Communication Strategies

          Many times, before I even realize it, I communicate differently with a person that is different than myself simply because of the difference.  Does that make sense?  I do not mean any harm by this, for most people they do not, but nonetheless, it causes feelings of hurt for the other person.  When I encounter a person that is different, e.g. different religion, different sexual orientation, different beliefs, different culture, sometimes I freeze up and do not know how to talk to them.  I do not know how to relate to them.  Therefore, I have nothing to talk to them about, or so I think.  Other times when I encounter a person that is different than myself, I may accidentally do or say something that offends that person without even meaning to.  This offense then causes a barrier to form between me and that person.  It is my job to learn how to handle differences for myself so that I do not offend others just because we are different. 
           A strategy that I could use would be to try to withhold judgement long enough to gain a deeper understanding than first impressions allow.  Instead of lettting the first impression rule our thinking about a person, we should really get to know the person or family before forming an opinion about them.  Another strategy that I would use would be when something about a families' practice really bothers me, I will try to look at what they are doing through their eyes instead of my own.  Trying to understand why they do what they do, by putting myself in their shoes would allow me to forget about my thoughts for a minute so I can think about others.  A third strategy that I could use would be to recognize that learning unwritten cultural rules of nonverbal communication takes time and patience(Gonzalez-Mena, 2010).  These three strategies could help me to communicate more effectively with the groups of people that I talked about previously. 

References

 

Gonzalez-Mena, J. (2010). 50 strategies for communicating and working with diverse families. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson Education, Inc.