Transmutation of Communication
I find that communication is all about letting go. How strange. Letting go, into yourself. Stranger yet. If you are confused by this statement, it’ll make sense by the end of this post.
I feel to some degree that I am bursting within; perhaps this is what a caterpillar feels in the process of becoming a butterfly. The process of change and transmutation. I have kept my communication small for so long. This looked like an uncertain tone when I asked questions. Speeding through an explanation to ensure I wasn’t taking too much of someone’s time. Asking for permission to speak. Avoiding speaking my truth or about what excited me. Feeling anxious and worrying that someone might think what I had to say was irrelevant or silly.
It can often feel like being trapped in uncertainty, in the darkness of being misunderstood and misunderstanding others. It is possible to experience the light on the other side of that darkness. I am curious about how you feel about communication, please tell me in the Ask, Comment or Share section at the end of this post.
I’m excited to share with you what communication means to me and how it feels after leaning into lots of practice with communication and connection. Communication is for me, a piece of my soul that has always been expressive, joyful, demanding and relentless (in all the best ways). I say this because my mouth has always been full of words and as long as I was speaking and there was someone to listen, my heart would expand with joy and connection. This is what I would love for everyone to feel when expressing themselves.
We Are Storytellers
I understand that communication doesn’t come naturally to us all. Or so we think. I just found a golden nugget by searching “humans are storytellers” check it out:
“Humans are storytellers. It is our nature to make up stories, to interpret everything we perceive. Without awareness, we give our personal power to the story and the story writes itself. With awareness, we recover the control of our story. We see we are the authors and if we don’t like our story, we change it.”
Miguel Ruiz, The Four Agreements
I feel we are authors figuratively, with our words, the way we speak, express ourselves, and especially the inner stories we tell ourselves. If you have read my other posts such as The Key to the Paradox of You and The Divine, you will see that this internal story will reflect into your reality. That is perhaps when it appears that the story is writing itself. Check out The Paradigm of Your Experience for more insight to the stories you live in when you are playing into your paradigms and how that impacts all areas of your life. Within this post we will explore the concept of taking your power back through communication. Communication is the essence of connection, with yourself and with others.
How to Nurture Communication and Foster Connection
It is important that you know, all of these aspects below are intended to be expressed both within yourself and to those around you. At any given moment, you are either communicating and connecting with yourself through inner monologue or feedback or verbally with others. The way you show up in one area of your life will flow into the other areas of your life too. Have a look at this theory in detail in The Paradigm of Your Experience.
BE BRAVE
Why is bravery important? Lets establish what it is.
Bravery is heading into a situation with an open mind and heart in the face of adversity. This adversity could be within yourself, for example, pursuing an ambition of yours and facing your fears. Or externally, communicating with another person regarding how you feel knowing that you could be equally distraught or joyous after their response. These situations could potentially result in hurt or healing, but leaning into the unknown is what nurtures an environment, within yourself, of hope and trust.
CONNECTING WITH BRAVERY
This is important because the more open you allow yourself to be, the more you will find the lessons, revelations and blessings that the universe has to offer. This encourages you to have a substantial understanding of yourself and how you interact with others. You have more self awareness with an open perspective. It also prevents you from having an absolute mindset where there is no room for growth or connection. Bravery is openness in the face of fear. This promotes your ability to have more effective conversations with yourself and those around you.
BE KIND
Why is kindness important? Lets establish what it is.
Kindness is honesty with compassion. It is helping in a time of need. Smiling. Listening. Asking questions. It is being willing to understand. To forgive. To embody kindness is to have certainty of the goodness in your heart and the intention to share that goodness. Kindness is a choice and it doesn’t always look the same but the essence remains.
CONNECTING WITH KINDNESS
Kindness is to be welcoming to another. We live in a world of polarity and we are beings of complexity, so much so, that you cannot fully understand another person and often, you will not understand yourself either. If we are all in a process of learning, kindness can go a long way to fostering the connection between people. We are extremely different and yet so much the same. To have kindness in your heart for you, is to have kindness and compassion for others.
If you practice kindness within the way you communicate, you open a portal of integration, from your past to your present. You allow yourself to step into a space of responding in the present rather than reacting out of emotion from the beliefs or preconceived ideas that have followed you from your past. You are inviting change, and an undetermined reality, full of possibility.
BE CURIOUS
Why is curiosity important? Lets establish what it is.
Curiosity is choosing inquisitiveness instead of assumptions. It is explorative communication. Picture every person you meet as another universe completely unique and unlike your own. When you are meeting new people, you are colliding with another universe. Even though you are surrounded by people you think you know, they are still an expansive universe where there will always be more to explore. Different perspectives, capabilities, decisions, emotions, thought processes, experiences, stories, all that are completely new to you, and have not yet been discovered. This is true for every moment. You will never fully know and understand what someone has been through, is going through or will experience. This is the unknown when you are connecting with another, and the unknown when they are connecting with you.
CONNECTING WITH CURIOSITY
When you are connecting from this framework you are less likely to take what is said or done personally. You will rather be intrigued by what is reflecting back to you. If you are frustrated, excited, nervous, anxious, joyful or loving, these emotions are wanting to be expressed by you. The same is true for another person, so when someone is trying to communicate and connect with you, they are showing you the emotions that need to be expressed from within and vice versa. When you lean into curiosity, you are expanding your connection with yourself and those around you because this creates scenarios for us to grow and understand one another.
These scenarios are likely showing you what you want more or less of in your reality, again this is the same for others. This shows up in our emotions and we express ourselves to communicate what is going on and to connect with each other. To bridge the gap between your reality and theirs as much as humanly possible. If we don’t practice this, you are more likely to be misunderstood, or misunderstand. If you are curious enough in those moments you might be able to understand what the other person is trying to communicate, beyond the story you have written in your mind without true understanding. This leads to growth, joy, understanding, freedom and excitement as you walk the journey of connection together.
Letting Go Into Yourself
Even as I write this phrase, it sounds strange. However do you see the above aspects of nurturing communication and fostering connection is all about releasing your absolute mindsets and leaning into what is truly going on internally. To stop reacting from a space of preconceived ideas and fears. No longer being assumptive, and taking someone else’s expressions personally. For you to achieve this, it requires letting go of aspects of you, habits, patterns, behaviours that no longer support you. To reclaim your power, to let go into yourself and trust in your ability to be brave, kind and curious so that you may nurture your communication skills and foster connection with yourself and others.
This little bee is a play on words for encouragement.
michelle – an unbridled soul
BEE Brave
BEE Kind
BEE Curious
For those of you who like puns, this one is for you.
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Michelle – Found of the Unbridled Soul blog
Your Line of Communication
Have you noticed the way I describe communication has been a balancing act between connection with yourself and your connection with others. The essence of which is the way you communicate. The below illustrations and descriptions will help navigate your lines of communication, with yourself and with others.
How do you feel when you walk the line of communication? In the illustration below, the people represent ourselves and who we are trying to communicate with and the line resembles how our communication looks and feels.
Navigating Discomfort and Conflict
When we feel discomfort or experience conflict, it feels unstable, disorientating and sometimes unsafe. At the root of our discomfort there exist the stories we have told ourselves and our beliefs around our interactions with others. This is normally why you’ll find trends in the way you communicate with others. It’s partially due to the conversation you are having with yourself.
To avoid creating stories in our mind that are based on prior experience, preconceived ideas and fears. I would like to bring your awareness to the concept of discomfort and resentment. I found this concept in the Shadow and Light Oracle Deck by Selena Moon. A beautiful deck of cards for self reflection.
When we face discomfort in conversation, such as boundaries being overstepped, someone has said something offensive or rude, or if our feelings have been hurt. When this pops up, it’s important to speak into your emotions as promptly as you reasonably can.
Here’s why. When we disregard discomfort, we internalise our emotions and they feed the stories we have told ourselves about how we communicate, how that is perceived by others and how others communicate with us. This could sound like “they always hurt my feelings”, “why don’t they understand”, “if they keep communicating this way, they must not care about how I feel”, “I can never find the right words”. Some of this may be true, at which point you are aware and can make some changes, but at this stage this is based in assumption without communicative truth. Discomfort turns into resentment and will invite further conflict and misunderstanding if a scenario or feelings remain unexpressed.
If you face the initial discomfort and speak to the person about what is truly going on, with bravery, kindness and curiosity, you invite a space for truth and connection to appear. You bridge the gap between their reality and your own. This takes practice. Muscle Momentum, may be a nice reminder at this time.
Nurturing Communication and Connection
I urge you to read The Clearest Lens, in particular the section about ‘What Is’ to feel the context of what I am about to speak into. Nurturing communication is about leaning into your emotion and being able to connect with another in that space. If you love someone, pausing and taking the time to let them know how you feel. If sadness or anger has encompassed your heart then pausing and expressing the emotion so that you may understand where it’s coming from. Which story or belief has overcome the present? To communicate within conflict truly takes practice, safety and vulnerability. All of which must be built within yourself first. With practice.
If we are truly here in this earthly experience to explore the unknown then why not lean in? Why not speak your truth regardless of circumstance. Why not build trust within yourself and connect deeply with another. You have tools now to lean into this space. You are capable of being brave, kind and curious.
The more you lean in, the richer your experience and your growth.
Why stand in the way of your souls journey and expression? You won’t get to a point of perfection but this is not the goal, there will still be hard conversations. Discomfort. Uncertainty. However, you can start to feel practiced and familiar when you lean into these scenarios more often, with an open mind and heart. Expand into deeper connection with yourself and those around you. Become the storyteller of the reality you wish to live in.
What Do You Want Your Line of Communication to Look Like?
How are your communication skills? Not the technical and grammatical stuff. The heart centered, honest and transparent skills of communicating from your soul. Do you tune into your intention before communicating? This will help you communicate from a space of bravery, kindness and curiosity instead of uncertainty, reactiveness, judgement etc. If you know the way you communicate largely comes from the stories you tell yourself about your personality or capabilities or another person’s intentions, can you lean in differently? Will you pause next time you are overcome with emotion? Are you willing to acknowledge the trends in your communication with others and make some changes so that you may foster a deeper connection with yourself and those around you? I encourage you to be brave, kind and curious with yourself as you practice nurturing communication and fostering deeper connections in your life.
Ask, Comment or Share
I would absolutely love for you to lean into this space. Please ask any questions you might have. Comment if there was something that really caught your attention. You are most welcome if you would like to share.
Share and Journal Prompts
Here are some prompts for your share, or they can be used as journal prompts. How do you feel about communication in general? Do you tune into your intention before communicating? Are you willing to lean into discomfort so that you may replace resentment with understanding? How have you been brave, kind or curious with yourself or someone else?
