Good communication is the foundation of any relationship. Especially with familial relationships, it’s vital that you communicate well so that you can develop and nurture relationships that you’ll have for your entire life. However, good communication doesn’t come naturally to everyone. So when you find that you’re struggling to communicate with someone, it’s best to go back to the basics.
To help you in doing this, here are three tips for improving your communication with all family members.
Find Ways To Spend Quality Time Together
In order for you to properly communicate with someone in your family, you have to spend an adequate amount of time with that person.
Not all time spent with each other is going to be equal as far as being good for communication. Ideally, you should be committed to spending quality time when you aren’t distracted by other things. If someone is on their phone or watching TV or otherwise engaged, there is a good chance that quality communication won’t be able to take place. So whether this means driving over to visit your loved one in an assisted living community or committing to turning off all technology once a week to make a real connection, having this time where you can communicate will be incredibly helpful.
Speak To Everyone With Respect
Regardless of who you’re speaking to in your family or what your relationship with them has been like in the past, if you’re wanting to communicate well with them and improve the way that you communicate with each other, you have to have some amount of mutual respect for one another.
Even if you’re a parent who’s trying to speak to their young child, speaking to them with respect will make your child more likely to listen to what you’re saying and really process that information. When someone feels disrespected, it can be hard for them to get past this and want to have good communication.
Learn How To Remain Calm In Challenging Conversations
For relationships that have suffered from bad communication in the past, it can be difficult to overcome this and move forward with a clean slate. But one way this can be done is by learning how to remain calm when faced with a challenging conversation. If both you and the family member that you’re speaking with are determined to remain calm and really listen to what the other person is saying, there’s a good chance that you can get yourselves on the right path for improving communication.
If communication has been a challenge in your family, consider using the tips mentioned above to help you learn how this can be improved upon in any relationship.
Originally posted on June 19, 2022 @ 5:18 am
