Advice on Marriage

Dear John and Mary,

I understand that the two of you would like some advice on marriage since you heard I was taken a class on interpersonal communication. First off I would like say congratulations and I wish both of you the best in your marriage. After reading this letter, I hope that I have helped the both of you learned how one should communicate in a marriage. I have a couple of ideas that should help the both of you now and when you two unite in marriage. Some people think that when you get married it become easier, but truth be told it does not. Both of you will still have to put in the same amount work while you were dating if not more. I believe I will be able to give good advice based on what I have learned from this class and life experiences. In this letter, I will first define and explain the role in which emotional intelligence will play part in your relationship. Next I will describe how gender and culture has impact on interpersonal relationship. Third I will help the both of you understand how perceptions, emotions, and nonverbal expression have effect on the relationship. Fourth I will also help the both of you recognize how words have the power to create and affect attitudes, behavior, and perceptions. Finally I will help the two of you develop strategies for active, critical, and empathic listening. In the end, the role of this letter is to inform you on how interpersonal communication plays a role in you guys marriage and to show techniques on how to improve communication between the two of you.

John and Mary, I am going to start by defining what emotional intelligence is and what part it plays in your relationship. Emotional intelligence is simply the ability to understand your own feelings and the feelings of others. Emotional intelligence is a set of skills that can be learned. You two can improve our emotional intelligence by increasing your awareness of emotional issues and improving our ability to identify, assess, and manage your feelings. (Sole, 2011). Being able to understand each other feelings will help you guys understand what the other trying to say or feeling at a certain time. According to Salovey and Mayer, there are four different factors of emotional intelligence. "These four factors are perception of emotions, ability to reason with emotions, understand emotions and to manage your emotions." (Karnaze, 2011). Perceiving emotions is important because this is the process in which the both of you as a couple try to understand each other verbally and nonverbally through body language and body expressions. Another process of emotional intelligence is for each of you to reason with your emotions by thinking, paying attention and responding. As a couple, you have to learn how to understand each other emotionally. By understanding each other emotions, you will have the ability to resolve issues that arise in a better way. For example, if one of you is expressing anger the other person would be able to understand what caused the other person to become angry. John and Mary, if you two had disagreement and the other person stop and began to listen to the other person, do you think you would be able to understand why the other person became angry? As relationship experts state, listening to each other is one the key components of a successful relationship. We discuss listening skills later in this letter. Managing your emotions is the key part of emotional intelligence. By doing this you have the ability to regulate emotions, respond appropriately and respond to the emotions of the other person. After reading this section, I hope the both you were able to understand how emotional intelligence plays a part in your relationship.

To help you better understand the role of emotional intelligence, I decided to use my parents as example. I will give you a little background information about my parents before I explain how the role of emotional intelligence plays a part in their marriage. My parents were married for twenty one years before my mom died in 2004. The one thing that stood out that still stay in mind today is that my dad said he married his best friend. The example that I am going to use to help you better understand how emotional intelligence will play part in your relationship is a story that my mom had told before. She said marriage is like any other relationship you have put in effort and work into in order for it to last. My mom stated that she and my dad were having a disagreement and neither one of them could not understand what the other was feeling at the time because both of them were trying to get their point across. The disagreement continued for a while until they realize neither one of them was listening to the other. Mom said after they realized that they decided then and there that even if they feel like the other person is wrong they should use the method of listening to each other first before responding. My mom always told me that marriage could be beautiful thing if the both of you communicate. It amazing how something that was told to me many years ago I remember and now can relate to what I have learned in the class I am now taking to you guys a better understanding of emotional intelligence.

Another topic I will discuss that I have also learned with taking this class is the impact of gender and culture on interpersonal communication. You guys are probably wondering what does gender and culture have to do with your relationship. Trust me I thought the same thing up until I started to do more research. Of course gender can play huge part in how people communicate in relationship, but the idea that culture could also play a part of how you guys communicate had me a little confused at first. Have you guys heard of the book that Women Are from Venus and Men are From Mars? Book titles like this let the reader know that the way men and women think, their emotions, and the way they responds are different. The statement that I have heard from friends both females and males is that women are more emotional than men. Every time I hear this I cannot do anything but laugh. Yes, gender does play a part how one reacts in certain situation. Gender plays a huge part in how people communicate because studies show that women and men talk the same but hear differently. It has been proven that both women and men are nurturing, loving, aggressive, patient, or impatient when communicating. Women are more likely to be sensitive to hidden messages or read between lines of social implications. Men are more likely to read to between the lines of status implications. For instance we are going use a scenario that make take place between wife and husband after long day of work. The husband might come and say, "I do not know how I am going to be able to get all this work done this week." The wife might reply, "I know, there are just not enough hours in