Learn to "On Mute" Yourself

It has been three months since I joined the new company, and it has always been in the state of Work From Home. In addition to emails and Teams Chat, various online meetings are essential every day. Sometimes the company needs to issue a notice, sometimes it needs to be discussed within the team, and some It is a one-on-one communication with the Manager or a colleague. This is quite a new experience for me, and in the process, I also discovered a very important function "Mute", which is to put myself in the Mute state. This is very important for multi-person conferences. When one person is speaking, others will consciously mute themselves. This is not only to avoid possible background noise interference, but also to let everyone concentrate on listening to the speaker. Express your opinion. I appreciate this unwritten rule, and I feel inspired by it in other ways.

I believe that everyone should have read "learning to listen" when reading many materials or books that teach people to communicate or interpersonal communication. It seems to be a very simple concept, isn't it just listening to others? There are not many people who can do this well (I think I need to improve my awareness and ability in this area). Recently I was reading Martin EP Seligman's "True Happiness", which has a chapter on effective communication between partners, The author puts special emphasis on learning to listen. To be a good listener, first of all, don't rush to interrupt the other party. While listening, it is best to give the other party a proper response to show that you have received the information the other party wants to convey. The second is to avoid Inattentiveness, in addition to being influenced by external factors or personal emotions, the most bad habit to overcome is to prepare your own rebuttals while listening (I have had many similar experiences myself). Information, such exchanges must be ineffective or even counterproductive. The author's suggestion is to try to summarize what the other party said before expressing your own opinions, so that the other party can feel that you are really listening. And to do this, in my opinion, it is to set a "Mute" key in my heart to "shut up" my brain, so as to calm down and listen to the other party.

I watched a Youtube video a few days ago, and one of the words I heard touched me a lot, to the effect that when we discuss issues with others, we often feel superior because of where we are or the things and information we are exposed to. Maybe We don't realize it ourselves, but the other party can feel it when communicating with others. And because this sense of superiority will make the other party uncomfortable, so he/she will try to refute all your views, even if he/she It's not necessarily against your opinion in mind. The most typical example I can think of is communicating with people with different political positions, we may feel that our position is correct and bring a sense of superiority, or persuade the people around us It’s easy to feel superior when it comes to getting vaccinated. When you’re in a condescending attitude to communicate with another person who disagrees, it’s easy to get caught up in listening to what the other person has to say. In the state of refuting or even mocking, let alone listening to the other party's demands.

No matter in life, work, or other occasions, communication includes two aspects of listening and expression, and even listening is more important than self-expression in many cases. Maybe we should try to install a "Mute" button in our hearts, when we need to Press it when listening, after all, what everyone says will only make sense if everyone learns to listen.