The essence of personal communication with understanding and being understood. While you might just want to be understood, in reality that won’t happen easily. There’s a good reason for that: you can’t control how other people behave. You can’t make other people understand you if they are not willing to do so.
So a good start is to begin with yourself. Don’t ask others to understand you. Instead, try to understand other first. It’s you who should begin building a good personal communication. Since you can fully control yourself, your chance of success is much bigger than just waiting for the other side to take the initiative. Of course, sometimes it means that you should put your ego aside. But that’s a temporary sacrificife that will give you a lot in return. You might suffer in the short term but you will gain a lot in the long term. Just imagine of all the opportunities you may get from good and healthy relationships.
But how can you take the initiative? A good way to start is by being a good listener. Often we just hear what other people are saying without actually listeining to them. Listening requires you to focus on the person you are talking with. It requires you to not just trying to get your point across but to also understand what his or her point is. You need to temporarily forget your agenda in order to be a good listener. You need to temporarily put your ego aside.
By being a good listener, you open the way to healthy personal communication. The person you are communicating with can feel that you listen to her. This will in turn make her more open to you and be a good listener herself. While at first she might come with only her agenda in mind, there’s a good chance that she will start paying attention to what you want. At the end, both of you win.
But it starts with you. Be a good listener.