Hailey Fernelius

COMM 2110
Relational Change Project
Date: November 25, 2014

Overview
Throughout this paper I am attempting to show my improvements with my
communication. I have a nasty habit of being very self-centered in conversations. I let my own
self talk speak louder than those around me who are trying to communicate with me. At first it
was hard to notice when I was practicing bad habits, but now it has become fairly easy. I am
able to stop myself and think about what I am actually trying to say and accomplish. I know I
have noticed a change in my habits and I believe that others have too. I feel like people respond
to me more willingly and more calmly. This proves to me that I have improved over the past
couple weeks. My goal for the future is to become more other-oriented. I think that being
other-oriented is centered in all of the theories we have learned and attempted. If I can
become other-oriented I believe that problems will become easier to handle and
communication will be more positive.
Unwanted Communication Pattern
When Im talking to friends and family I tend to find it hard to focus on what they are
saying if I feel like what I want to say is more important/interesting. An example of this is when
a big event happened in my life that day, like I got a raise, and I feel like I just need to talk about
it. If I am not the first person to share their news from the day I find it very hard to select a
noise and attend to it (Beebe, 2014, p. 121, 127). This is an unhealthy habit because it often
results in the other person getting upset and feeling like I dont care about what has happened
to them. This fault becomes even more of a problem when I become upset. In heated
arguments I tend to be a selective listener, I only think about what I need to say instead of

listening and understanding what the other person is saying (Beebe, 2014, 127). And even
worse, I am an ambush listener, once I have heard something that I can dispute, I cut the other
person off and criticize their argument (Beebe, 2014, 128). This is very unhealthy. This kind of
behavior suggests that I stereotype what people are going to say. I treat the small amount of
information I listen to as the most important, which generally leads me to the wrong conclusion
(Beebe, 2014, 75). It makes it hard to resolve problems when I am unwilling to completely
listen to what the other person is trying to tell me. And for the longest time I believed that I was
not the problem. Other people were the problem because what they were doing was upsetting
me. This makes me guilty of self-serving bias. I can use this new found knowledge to become
more objective in my attempts to solve the problems in my life (Beebe, 2014, 78-79).

Strategies
The first Strategy I knew I needed to implement was selecting Noise. I needed to
improve my ability to choose to listen to what the other person is saying rather than listen to
myself. Practicing this skill will allow me to focus on the verbal and nonverbal communication of
the person I am speaking with. When I am not focused on them I could miss cues within their
speech or body language that could cause me to misinterpret their meaning (Beebe, 2014, p.
121).
The second strategy I wanted to work on was attending, focusing on the nonverbal
messages coming from the person I am talking to. People tend to only pay attention to
information that relates to themselves. Listening is a transactional process, both people are
sending and receiving messages at the same time. I must improve my ability to attend to all
messages sent during a conversation (Beebe, 2014, p. 127).

The third strategy I wanted to learn and apply was selective listening, I need to not let
pre-formed expectations of what I think people will say prevent me from hearing what they are
actually saying. This usually results in a misunderstanding between people. Someone who does
not practice selective listening often interrupts people and wants to focus the conversation
around them. I will be able to become more other-oriented if I am able to apply this strategy in
my daily life (Beebe, 2014, p. 127).
The fourth strategy I needed to improve was my tendency to be an ambush listener, I
tend to pounce on the people Im talking to, trying to argue, criticized, and find faults in what
they are saying without letting them finish. It is said that a person may seem to look like they
are paying attention but, they are just waiting to critique the speaker for any reason. One must
realize that their internal dialogue can lead them astray. I need to not let judgments of the
speaker fill my mind instead of their message (Beebe, 2014, p. 128).
To correct this behavior I will apply my fifth strategy, stop, I will put my own thoughts
aside, be mentally present, and make a conscious effort to listen and be patient. Being focused
on only our own messages and not the messages of others robs us from being able to connect
with other people. The most important thing I person can do is to become other-oriented
(Beebe, 2014, p. 131).
Lastly, sympathy, acknowledging someone elses feelings by putting myself in their
shoes, needs to be applied with all other strategies. Without sympathy no one can be otheroriented. We must be able to acknowledge others feelings in order to help us understand them
as well as their message. (Beebe, 2014, p. 138).

Constraints

Sometimes I found it very hard to realize in the moment that I was practicing bad
listening habits. One day my manager asked me to order some food for him, apparently I said
okay and then walked away from him. I remember as soon as I was done talking to him that I
began cleaning and then was distracted by people coming in. A few hours later my manger was
making fun of me for just walking away from him. I apologized and realized that I was not
selecting his noise to listen to, I was selecting the noise in my head that was telling me other
stuff needed to get done. Another example is when I argue, it is very hard to break
communication habits. There were multiple times where I wanted to yell at my now exboyfriend. I felt like he wasnt seeing it my way and I didnt agree with the way he was seeing
things.
Implementation
I was able to refrain from ambush listening on more than one occasion, but the best
example that I have of this is: While at work, one of my coworkers complained about another
coworker seating a table while they were trying to clean the floor. This coworker causes
problems and drama all the time. I wanted to automatically tell her that she was in the wrong
and she just needed to do the job right, but I didnt. I calmly explained that it was just a
communication error between the two of them and in the future she needs to let the others
know that her plan is to sweep before they seat the table. She basically yelled, Youre not
listening to me. I wanted to get really upset with her and tell her everything she was doing
wrong and kind of force my authority over her. But I didnt. I apologized for not hearing her
correctly and asked her to repeat what had happened. She claimed that both of them were
cleaning the table together, she walked away to grab a broom and the other girl brought the

party to the table. I once again explained that it was a communication error. She needed to let
the others know what she was doing in order for them to respond accordingly. I was able to
change the way I listen as well as the way I respond. I found that people respond more
effectively if you sympathize and explain instead of command and argue (Beebe, 2014, p. 138).
To manage my constraints I found that I really need to force myself to focus. The best
practice I have for this is my job. I know that I am getting better at selecting the right noises to
listen to because my new position at work is now a breeze. I am able to focus on organizing the
food while also being able to hear what the servers and kitchen need from me. It makes
working a lot more enjoyable to just have my mind clear of all that noise. I am able to focus
solely on the job at hand with a clear, calm mind. To help with the constraints I have with
arguing, I just needed to practice patience and sympathy. There is a way to show that you are
frustrated and to get your point across that is not yelling or ambush listening. I have found that
the reason I am an ambush listener is because I tend to bottle everything up until I cant take it
anymore and I just explode. I have discovered that it is best to just tell someone when
something they are doing bothers you, that way you can work together to fix the problem. It is
unhealthy and destructive to bottle things up.
I planned on being able to always focus on what people are saying to me, and I realized
that it is going to take a lot of practice and effort. I need to learn to be more other-oriented and
selfless. There were many times where I hadnt realized I was practicing bad habits until I
thought about it later. At that point I was able to see what I had done wrong and think about
how I would have handled the situation had I realized I was falling into old habits. I think this

will help me to recognize these kinds of situations in the future and to be able to react using my
communication strategies.
Results
I truly believe that this will help me in the future. I have realized that my communication
skills can be greatly improved. I also noticed that when I do practice new strategies I see a
difference in the response from the people around me. For example, one day I called my mom,
just like I do every day, but with the intention of talking about her life. She asked me about
what was going on in my life. I kept it brief and then stopped thinking about myself and focused
on her. She has a lot going on. She has a new job and has a lot to say about it. She is trying to
make a wedding book for my sister who recently got married. She is trying to find new recipes
to try. She is decorating the house for the holidays. She found a frog trapped on the side of the
house and is deciding on how to help it. Some of these things may seem small, but that is her
life. Selecting to listen to her will make us closer when we cant see each other every day.
Some negative consequences that I experienced were that it is very hard to change your
communication style when your significant other is not willing to change theirs. I found that the
reason I have a lot of these bad habits is because I am reacting to the way he communicates. In
this journal entry I try to explain it; I had to have a conversation with my now ex-boyfriend. He
told me that he doesnt think I listen to what he is saying. I am trying to shut of my internal
noise, but I now know why I have it. My ex-boyfriend and his family jump between subjects too
fast for me to keep up with. It is a lot of work to try to understand what pieces go with what
stories. I tried to get him to sympathize with my struggles understanding him. This is one
example of why I think I have bad communication skills. I used to be the person that always

listened to what others had to say and I would give them my full attention. I found that most of
the time him and his family cut each other off and change the subject and then each person will
talk about what they want to. This means there are about three different conversations going
on at the same time. It was easier for me to create internal noise than to try to keep up with all
the conversations.
The implicit personality theory states that we make assumptions about other people
from our own ideas and guesses (Beebe, 2014, 68). This is what I am trying to work on. I want
to be able to make judgments about people from what they tell me, not what they look like or
how they talk. This theory states that people judge based on the surface layer, not the true
depth of a person. In order to be more other-oriented we must try to let go of these implicit
thoughts about others and give them a chance to show us who they really are. I experience this
when I am an ambush listener, I assume what they are talking about based on very little
information and then I just react. I have found that when I apply my strategies I can make this
theory less applicable in my life. I want to continue to better myself so I am seen and known as
an other-oriented person that anyone can talk to because I am understanding.
Recommendations
I am no longer in a relationship with the boy that is in a lot of my journal entries because
of what I have learned in this class. I started comparing my relationship to examples that we
talked about in class and testing it with the theories we have learned, and it failed. His
communication to me was very controlling and my communication to him was very defensive
and angry. I was omitting information from our conversations because I was trying to avoid
fights (Beebe, 2014, 292). I will continue to use the skills and theories we have learned in class

to improve and maintain future relationships. I want to make sure that I am the best person I
can be and destructive communication skills will make it hard for me in the future to be otheroriented. I want people to see me as a person who they can communicate with because they
know that I will listen, understand, and react proactively to the situation at hand.
I plan to stop being an ambush listener and continue trying to be a better listener. I
want to move past my destructive relationship and move forward into a relationship where we
want to have effective and positive communication. I want to apply the platinum rule in my life.
In order to be other-oriented you have to listen and get to know a person in order to treat them
how they would like to be treated (Beebe, 2014, 115). I need to undo the damage that has been
done from my past relationship by creating new relationships the right way, with otheroriented communication and interaction.

Works Cited
Beebe, Beebe, &Redmond. (2014). Interpersonal Communication: Relating to Others. Boston:
Pearson Education / Allyn & Bacon.