How To Converse Well While Keeping Others Interested: 6 Keys
Having the ability to create good conversations is, possibly, one of those easy-to-train abilities that serve us the most throughout our lives.
Human beings being a social animal, the difference between being a conversationalist capable of generating interest or not being one is capable of opening many doors for us. After all, the way in which other people value us depends more on the idea we want to convey than on how we convey it. Charisma and the ability to connect emotionally with other people they are extremely valuable resources.
So that…how to converse well, ensuring that our interventions are listened to attentively because of the emotional impact they produce? Below you will find several basic tips to achieve this.
Converse well and capture the attention of listeners
To add value to the way you participate in conversations, practically all you have to do is do make the content clear and coherent, and express it in a way that catches the attention of the listener Let’s see how to do it.
1. Tell a story
The beginning of a conversation is the moment in which the probability that the other person will be interested in what we say is largely decided. Therefore, we must make what we say attract attention from the beginning, and For this it is good to start with a short narrative although this one is so simple and short that it doesn’t seem like it.
For example, if you want to talk about what you do professionally, instead of reproducing a list of tasks you are in charge of, explain in 10 or 20 seconds how the idea of working there came about and how that profession is useful. or it fits the objectives you originally had.
2. Take into account the cultural level of the other person
When you talk to someone, you should always take into account their cultural background, as well as their type of training.
The simple fact of making a reference to something unknown to the listener during the course of an explanation can be enough for this person to disconnect and want to end the dialogue, since in this way it is implied that the time that passes to spend listening to you It may be of no use if in the end the message is not going to be understood After all, whoever assumes that the other knows such an artist or such a philosopher will possibly make that mistake more than once in the next few minutes; Why continue listening to him and risk completely losing the thread?
Of course, it is not always possible to know from the first moment what the other person’s cultural background is, and that is why in these cases it is best to play it safe and use references to people or everyday elements.
3. Use known references
This resource is one of the most useful when it comes to making our interlocutor maintain interest in what we say throughout relatively long explanations or with a certain level of complexity. The trick is, fundamentally, express what we want to convey using metaphors and analogies generally based on something that everyone knows: pieces of general culture.
These types of comparisons serve to go from more or less abstract explanations to images with a powerful expressive capacity Thus, by simply mentioning them, they already transmit a lot of emotionally charged information.
For example, if you want to express that someone you know lives to satisfy others and does not take time for himself, you can say that he behaves like a swashbuckling hero. It is an image that in itself already conveys an attitude and a philosophy of life that would otherwise take longer to explain, so taking advantage of this comparison will help you lighten content in parts that could be too long.
4. Create expectation with pauses
To be able to converse well it is necessary to give our words the value they deserve, and to do so we must take advantage of the expressive depth that pauses give us.
Once you have managed to attract the person’s attention to a specific topic, silences are another resource to maintain this interest, because the simple act of waiting to see what we will say next makes the feeling of listening to something important intensify This is due to a phenomenon known as cognitive dissonance: if we do not want to recognize an uncomfortable idea, we make our interpretation of reality fit with another idea that cancels the previous one: “I am not waiting for anything, the topic causes me real interest.”
Furthermore, there is another reason why it is good to play the pause card: they make, almost involuntarily, the interlocutors try to “fill in” that blank space with their imagination, choosing what they would say next, or what words they would use. In a way, silences are questions, and of course, a question cries out to be answered.
We must avoid falling into The trap of thinking that speaking correctly is doing it as quickly as possible In any case, small moments of silence make the other person enter into the game of “thinking together” with us to create meaning through dialogue, since the pauses give the opportunity to try to anticipate what is going to be said.
To converse well you don’t have to recite a monologue. An engaging intervention is one that offers the possibility of satisfying at least part of our curiosity, and a good way to do this is to adopt the perspective of the listener, raising out loud reactions or doubts that the other person might have when listening to what you say. you are saying, and giving them an answer.
In this way, you will not limit yourself to transmitting your point of view as is, but you will show how different ideas collide with each other and produce conclusions Of course, listeners don’t have to agree with the way you “self-answer” but at least this way they can see that you have a broad knowledge of the topic and that you have taken into account different interpretations. On the other hand, putting yourself in the place of a fictional person also helps to give a more emotional and human touch to the conversation, something that always helps when it comes to showing that what is happening in the dialogue is not something removed from life. real.
6. Pay attention to the non-verbal language of others
When you are speaking, most of your attention should be directed toward what you are communicating. However, it is good that you pay attention to the way in which other people react through their gestures. Thus you will be able to adapt what you do to the way in which others react In a conversation, there is nothing worse than a person who is completely ignorant of the way the listeners feel.
