Many people believe that the purpose of language is to simply convey information. This is very far from the truth. Evolutionary psychologists tell us that the meaning of all language is meant to create some kind of effect, or outcome. Often times to elicit support of some kind.
Even if you're writing stories or non-fiction, the purpose is to generate certain feelings or beliefs in your readers. When we're just sitting around at the corner bar talking to our buddies, we still are trying to influence on some level.
When we tell jokes we're hoping to get a laugh. When we tell sad stories we're hoping to get some compassion. Even if a stranger on the street stops us and asks us for the time, we tell them because we want a certain outcome. Maybe to get rid of them. Maybe to get a boost of self-confidence from helping them. Maybe just a nice smile and a "Thank you."
The bottom line is
communication, written or spoken, is much, much more than simply conveying information.
So why not accept this and try to make it easier on ourselves? So, how do we do this? How do we make our communication more effective?
The first step is to simply be honest with yourself with what you want. Don't worry, this is just for you. If you want validation, fine. If you're ideas acknowledged as unique, great. If you want agreement, fantastic. These are all perfectly normal, and perfectly human.
The next step is to simply phrase your message in the best way possible, so it's most likely to be heard. How do you do that? Easy. First find out what the other person wants. If you already know them, then you probably have a good idea of what makes them tick.
If you have just met them, you can get a good idea based on the context and the surroundings. If you're message is going to anonymous people online, you can still get a good idea of what they're after, based on how and where they'll be reading your message.
Sure, this may take a little bit more effort than simply opening your mouth and spitting out a bunch of words that hopefully make sense.
But the amount of effort you put in on the front end will have tremendous rewards on the back end.
