and your partner for their presence and vulnerability.
- Explore and share your experience with one another for 5~10 minutes.
- How did the silence feel? What thoughts or feelings came up?
- How present did you feel? How can you take this experience with you to future conversations?
*Questions used during this exercise can be changed to whatever question resonates with the situation or client.
Listening during challenging communications provides us with the opportunity to check our own emotions and triggers. It prevents us from a reactive and emotional rebuttal that can easily turn into arguments or even screaming matches. Listening first before speaking also sets an example about how you expect to be treated when you’re speaking. Explore what it felt like to be the listener and not have the ability to speak. Can you envision yourself having the same presence when talking and listening to others?
