Communication Basics: What We Have Here is a Failure to Communicate about Rest

As a track coach, I have always understood the difference between walking and renewing.  The problem is that many people regard walking as a form of rest.  It is NOT!  Not only that, but it is the least restful of the paces available to a person trying to reach a destination in a particular time frame.

Let me illustrate this from track.  In track, there are four paces:

rest
sprint
run
walk.

These are the variable speeds available based on a person's lung, spirit, breath, or wind capacity.  Every public school track coach knows these are different.  I hope everyone can agree on these.  My coaches never failed in communicating this clearly.  Walking was unacceptable for the mile run, for one example!

Let me also illustrate from the Bible, In Isaiah, there are four paces:

renew
fly
run
walk.

These are the variable speeds available for those who bind themselves to the LORD (Yahweh). Every private school should teach these paces to all their students.  I hope all Christians (and Jews) can agree on these.  When a situation calls for a sprint, I hope no Christian (and Jew), thinks a run or trotting pace will do!

This is all pretty straightforward, but there is still a problem.  The problem is that people think walking is restful like renewals or rest itself is.  That is a major mistake.

Let me explain what I mean.  Moving from renew and rest pace to walk pace, each pace is increasingly more restless.  So here is how I rank each pace in terms of its level of rest:

renew/rest - most restful
sprint - more restful
run - less restful
walk - least restful.

To understand this, you need to recall something that goes beyond track athletes.  You have to think in terms of location and time.  In everyday life, people have a destination and a time for arrival.  In track, you have for a destination of at least three places, the fenced in area around the track, the starting line, and the finish line.

Think of young family members here.  Children don't get too restless about shorter distances or shorter time frames.  They get restless about longer distances and longer time frames.  Don't you recall this question on the way to Grandma's house: "Are we there yet?"  This grows out their increasing restlessness on every stop along the way.  They won't rest till they get to Grandma's house unless you can entertain them, like my parents when I was growing up and help the children lose track of time.  Everyone should get this.

In track, it is the same way, except now you are no longer dealing with the youngest family members, but with young people who are now functioning out of their first stages of being an adult.  Still the lesson does not change - the slower the pace, the greater the restlessness.

The first pace is that of rest.  Once at the track and settled on a location, a good track coach instructs all competitors to take it easy and to rest.  He or she then tells each individual to listen for the 1st through 3rd calls for their races.  These 3 calls are each fore-warnings to report to the area of competition and to break off from resting with the team is at place where they are resting.  Rest, though, is the first state or pace that track athletes need to master.  During full rest there is no distance or time between start and finish.  You rest where and when you are resting with your teammates. They may not move an inch and settle in under a second. Their starting and finishing line overlap one another.  Rest is living in the here and now fully.

The second pace is that of the sprinters.  They are generally those who run races that can be finished in a minute or less. This varies, of course, according to conditioning.  Also the separation between starting and finishing lines are 50 meters (I'm not sure what has replaced the 60 yard run from an earlier era?), 100 meters, 200 meters and 400 meters.  These locations are relatively close to each other and like I said before can be sprinted in under a minute.  With that short distance between lines and the short time to run, the sprinter's restlessness until they have reached the finish line is relatively short.  Be smart here.  You must separate fear or nerves due to a lack of confidence from restlessness.  Once the runner eclipses the finish line, they have put that race to rest.  The sprinter flys a short distance for a short time to reach the here and now of the finish line.

The third pace is that of the runners.  These races all take over a minute.  There is the 800 meters, 1600 meters, 3200 meters, and 4800 meters (3 mile) runs.  In these instances, the races vary from around 2 minutes long up to quarter of an hour.  The 3 mile race on the high school level is not part of a track meet like in college.  It is instead the distance for cross country racing.  Runners have to set a reasonable pace for their distance and they have to be more patient than a sprinter because they have to run for a longer time.   As an experienced runner and coach, I can tell you that one of the reasons sprinters don't want to e distance runners is because they don't like how long the race takes.  As a former distance runner, I can tell you that the length of the race is the roughest part.   You don't get to rest until you cross the finish line!  A runner runs for a little longer distance and time.  It can test how well you handle a long restless state.  For me, the two most restful moments were the start and the finish.  Let's end the wait.

Finally, the fourth pace is that of the walkers.  These races all take place at the college level and higher.  I happen to be at the UCLA Summer Olympic Festival in the early nineties where the American record for race walking was set by the gentleman I happened to visit with before his run.  I also had one of my former teammates from high school, Roger Kordus, go on and become a race walker in college.  That is my only direct connection to these races.  For me, this is where the tortoise and the hare story makes some sense.  It is "slower" than the sprint and run, but not "slow" and here "steady" is important.  The thing is that these races can become tedious and people can become restless and leave before the race is over!

The problem in our day is that people mistakenly associate restlessness mostly with sprinting rather than walking.  I think there is a failure to communicate and understand the restlessness of a sprinter in that case.  The restlessness is building due to a delay in a finish, and not due to a fast finish.  Also there is a restlessness created by a tension between one person who can do something fast and someone who is less fast.  Let's clarify things more at this point.  Here is how I see it:

renewing is not restless
sprinting is restless for a short time
running is restless for a little longer time
walking is restless for the longest time among the four.

In each instance, restlessness is there until the final destination and the end time are reached.  There is no tension, when you are already here.  There is the height of tension, when we are not there yet. Don't forget the elementary here - remember the kids!

I am at a place of rest in my life.  It is only when I walk out the the door and meet people who still haven't found what they are looking for that I run into restlessness!  Ah, the satisfaction of having already finished finding what I was previously looking for!  Ah, the satisfaction of having finished this post also.


Be healthy and live life to its fullest,

Jon

Communication Basics: When Excess Means Too Much of a Good Thing

There are many good things that can be destroyed by excess.  An apple is a good thing, but a diet of only apples is not.  Protein is a good thing, but just hamburgers at McDonald's for one's entire diet is not!  You get the point.  Well, I want you to get to point about a set of excesses in the case of mental health and not just physical health.

My book on mental health, Mental Health for Everyone, deals a lot with excesses and how to beat the problem of excess. It deals with it through the principle of intervals.  One gets bigger, faster, stronger, and smarter little by little, moment by moment, step by step, and bit by bit.  The attainments that are every child's dream - to become bigger, faster, stronger, and smarter, don't occur overnight except in fairy tales but they can begin that night.  So my approach in this piece will be to get at the basics of defeating excesses!

Let's bulldoze them down together, shall we?   There are four major sets of excesses.  They are:

1) expert excess or amateur excess

2) manic depression excess or procrastination-sleep excess

3) easy street excess or difficulty street excess

4) know everything excess and know nothing excess

You probably have not heard of some of these under these names, but I would guess everyone has experienced these excesses whether it be at school, at work, at play, or at a religious gathering.

Let's deal with each one, one at a time, starting with the first one.  As I deal with each I will be more specific about each generalized grouping.


Expert excess I call "expertitis".  It has a close cousin, a fellow excess, called "amateuritis".  They both fail to lift a light weight more than previous lifts that is necessary to get bigger.  Excess expertise fastens too heavy a load on people's backs.  Excess amateurism fastens too light of a load on people's backs.  They both look foolish, yet day after day the king doesn't realize he's wearing no clothes!  We want people's minds to grow into a greater understanding - it is just that it has to happen little by light to remain light so that people reach a bigger understanding.  The excesses make understanding smaller.  We need to change this in terms of quantity and quality from both excesses.  

Manic-depression excess is what it sounds like.  It is both too high and too low.  It goes outside actual human limitations.  It has a close cousin, a fellow excess, called procrastination-slowness.  The latter pair is my own creation.  Isn't it ironic that on the internet I can plenty of articles on manic-depression and on bipolar that are sicknesses, but I could not find an article on what is its healthy opposite nor on its close cousin of excess?  I had to go to other sources than psychology for a serious concern about being a procrastinator or being too slow - a slow poke.  You find this in the business world primarily. This is interesting because the success of high technology has led us into a steady diet of fast and steady.  Also interesting is that a child's fairy tale has taken hold in psychological circles.  It is part of Aesop's fables and it is called, The Tortoise and the Hare.  This story's fabled moral is a steady diet of "slow and steady wins the race".  Not according to the internet and the rest of technology!  The excesses of both stories - Aesop's and the internet's - are woven into too much of our thinking.  We are people that should be fast and variable - able to rest, sprint, run, or walk depending on the distance and time.  We aren't doing this!  We need to break free in terms of placement and timing from both excesses.


Easy excess can be called easy street.  Difficult excess, its close cousin, can be called difficult street. When it comes to increments it should be easy, but this should not lead to an avoidance of difficulty.  Eventually in our jobs over time, we can handle more difficult processes than we could at first.  If we try to master everything in the beginning, it all becomes difficult and then some even quit.  In other cases, employees can be with a company for years and never master the harder parts of a job.  It should be that we are moving from easy to easy step by step, but not all in one step and not with the end goal that we cannot master hard things.  The greats make the difficult look easy.  Look at your greatest musical artists and at your best athletes - they make even the difficult look easy - so it is both and not excess!  We need to free ourselves from the popular approaches to methods and purposes where we too one day can make the difficult look easy.


The I know everything mentality and its close cousin, I know nothing mentality are both dangerous.  We have got people who run around claiming to know what they don't know.  I see this a lot with predictions of the future. Some things you can know about tomorrow given that certain conditions remain constant, but you don't know that they necessarily will.  There are people who claim to know the end of the earth.  I thought we we human beings who don't know everything?  Having said that though, we also like to play at knowing nothing.  Really?  You really don't know.  Some of this play borders on pathetic.  If we've had teachers, we ought to know some things as do others, we ought to know things others don't, we ought to not know things others do know, and there ought to be things neither person knows; but this last category is only one of four - not the whole deal.  We need to be learning new things in terms of things and kinds and not just be stuck with two old bad cousins.


It is time to close up this discussion.  The point in all of it is to be healthy by avoiding excess.  This article for example can only be so long.  We need to avoid the excesses of experts and amateurs and step up our understanding little by little.  We need to avoid the excesses of the Manic -Depression and the Procrastination-Slow and step up our inspiring moment by moment.  We need to avoid the excesses of Easy Street and Difficult Street (it might be also called Baker Street with the difficult hero, Sherlock Holmes, in room 212B).  We also need to avoid the excesses of know-it-all and know-it-not at all and develop the captivating bit by bit  If you avoid the communication of this article, then please be sure it is not because of one of these excesses.  Improve your ability to listen and then speak  - to communicate - through excess avoidance.  We need to change excesses, break from excesses, free ourselves from excesses, and discover some new things.    Remember too many apples is not a good thing for your diet.  Your mind has a healthy diet too!  Get mental health and then get happy!


Sincerely,

Jon

Communications Basics 101: A Communicators Job is Never Done on a Higher Level

While I have completed a book and then had it published too, it does not mean my communication is over.  In one sense it is, the fundamentals in it really are done.  What remains is more of each of those fundamentals - their development.  My book is titled, Mental Health for Everyone,

One of the chapters describing schooling is the key to making a major dent in the problem of manic-depression and the other extreme of putting people to sleep.  My sample or example in that chapter comes from the sport of track.

Since writing the book, I think the key point using track is solid, but I should have developed my approach in contrast two approaches.  There are essentially three approaches to the mind's handling of relationships.  They are:

fast and steady
fast and variable
slow and steady.

I should have used the story of what I will call my reformed school one mile race.  In high school, I ran a race against two runners from a reformed school.  One was fast and steady and the other was slow and steady.  I was the one who was fast and variable.

The fast and steady runner took off in the race like it was a 400 meter or 440 yard race.  He collapsed after a couple of laps.  I mean he literally collapsed onto the track.

His teammate on the other hand ran steadily slow until he realized it was the last lap.  Then he at the last moment took off in an effort to catch me.

Personally, I was lulled into running too slow myself by his approach to the race and by his activities leading up to the race.  I call it the zombie effect.  Until he took off after his procrastination in the race I had been running a too relaxed pace myself.  Fortunately, a teammate let me know I should get going since the guy was coming up on my fast.

I took off harder myself with 300 meters or 330 yards to go.  I in the end held him off since I had run fast, but variably based on my distance.

In this race, I knew I had to vary my pace from what I would do for 400 meters.  That way I did not collapse.  But I also knew to run fast still, since too slow of a pace could also lose the race.  That is what happened to the second runner.

In the United States we have young people especially who are trapped by a world that is only fast and steady and eventually collapses - too often in the form of suicide or some form of breakdown.  We also have many who procrastinate until the race is lost and it is too late to win the prize.

I could further the ideas in  my book by developing this story.  So I am doing it now.  This will likely go into a second edition, if I am fast enough to get that opportunity.

The good thing is that I finished my book - I did not collapse and not finish.  Likewise, I didn't drag it out until the last gasp and end up getting it out too late - I still have things left over to improve next time.  I didn't engage in fruitless procrastination.

My book titled, Mental Health for Everyone, is available through Amazon and through Barnes and Noble.  To get to my book simply type in my full name or the full title or both.  You will find it.

If you want a bit of a preview beyond that found at Amazon.com, then you can go to youtube and watch the following (you might have to copy and paste this to your browser):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uC5XDFly3GA



Have fun!  Remember, it is fast and variable wins the race.  Go get 'em and let's win this race!



Sincerely,

Jon Westlund

Communication Basics: A Quick Update

It has been some time since I made an entry on this blog.  My goal had originally been to resume submitting posts in August of 2014.  Now we are fair distance from that time frame.  So I want to offer a quick update.

My book, Mental Health for Everyone: In Captivating, Motivating, Inspiring, Meaningful Pictures is very near completion.  The pictures in the book are what have me excited.  Before long, I will be sharing something about at least one of them, before the book arrives on shelves.

I wish I had time today to do that, but I have to get back to writing and finishing that race before I begin another.  Let me say this quickly - the book has huge implications for communication.

Imagine this - you could summarize the smarts of the two authors of the Johari Window, of Vince Lombardi in Instant Replay and John Wooden's Pyramid of Success, the wave diagrams for manic-depression and hyper-activity, and the work on education and translation by Benjamin Bloom and by Eugene Nida all on one page.  Now that is something to be excited about, isn't it?  

I have been very fortunate to simplify all this material to where it is now accessible from the starting line on one page!  You only have to see the back side of the same sheet to picture the finish line!

That is what is in my book.  The danger in a book is that the person gets lost in the forest due to too many trees.  I and my editors will be working hard to make sue the pictures (or diagrams) in the book remain the focus.

Please pray that I can hasten the project along.  That is enough for now.  It is coming soon, I pray!


Sincerely,

Jon

P. S. Don't be too late to the start and too soon to the finish!

Communication Basics: My Manuscript for My Book has Been Submitted

I have not been writing as frequently on this blog or my other major blog due to my needing to complete a book manuscript for publication.  It will hopefully be out by the end of the year.

The book's title is: Mental Health for Everybody: A Field Guide.  I don't think I have to argue for its relevance.  I might have to argue for its content.

It is a book that will bring basic scientific studies (including psychology) down to the average person's level (but not by bypassing, but by using high level expertise).  I can't wait to hold the first copy in my hands.

It will define the meanings of words like teaching, coaching, schooling, and educating in ways that will foster people's basic mental health.  Remember, it is a field guide.

I did my best to follow the rule of K.I.S.S.  It means "Keep it Simple Silly".  Take care.  I will give updates as good new arrives on my book.


Sincerely,


Jon

Communication Basics: The Blind leading the Blind

The issues right now following my discussion with a fellow minister is that we've got the blind leading the blind.  People are not seeing.  People are associating emotions with relationships and not with all things and the nervous system as a whole.

They are also not seeing that what is foundational is only on a psychology 105 level and an eighth grader ought to be able to understand.   That bottom level is what I am trying to provide and strengthen rather than trying to strengthen the top of the pyramid of learning.

The bottom line problem still remains a problem of seeing or rather a problem of not seeing.  Good teachers help people see.   Bad teachers conceal what should be visible.  If you read my other posts you will see the basic 5 emotions, the basic 5 logics, and the 5 altogether combinations from the first two.

Keep searching and studying till you have those 15 down.  When you do you will be smarter than a PhD.   By the way, I still regard the goal of PhD education highly.  They should have the opportunity to lead.  But if they are blind about the basics, how can they lead?

My only criticism of the PhD level isthat many of them are not getting a foundationally strong first-rate basic education before they reach that level.  Be smart and seeing and then you will take care.


Sincerely,

Jon

Communication Basics: Classical and Cutting Edge (the story of Scott Canon)

My freshman year of college I had a roommate who everybody questioned how we got along.  Actually, it was a very good match.  He stretched me in one cool way in particular.  He had a really good receiver, a great turntable, and an awesome speakers.  But his equipment wasn't the only cool thing.

Cooler yet, he listened to classical music in the morning and edgy rock and roll at night (or do I have that backwards?).  The same holds true for me today.  When it comes to communication, I think we need to read the classics in rhetoric in the morning and read the best communication research of the 21st century in the afternoon.  Or you can reverse that if you like. Neither one alone is cool enough!

So when you read my comments on communication, sometimes I'll be reading something from B.C. and other times something from A.D.  I hope that means we can still get along as classmates of communication.  I think it just might stretch you like Scott's music stretched me.

Stretching by the way is a good way to avoid injury.  But also don't overstretch.  But that is another story.  .


Sincerely

Jon

P.S.  This entry is dedicated to Scott Canon, who stretched me and strengthened me.  We still are getting along just fine, based on my last conversation with him a few years ago.

Communication: Basing the Basics on Common Sense

I am NOT opposed to people having a good technical sense.  The race to get to the moon using the heightened abilities of electronic invention was a great thing.  It helped give birth to the microprocessor that drives so many technologies today like the cell phone.  As a result, most of us have heard of an Intel microprocessor.  But I think there is an invention that could eclipse this improvement of electronic devices.  I think it lies not in the direction of an external electronic device, but in the direction of improving our ability to use the minds each of us are equipped with as standard equipment. 

The human mind is still a wonder.  It has incredible capacities.  But lately, I am noticing that technical sense does not mean common sense.  Many people have high technical abilities, but their minds have little common sense.  Here lies the tragedy, because the mind is capable of both. 

I think common sense is greater than the lesser ability of technical sense, but it is when the two are combined together that the greatest ideal is achieved.  We seem to have come out of the 20th century with lots of the latter and few of the former.  We need now common sense to match our technical achievements. 

This is what I believe the majority of people yearn for, when it comes to even technology.  I like to call my under-developed smart phone a "dumb phone".  More times than not it fails to demonstrate smarts.  Rather it shows a great lack of common sense features.  It can make a pocket call right after I shut it down.  It can start up by simply bumping another object in my pocket.  It has immense capabilities, but few of which follow even the most basic common sense. 

My goal on this blog in this year will be to lay out what I consider to be a common sense approach to communication based on the very common words that we use to communicate every single day.  I hate to state the overly obvious, but the common is found among the very common, and not among the unique or exceptional. 

I saw this in a commercial: "Great minds think alike" followed by "Great minds think differently".  These slogans in the commercial were meant to be mutually exclusive of one another.  But I think they are not.  The ideal is common sense, where great minds think alike, and technical sense, where great minds think differently. 

I recently realized that my communication basic method of "ARWAT" is not common sense enough.  The categories of: 1)Amount, 2) Relationships, 3) Wholes, 4) Actions, and 5) Things are not on a list of most frequent words in English.  They are closer than the word categories that I had previously used called "TEAR" with the categories of !)Thing, 2Event, 3)Attribute, and 4) Relation.  Recently, I took the final step toward "very common".   That is where I found common sense!  It is alive and well once you know where to find it. 

[Sorry, I have to come back and finish this later.  You can contact me if you like to learn more sooner.  Thank you.]

Sincerely,

Jon

 

Communication Basics: From 5 Questions to 10 Questions

Teachers, especially writing teachers and journalism teachers are supposed to teach their students the basic questions every reporter or writer should ask:  "Who?  What?  Why?  Where?  and How?"   I would like to re-work this list and chang it up some.  I want to say that some of the most important questions are left out. 

My first clue came from my higher level of educaiton in theology where I ran across Martin Luther's original question of "How much?" behind the answer of "the righteousness of Jesus Christ".  See often people think too much about answers and not enough about questions.   I know John Calvin's answer was "humility. humility, humility", but what was his question?  I have asked teachers in the Reformed tradtion and they still have not gotten back to me on the question.  I think it might be a "when" question (that is my best guess). 

So without further ado, let me show you my re-working of the 5 questions into 5 groups of questions.  They are:

1) How many?  How much?

2) Where?  When"

3) Who?  Whole?

4) How?  Why?

5) What?  Which?

I have found these immensely helpful to avoid the pitfalls of not asking a critical basic question.  How many times do we zoom to teaching a "how" (method) without a "why" (motivation)?  Do others sometimes tell us "what" (ice cream) they want, but they forget to tell us "which (kind)" (chocolate) they want?  Do we dare get in trouble for bringing them plain vanilla?  We need to ask "which (kind)?" 

So when I teach or tutor a student or when I am a good listening mode, I ask all these kinds of questions.  They are all valuable.  Do you (who?) have any (of the whole of?) questions?  If you do, then please choose one of the questions above and ask through your comments!  Thank you. 

Take care,

Jon

P. S.  Happy teaching and learning!

Communication: Its Importance as an Action

I ran across a quote recently that I could not pass up as a post on this blog.  It is from Stephen R. Covey.  It reads: "Communication (human and divine) is the most important single activity of man".   This quote is an important one to ponder. 

The quote is found in Covey's early book titled The Spiritual Roots of Human Relations.  It is a fascinating read from the standpoint of understanding Covey's own roots for his later 7 Habits and The 8th Habit. 

I am not endorsing all aspects of this book, but simply putting forward ideas from him that I do agree with.  His idea that communication as an activity that is very important has exciting implications, if true and if it can be proven.  For myself, I choose to ponder his idea and keep my eyes open for evidence of this idea. 

Sincerely,

Jon

Communication Basics: A Synergy of Methods

There is a very helpful book written by Steven Covey called The Third Alternative.  That is a great way to describe the alternative that I am suggesting for communication basics.  Most of what is written about listening, speaking, reading and writing is based either on the classic view of grammar or on a contemporary advance in some part of the field of linguistics (the scientific study of language).  Very rarely is a third alternative proposed, where the strengths of each is equally combined together.  The path I am proposing combines the best of classical grammar with the recent insights from linguistics.

My experience is primarily, yet not exlusively, in the field of biblical study and interpretation. What I say can be applied anywhere, but my examples come mainly from the context of a Christian college and later three different Christian seminaries.  An example of how I was given only two alternatives is that a semiary professor in the historical-grammatical tradition of biblical scholarship refused to show interest in the linguistic developments used by Wycliffe Bible Translators.  In a very recent class experirence, I noticed that the professor was still not aware of some valuable insights from linguistics that could have been very helpful.  He had no idea about the basic semantic classes of meaning: Whole, Amount, Relationship, Action, and Thing (Whole is my own addition based on classical grammar). These two streams for the most part flow apart from one another seldom combining their strengths into one stream.  As an avid trout fisherman, I have seen how the power of two streams coming together can vastly increase their force, when they combine.  I believe that is what is missing in the broad field of communications!

To have a break through, you must break from the currient views that are held.  This does not mean that you are breaking from the classic past or the promising future.  It only means you are breaking from the present.  I believe we need a break through in the current field of communication basics.

On the classical grammatical side it is important to realize that within its banks is not just the Greek tradition, but also the traditions of Hebrew, Sanskrit, and Arabic.  On the side of present day advances, there are many specialities including the advances in the field of semantics (a meaning focused approach within lingusitcs).   Both provide insights into communication.  Neither has the corner on the market, despite what advocates of either stream may say. 

I was fortunate enough to study under professors at my college and seminary levels of education, who placed each of these two alternatives in their best light.  I found the insights of inductive bible study to be very valuable for reading and interpreting, even while contemporary linguistic insights were overlooked.  My primary professors following a classical alternative were Dr. John S. Piper and Tom Stellar.  Later at the seminary level, I followed up on their teaching with studying under their mentor, Dr. Daniel P. Fuller. Most recently I was able to study this tradition under Dr. Garwood Anderson, Dr. Walter C. Kaiser and Dr. Allen P. Ross.  This teaching and experience are invaluable to me, because they represented this tradtion in its best light and provided me with a number of new tools for reading and interpretation that I did not previously possess.  The other alternative that provided me a great deal of value was that of courses in the field of linguistics.  I was extremely fortunate to study the ideas and insights of many great linguists and to even meet some of the more famous and some of the more humble.   I studied primarily under Dr. William A. Smalley and did a project on behalf of Dr. Donald A. Larson.  I also was taught by Lois Malcolm, who is now is a seminary professor.   Later I was fortunate to study linguistics for a short time at UW-Madison and got to talk to Dr. Noam Chomsky.  Besides meeting him I was earlier introduced to Dr. Kenneth Pike, a one-time President of Wycliffe.  But also I cannot leave out Dr. R. Daniel Shaw. 

Each of these names I have tried to list with some detail like their middle initials in case that some people like yourself may wish to examine the credential of each of them.  I owe each of them a great deal, because at one time I was by all my scores in the classroom very poor  in reading and writing.  Through them I have become much stronger, though I still have a good distance to go.  The greatest witness I can give to their legacy is that they have each made school much easier for me by giving me superior tools to work with rather than leaving me with inferior tools to work with in trying to reach lofty goals.   I used to just work hard to compensate for poor tools.  Now I work hard with great tools.

What I could not say as clearly before, as I can now because of Covey, is that I have synergized these two traditions into one higher powered tool for understanding basic communication.  Each alternative has allowed me to make improvements to what I was taught by the other.  For example, historical-grammatical exegesis provides sentence diagramming as one of their tools.  Quite honestly, I really struggled with this tool in the beginning.  It overwhelmed me and a number of my classmates.  It also can be very time consuming.  I think that is why too many of my fellow classmates likely no longer use this tool.  The only reason I am still using it is that I learned the tool of a semantic structure analysis (S.S.A.) from the alternative of linguistics and it helped me greatly simplify the tool of sentence diagramming. 

This combined tool also saves me a great deal of time.  I can now prepare my structure analysis in a short enough period of time that I can do a complete one from scratch for every sermon I preach.  The first key opening the door to ease was to focus on action words, as I analyzed a text into its parts.  The second key opening the door to ease was understanding the primary meaning classes of words, so that I could quickly identify any of them in the original text or in a translation.  The structure analysis is also more technology friendly, because of its straight line layout versus the arcing method of sentence diagramming which uses curved lines .  It is easy to do in Excel without any fancy extra enhancements or technical training!

So fundamentally I want you to know that I am synergizing two alternatives that are greater than using either of the other two alternatives all by themselves.  I am offering the two alternatives together that form a much stronger third alternative to either of them alone.  It is like the streams of water in your state, county or country.  As they merge together like the tributaries of the Mississippi, they form together the mighty Misssissippi.

Sincerely,

Jon

Communication Basics: Combining the Strengths of Rhetoric, Grammar and Logic

There are many angles from which to explain the strength of my idea on communication basics.  One of the angles is from that of classic rhetoric, grammar and logic.  From this angle the strength of the method I use is that it combines the strengths of rhetoric, grammar and logic; rather than depending on primarily grammar. 

Contemporary schooling has turned the basics of classic education into the 3 R's of reading, writing and arithmetic.  In classic education the big 3 were rhetoric, grammar and logic.  When I studied linguistics in college I now realize that the greatest gain I experienced came from combing rhetoric, grammar and logic.  Yet it is the renewed use of rhetoric that was the real source of greatest insight. 

Classic rhetoric recognized four classes of meaning plus the whole that unites them.  I have simplified those four classes or categories down to amount, relationship, action and thing.  This is not discovered in reading or writing classes that rely mainly on grammar.  Likewise, logic is no longer taught as essentially logic, but is now mathematical logic and so is taught indirectly through mathematics. 

So what all of this boils down to is using a method that does not set aside the insights of classic rhetoric, that does not exalt grammar too much and that does not ignore the logic of mathematics.  That is what my linguistics professors in college handed on to me as a legacy.  I thank them very deeply for their insights and for the experience of excitement rather than boredom as I approach language.  

Sincerely,

Jon

Communication Taught from Simple to Complex

I was taught the K.I.S.S. principle long ago in coaching. It is also important for communication and in particular in teaching people how to define words by other words.

My favorite example of this recently is the relationship between the Golden Rule and the 2nd Greatest Commandment from the Bible. One reads: "Do for others what you would have them do for you." The second reads: "Love your neighbor as yourself."

I think you can go along way toward defining the words of the second from the first set of the first. It would look like this:

"Love" means "do for" (at its least)
"Your" means "you" (at its least)
"neighbor" means "other" (at its least)
"as" means "what you would have them (others) do for you (in contrast to others)"
"yourself" means "you" (at its least)

Sometimes in teaching communication we need to remember the rule that it is good to keep things simple initially and only later move people up to a higher level. I hope this example demonstrates to you the rule of K.I.S.S.

Sincerely,

Jon

Communication: The Distinctives

When it comes to communication ideas, it is important to understand what the key things that are behind an approach to communication. This is especially true in my case, where I point out to people that I do a few things differently from what they might be accustomed to seeing.

It may be good to begin by saying that my approach is not meant to replace or undercut the generally effective ways of teaching communication. What it does do is strengthen more what is already effective. So my approach does not so much replace, for example, grammar's use as much as shift it's use to where it is more effective.

So let me deal with each of the key things in my approach one by one. They are: 1)an integrated approach to language, 2)a surface structure approach to language, 3)a communication as relationship approach, 4)a cycle of communication process and 5)a thing-based approach to language. These are the positive components of what I teach about communication.

Let me say something about what I don't do. First, I don't do these things because they are at higher levels in the developmental process and they are not basic. When you get to a higher level, then they do have value. So I don't avoid them as though they are purely negative. It is just that I do not find them to be basic as too many teachers insist they are, when they are teaching in the classroom. I don't teach 1)just one particular approach to language like generative grammar, 2)the deep structure approach to language as more valuable than the surface structure, 3)communication for its own sake outside of relationship building, 4)a chaotic process of communication that leaves out the author or audience and so misses out on the cyclical part of the communcation process and 5)a word-based approach to language that relies on an expansion of vocabulary approach for learners to get smarter.

So back to my list of 5 positives. I will list them in the same order as above.

First, I approach language from an integrated perspective. I think you need to see the whole as you grapple with different views of language. You could call it a multi-dimensional approach. In contrast, I think the phonics versus whole-language debate is way too narrow in its scope. Each side misses the point. It is like a golfer who uses one club for every shot.

Second, I approach language from the surface. I think that the surface structure is actually right there in the speaker's mind. On a basic level, not on a deep level, they know what they are trying to say and in one sense it is all clear. In contrast, I find the generative grammar approach or sentence diagramming to be backwards from what we actually are after. It is like a fisherman fishing in deep water, when the walleyes are feeding close to shore.

Third, I approach language from the standpoint that something relational is happening or there is little sense to trying to communicate. The point is that you have to understand fundamentally whether the communication is attempting to form a connection or not. In contrast, I find some of the analysis of language has lost sight of the basic purpose of communication in trying to connect or not connect people. It is like forgetting what you went to the garage to get.

Fourth, I approach language as a process that begins with an author and leads to an audience and as a cycle in which the audience may then ask the author questions to see if the cycle of communication was completed successfully. In contrast, some books start with a text and then lead to a speech or another book without consideration for the author or the audience. It is like leaving off the beginning steps, like getting together the ingredients, in baking a cake and jumping right to putting the only part of the ingredients in the oven.

Fifth, I approach language as thing-based rather than word-based in its earliest development. Children do not learn vocabulary initially from dictionary definitions. Instead they learn words that point to things. This remains fundamental throughout the process, even after the dictionary becomes a helpful tool. In contrast, many teach language as though it began with definitions of words from other simpler words without any inclusion of things in the beginning. It is like giving a fishing pole to someone who doesn't know what a fish is.

These are the five most basic keys to my approach to communication and to language. For me, these five things or principles have revolutionized my comprehension of communicaiton. It has also enhanced my ability to communicate. Remember these are basic, so there may be those who can communicate better than I, but I think I can stand toe to toe with them on the basics. I know where to begin, even if others have already reached the finish line. Before this point in my life, I could not even find the starting line to begin the race and my communication was chaotic at best. So at least I can help a lot of people get started on the race of communication and give them a fair chance of finishing too rather than a few people finishing, while others haven't even found the starting line.

Sincerely,

Jon

Communication is Hidden in Plain View

Hidden (from me) in Plain View (of others)

In the game of hide and seek it is difficult to hide yourself in plain view of the person doing the seeking. The goal, after all is said and done, is to hide and not be found. Yet in the game of communication, where we want people to discover our meaning and we want to be plain, it is too often the case that our meaning is hidden from the person seeking the meaning. The goal, after all is said and done, is for our plain meaning to be found. Our meaning is not to be hidden. It is not to be a game of hide and seek. If it becomes that, then people get tired of communicating, just like they would get tired of a prolonged game of hide and seek. Sometimes in hide and seek, you just tell the person hiding to come out and that it is safe, rather than continue to try to find them. I think too often in the teaching of communicating, our method has hidden things in plain view.

Let me explain. Some things are hidden from me that are in plain view of others, or vice versa. The question for communication is: What makes things plain and what makes things hidden? Or more to the point: Why are so many things hidden from us in communication? Or in the Christian context, why so many interpretations of the same text in the Bible?

I think there is an explanation, one at least hinted at by my professor in college, Dr. Don Larson. He used to say he was mad. What was he mad about? He was upset about the stark contrast between learning at home and studying in school. He called the first learning and the second studying. He wasn’t against either one, but he felt the balance of the two had been lost in schools. He saw the dominance of studying over learning as harmful and he was trying hard to bring back a balance by re-inserting learning into schools with a focus on studying.

I want to take this a step further. I want you to do an experiment for me following in the tradition of the studying you have done in school. I want you to find a few things for me in the place you are right now within 2 seconds. The rule is that you cannot find words, but only things. If you do find words, then you are cheating and in school that means a zero for your score. Find for me a noun. Your two seconds are up. The result, if you followed my rules strictly, is that you found none.

If you want, you can go a little further. I want you to find an adjective. Next, I want you to find a conjunction. Finally, find a verb. Your next 6 seconds are up. The result, if you followed my rules strictly, is that you still found none of them. Don’t feel silly, if you thought you found one. I know now that you will never try to find these things again, unless you are allowed to look for words.

Now I want you to do another experiment for me following the same set of rules and you must find them within 2 seconds. Again, the rule is that you cannot find words, but only things. Again, please do not cheat. Find for me a thing. Your two seconds are up. The result, if you followed my rules strictly, is that you found at least one thing. If you are in your office, it might be a light or obviously your computer.

If you want, you can go a little further. I want you to find an amount. Next, I want you to find a relationship. Finally, find an action. Your six seconds are up. I would imagine you got 2-3 more right. If you are in your office, you could have found one phone, a cord connected to your computer and the light shining in your window. Don’t feel silly, if you didn’t get them all. I know on the next try you would get all four without breaking a sweat.

These two experiments are meant to demonstrate one main thing. The most important thing is to notice that in the first experiment, the words I used hid from you things. They did not take you directly to them. These are categories of words, not things. Also noticeable is that in the second experiment, the words I used were plain to you, when it came to things. Well, at least now that I gave you some examples. These are categories for things and not just classifications for words.

The problem is seen at its height, when we try to teach language in school whether it is native or foreign to us. The typical approach in the United States is that in about the 5th or 6th grade, we teach a thing called grammar through the parts of speech. This is meant to help us with at least two elements of communication, reading and writing. The one problem I am trying to point out here, is that the method is about words and studying, not things and learning.

In total, I think there are at least five weaknesses in our grammatical method in the United States: (1) it follows a one-dimensional approach to language versus a multi (five)-dimensional approach to language, (2) it has too great of an information load for our brains with eight parts of speech versus having an information load of only four to five things in a set, (3) it deals with later development of language skill rather than earlier development of language skill, (4) it focuses on words and study, a grammar of words, rather than on learning and things, a classification of things and words or word uses and (5) it makes things hidden rather than plain. We need to bring the things we need out in the open. It is this last problem that I am dealing with here.

The problem is that words have become more important than things as education has expanded into universal education in places like the United States. We need instead to keep words and things side by side. We need to teach and study alongside of know and learn. In our earliest development as children, we were concerned with needs related to the things that would satisfy our basic needs. We also though needed to relate to parents for what we needed. So we used some rather simple ways to get what we needed like food for our stomach. I’ve seen crying work effectively. Later we studied words with our parents, who also taught us those words, in the context of things we needed.

In the approach I take to communication, one of the great advantages it has is that it is plain, because it applies to things and words. It ties together both learning and studying. In a chart form of categories , it appears like this:

Communication (Whole)
1. Amount (Part)
2. Relationship (Part)
3. Action (Part)
4. Thing (Part)

When I first studied this method of learning communication, there was a problem with it. It was that a few items were not plain on the thing level. In place of amount, they had the concept of attribute, which I think is harder to find in the world of things. In place of action, they had the concept of event, which I think is also harder to find in the world of things because of its limitations in the realm of things. They both seem to apply better in the realm of words.

Because these words apply better to things than the words of grammar, I think they enhance our ability to make things plain. I know for me personally, this has been a major benefit. Recently, I took an online course and I aced the final exam. If I remember correctly, this may be the first time I didn’t get a single answer wrong on a final. The reason, I recall, for not getting every answer right on a final exam previously is, that I would typically misread at least one question. What this method has done for me is to make things plain or clear. If I get stumped, then I can go back to basic things to put words into a plain context.

Let’s go back to the earlier questions and look at some answers. The first question for communication was: What makes things plain and what makes things hidden? An answer is that grammar hides things, because it is only about word categories and not about thing categories. Or more to the point of the first question: Why are so many things hidden from us in communication? An answer is that it is because we rely on a method that favors words over things, rather than joining them together like two sides of a coin. Or applying the second question in the Christian context: Why so many interpretations of the same text in the Bible? An answer is that too often our method is limited to language, words and their rules and does not look enough at the things in the context. Again, because the questions asked are often only about language and not about things, things are hidden that otherwise could be plain.

So using categories of things and words has helped make things hidden from me in plain view of the communicator, to become plain also for me. I want the same thing to be available to others, including yourself. We need to work from categories of things, not just categories of words. Remember our earlier experiment. We need to change education in the direction that my linguistics professor, Dr. Donald Larson, wanted to take it. Things are in plain view, if only we will change our basic approach to communication and talk about things and not just words. Is the thing I'm saying plain and not just my words?


Sincerely,

Jon

Communication Basics: The Education Gap

You know how it is. There are some who achieve educationally and there are those who don't. There are also those who no longer care. In the end, there must be an explanation for this achievement gap in education.

For me, the secret to success in the traditional educational system in the United States is to realize the importance that words play in the system. It is modelled after the Greek system of education more than any other model. This system focuses on words over things.

This is both a strength and a weakness. This means that we can through our system of education, become experts in words. This is its strength. This also means that we can through our system of education, become failures at real life. This is its weakness. This is because we lose a sense of balance between words and reality. The secret is to maximize the strength while minimizing the weakness at the same time. Those who no longer care usually gave up trying to do this a long time ago.

My writing on this blog will focus on the basics of communication as found in using words. It doesn't mean that we won't ever talk about things, but dealing with things is better done through another means than words alone, even concrete ones.

I will be introducing a way of communication that I think is basic to meaning and talking about the things we all need. I will do my best to add something every month. So please stop back and check in every once in while. Thank you.

Sincerely,

Jon