Letter of Advice

Letter of Advice

MEEEEE

Interpersonal Communication

Samantha Duhn

March 12th 2012

Dear SOMEONE IMPORTANT,

You have come to me to assist you on how to effectively communicate in your relationship. After taking the class interpersonal communication for my nursing degree, I feel confident enough to give you some advice on your relationship that will help what you get married. We all know the golden saying that "communication is key". We also know that in a relationship we need to be considerate about one another's feelings and to always be open and honest. These are some of the lessons that a parent should teach us when we were younger. But, the biggest question is, how do we apply them to our life and use these practices with a positive outcome. Space as we get older and start to settle down it seems to become lost. Within this letter will touch base is of important areas the communication that I believe will help to review with communication that will help you in your future married life and beyond.

Conflict in a relationship is not always a bad thing. There are times where you will just butt heads with one another. These conflicts are usually short-lived and resolve themselves. Occasionally you may have to deal with situations from each other, kids, and past relationships that'll make you feel uncomfortable and may cause miscommunication between you. But as long as you heed my vice and always communicate through situations like this you can overcome them and stay together. According to Orbuch, people can chat for hours and never at one time, discuss amino for significant contents; therefore, couples can improve and develop sustainable communication that is proven useful in relationships that endure for life (Schoenberg,2011).

I will first begin with an explanation of the principles of misconception of interpersonal communications and the effective communications. "Communication is a process by which we shared ideas or information with other people. Communication is commonly thought of as talking, but is much more than just speech" (Sole, 2011). Learning to communicate effectively is very important in any type or relationship. Some common misconceptions of communication are that every time we talk with someone it is considered communication, the longer someone knows a person the better they communicate, and everyone thinks that they are a good listener. These are not true when talking with people there should not be only sharing of information but key points. In the five other points within this letter, it will explain how to effectively communicate.

Self-concept is a key learning outcome for my class that I believe is beneficial. So what is self-concept? Self-concept can be defined as an appraisal of your own attributes and competencies. Self-concept is developed and maintained by the things we as humans are prone to watch or follow. Because of this, our view of ourselves can be skewed. Once you recognize the way we view ourselves, we can easily begin understand who we are as a person. This in turn, make it easier for you to be able to tell your significant other were things without worrying. You will begin to open up to one another and a brand-new way.

After understanding self-concept, you will be able to understand and work on self-image and most importantly your self-esteem. Self-image is "the total subjective perception of oneself, including an image of one's body and impression of one's personality, capabilities, and so on" (Sole, 2011). Self-esteem is "your sense of self-worth and the level of satisfaction you have with yourself, it is how you feel about yourself" (Sole, 2011). Using both self-image and self-esteem will allow you to present yourself and ideas to others more effectively.

Basically, if you're not afraid of how you look or act that you will have nothing to worry about. Self-esteem can be influenced by many factors. It could be influenced by social media, peers, and even parents. Lately there has been a lot of emphasis placed on looks and actions. Social media currently is the worst outlet. It has been telling us how to dress, look, and behave in a negative way. In order to have great self-esteem, a person needs to have a great self-concept.

The third area I would like to discuss is assessing your personal communications and improving communication competencies. "Being a competent communicator requires knowledge of a number of communication skills and practice of those skills on a regular basis" (Sole, 2011). This is best defined as the ability to send, receive, and understand messages in any context. This involves careful listening, questioning, and the ability to take it all in. It does take some work for your competencies to improve, but would just a few simple steps every day it will improve. "Relationship therapist Terri Orbuch advocates at least 10 min. of quality conversation the day for couples. Try to touch on goals, values, important friendship, or sources of stress. Avoid household chores (who's getting the milk?) and other minutiae" (Schoenberg, 2011).

In my interpersonal communications class, we were asked to read the article "Can We Talk? Researcher Talks about the Role of Communication in Happy Marriages." It gave a few conversation starters from Terri Orbuch's book "5 Simple Steps to Take Your Marriage from Good to Great". I have listed the steps below for you to keep:

* What's your favorite movie? Why?

* Are you closer to your mom or dad? Why?

* What is the one thing you really want to accomplish in the next two years?

* What are you most afraid of?

* What age do you feel like inside? Why?

* What was the one thing you hate most is a kid?

* What are the top three worst songs of all time?

Now that you know what communication is, let's get down to the nitty-gritty portion of communication, words! We have all grown up with our parents taught us the saying "sticks and stones may break my bones, but words can never hurt me!" Well, it all actuality it was more to help us feel better and not listen to the negative things that kids were saying as they bullied us. In order to communicate effectively, the saying comes to mind. My mother always told me words have the power