Better Conversations Newsletter
"Raising the Standard of Conversation in Life"
Loren Ekroth, Ph.D.
 DrConversation
 
aka "Dr.Conversation" 
Provocative Communication Ideas
Loren Ekroth photo
Today's Contents
Believing in Ourselves
Seek Different Views?
Mehrabian Myth
Word-a-Week: Cultural Creatives
Barbed Ire
Aloha
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This Week's Issue:
Sept. 8, 2010

Hello again, subscriber friend!

 
Today's format is different with short provocative ideas.
I hope you find value in it.
 
Loren Ekroth, publisher

[email protected]

Today's Contents
(Words this issue:  504   Reading time: 2 minutes
Video Viewing time:  3 minutes
 
1.  Believing in ourselves
 
2.  Do you seek out different ideas?
 
3.  The Mehrabian Myth
 
4.  Word-a-Week
 
5.  Barbed Ire
 
6.  Aloha
1.  Believing in Ourselves

"Our efficacy (skills, knowledge, experiences) will help us to use the right language at the right time to persuade and influence others. But our self-worth will determine whether we have the volition and confidence to attempt such persuasion and influence. Often, training and skills development are wasted good intentions. What we need are people who can help us believe in ourselves and jettison the accumulated baggage that impedes our actions." 

 

--Alan Weiss, Business Consultant

2. Do You Seek Different Views and Ideas?

(Is the statement below true of you?)

 

"In conversations with people in our immediate social circles,

we exchange what we've learned elsewhere, occasionally delivering original thoughts.  But few of us actually seek connection with people for their ability to present provocative ideas."

3.  The Mehrabian Myth

The Mehrabian Myth

 

Remember you heard that meaning in interpersonal communication was transmitted only 7% by your words but 38% tone of voice and 55% by your body language?  Eminent social psychologist Albert Mehrabian from UCLA had done the research, so it must be true, right?  No:  Wrong.  (And Prof. Mehrabian himself has long tried to bust this myth -- but with little success.)

 

Here, in 3 minutes, you can learn how a piece of research came to be badly misunderstood and sold as "the truth" to millions.

This wonderfully creative video busts the oft-quoted Mehrabian myth that  words make up only 7% of communication.  Take a look:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7dboA8cag1M

(If this link doesn't work, simply Google "Busting the Mehrabian Myth".)

Thanks to SpeakerNet News for this link. You can subscribe to this weekly, informative newsletter for authors and speakers at www.speakernetnews.com.

4.  Word-a-Week: cultural creatives (noun)
A term coined by sociologist Paul H. Ray and psychologist Sherry Ruth Anderson to define a large number of people in the U.S. and Europe that are nontraditional in various ways, such as their concern for nature and the environment ("Green Cultural Creatives") and leading-edge thinkers and activists about education, social justice, gender equality, and personal authenticity ("Core Cultural Creatives").

(In-depth information is available at website, www.culturalcreatives.org.)

Example sentence:

"When preparing his talks, Leonard found the term cultural creatives to be a more accurate and precise term than the overused words 'modernists' or 'activists'."

(Dear reader:  I consider myself a cultural creative.)

5.  Barbed Ire

"He was good-natured, obliging and immensely ignorant, and was endowed with a stupidity which by the least little stretch would go around the globe four times and tie."

--Mark Twain

6.  Aloha nui loa

I hope you enjoyed the change of pace and format this week. 

 

Until next week, best wishes to all.

 

Loren Ekroth, publisher.

 

Loren Ekroth �2010, all rights reserved

 

Loren Ekroth, Ph.D. is a specialist in human communication and a national expert on conversation for business and social life. 

 

Contact at [email protected]