Posts in category: PERSONAL RELATIONSHIPS

The usefulness of the TALK2ME system in improving relationship communication is unmatched. What one husband and community leader had to say about understanding the different viewpoints of Empathizer and Instigator communicators to promote conflict-free communication with his wife…

DOC,

I always knew there was something missing in my understanding of personalities. The best explanation that I was able to craft was to an analogy of men in the old West, i.e., that there are two types of men: the ones that rode horses and the ones that rode stagecoaches.

After my initial consultation with you and subsequently reading the information contained in your website, my eyes have been opened, and clarity of thought now prevails.

Dr. O’Grady, you have been able to define and explain the missing elements of what I’ve been trying to figure out. I’ve studied many of the greats, Zig Ziglar, Dale Carnegie, Jackie Cooper, Joe Verde, and others. I’ve bought their tapes, attended their seminars, and developed communication strategies following their outlines, but none of these great motivators and teachers has ever unlocked the basic human psychological traits in such a manner as you and in such a way that is so meaningful.

Learning word tracts and/or altering word tracts to fit my individual personality is OK, but I believe that understanding the personality traits of the person I’m dealing with is far more valuable, which for the first time, I now understand in ways that previously had me mystified.

I’ll be in touch, as I want to see if we can arrange to get you in front of our men’s ministry to do a seminar or two.

To begin understanding men and women communicating better, simply download this free discussion of your communication style and preferences http://www.drogrady.com/ttm_optin.php

About TALK2ME©

Dennis O’Grady delivers TALK2ME© effective communication workshops that provide a Communication Toolbox full of positive communication tools, to executive, managerial, and supervisory groups, to set people up for success. He also uses the TALK2ME system with his private, relationship communications-training clients. Dr. O’Grady is known as the “Talk Doc” since the advent of his positive and effective communication system, TALK2ME. He is past president of the Dayton Psychological Association, founder of New Insights Communication, and is a clinical professor at the Wright State University School of Professional Psychology. His talk textbook, TALK TO ME: Communication Moves to Get Along With Anyone, received the 2008 Axiom Business Book Award Silver Medal. Please feel free to contact New Insights Communication at 937.428-0724 to set up a time to speak with Dr. O’Grady. Your questions and inquiries are welcomed.

Why state your communication intentions to your beloved life partner of many decades? While life is difficult, love is amazing. Even with boatloads of trouble or other serious issues or walls built, still-in-love couples can tear down the walls and build something anew. But how to accomplish this communication feat? And what shall we co-create that is positive? You can get out of communication ruts with a little help from the Talk2Me© positive and effective communication system, which works like a lucky charm, whether you want it to or not.

STONEWALLING

When trust is broken, everything falls apart, and things don’t go well. Arguing between two loving partners is a red flag that there is too much loneliness, and a stone wall (ergo, stonewalling) with only one small plexiglass window has been erected. One loving husband who was married 46 years, but in love 49 years, said it well.

Instigator Talk: He described how the couple had fallen on tough times, and their love tested by fire….

We’ve been in love since we were young kids. I shut her out of my life, and she, in turn, locked the door to hers. The hurt has to be dealt with, and then eventually the why must be addressed. I spend hours at work, and she spends hours on the computer. We isolate ourselves on an island, going hard daylight to dark. Our kids are grown, and now it’s our turn…but we don’t know how to turn to one another and just to talk.

The couple goals were: To love…To talk…To be close…To get back together…To enjoy one another.

WRITE A DISSERTATION OF LOVE

If you don’t experience your love, does your love still exist? Yes, but you’re going have trouble believing in it. So that’s why you focus on your intentions to co-create…

• Peace
• Enjoyment of life
• Healed hurts
• Surplus respect
• Joy
• Emotional closeness
• Good communication
• Actions to remove resentments
• Strategies to remove wedges that push us apart
• Ways to mourn our losses together
• Approaches to change what we can
• Acceptance of what we can’t change
• A blueprint to be best friends to one another
• Deep trust
• A happy partner

Nobody holds a candle next to the two of you!

FAMILY CLIMATE CONTROL

What emotional climate would you like to create in your marriage, family, or home? Find out by answering these queries:

1. What do you intend to create in your relationship?

2. Do you drive while under the influence of intoxicating negative emotions? (How do you allow your emotional chain to be pulled?)

3. Why do you rise to the bait of an unproductive argument with a child or teen?

4. Why do you push the buttons of your partner by complaining and sounding glum? (Who feels lonely for you and is waiting for things to improve?)

5. How do you break the chain reaction of behaving like the very people who have hurt you?

6. What does “Complaining is only human, but coming up with a solution is divine!” mean to you?

7. Why can’t you teach old dogs new tricks? (Is your plan for change in writing?)

So, count the ways you can make yourself and your partner happy. Unleash your love! By using the Talk2Me© system to focus on solving communication problems instead of repeating them, we can truly value the no nonsense way we can all talk productively around the Communicator Table.

ABOUT “TALK DOC” DENNIS O’GRADY, PSY.D.Dr. Dennis O’Grady is a clinical psychologist, a communication and relationship expert, and a corporate consultant in areas such as leadership development. Dr. O’Grady is the developer of the Talk2Me communication system, which is central to business innovation through using positive and effective communication tools.

DO YOU PUT BRAKES ON YOUR MOUTH?

Are you reactive by striving hard to have the last word? Or are you responsive by driving safely to have the first positive action on the two-way communicator highway?

HOW DO I TAP ON MY BRAKES WHEN I’M MOVING TOO FAST?

DO TALK, OF COURSE:

• Do tap on your brakes to slow down, when your emotions are running hot.

• Do release yourself from the prison of perfectionism.

• Do listen more than you pontificate or lecture.

• Do hear negative feedback that resolves those pesky problems which haunt you.

• Do escort the elephant in the room to outside your front door.

• Do respond authentically to others instead of using “knee-jerk-me-jerk” reactions.

• Do pull out the tree from your own eye before you point out the toothpick in the other guy’s eye.

• Do nurture yourself and reach out to others to “depressurize” when you’re stressed out.

• Do use your character values (honesty, integrity, respect) as your compass when speeding along, lost in a fog of emotion.

• Do take the cotton out of your ears, especially if you are prone to trying too hard to be right, just to save face.

• Do make every effort to change and grow on a daily basis.

• Do have the first action, instead of having the last word.

• Do be a validator, instead of a villain.

• Do remember that God gave us one mouth and two ears for a very good reason!

• Do follow good communication driving rules, especially when you don’t want to.

Travel on the two-way Communicator Highway can be, and often is, hazardous to your health. If you use the Talk Tools from your Communicator Toolbox, you will be able to circumvent those fender-benders just ahead, and you’ll know when to take a detour or a completely new route, as you head toward your destination.

Dennis O’Grady, Psy.D., is a Communication Expert and Developer of Talk2Me positive and effective communication system. His communication classes are described as “humbling, surprising, eye-opening, enlightening, valuable, intense, informative, very educational, very beneficial.” He is available to talk at (937) 428-0724.

YOU JUST DON’T UNDERSTAND ME

“I just don’t understand you, and you don’t get me!” piped in a frustrated spouse.  Are you in a crazy-talking relationship where you’re told all is well, but for some reason you feel ill in the pit of your stomach? A bright, professional, female communications client of mine lamented, “I just don’t understand. When I get close, he moves away!” This same sentiment of “Why, when we’re having such fun, does he have to go and ruin everything by making a big communication mess!” happens over and over again in Talk World. And the impact is devastating to both Empathizer and Instigator communicators. The Talk2Me© system clears away the confusion from your mind, so you aren’t struck down by a lightning bolt of grief time and again.

ARE YOU IN A CRAZY-TALKING RELATIONSHIP?

Your experience doesn’t lie when you listen to and respect yourself. For example, if you feel unimportant in a relationship, chances are that you’re treated poorly. You can be fed lines and lies, but your experience tells you the truth most times. How to “listen to yourself” to personally know if a calculating communicator (who is an Impressionator and Negatalker) is bluffing while playing you like a fiddle:

1. I just don’t understand, when we’re close, you move away.

2. I feel unimportant.

3. Nothing seems to work for long.

4. When I say “No,” you get mad.

5. You treat strangers and the dog better than you treat me.

6. You don’t act like you respect me.

7. You try so hard to impress everybody with how wonderful you are.

8. You neglect me and our relationship.

9. Everyone else you know and interact with is treated with respect.

10. I don’t want to pretend everything is O.K.

11. You’re mean to me behind closed doors.

12. I feel an urge to drink/drug/eat/have sex, to get away from this pain of losing you

Crazy-talking causes you to wonder if your perception is off. It isn’t!

CRAZY-TALKING REDIRECTS CONFRONTATIONS

What comebacks might you expect, from crafty communicators who are playing their cards close to the vest? For example, “Why can’t you trust me?!” is crazy-making when the talker has arrogantly broken promise after promise. Here are a few other excuses to exonerate behaviors that create disastrous losses:

1. I’m not a great communicator.

2. I get upset easily.

3. I can be pretty moody.

4. I don’t have much patience.

5. I don’t see it that way at all.

6. I’m doing the right thing.

7. Why should I have to live my life by your rules?

8. I have mixed feelings and alternate between feeling good and feeling bad about us.

9. I believe that we can work anything out.

10. Why can’t you get past the past and trust me?

Learn from your experiences when results and actions don’t match promises. If you’re not sure whether to believe your eyes and ears, track what’s been promised to determine how often there has been follow through. If too few promises have been fulfilled, holler to high Heaven about it…or take action, learn the strategies in the Talk2Me© system, and protect yourself from the negatalker whose goal is to bring you down once again.

WHO IS COMMUNICATIONS PSYCHOLOGIST DENNIS O’GRADY, PSY.D.?

Dr. Dennis O’Grady is a communications psychologist from Dayton, Ohio, who specializes in teaching positive and effective communication skills. Dr. O’Grady’s third book, which includes his “Talk to Me” effective leadership communication system, is at www.drogrady.com and Amazon. Life is a highway? Are you traveling to where you need and want to go in a spirit of hopeful anticipation, or are you cursing under your breath at the other driver’s stupidity? The choice is yours. Know this: Whenever you travel with an open heart and flowing mind on the two-way communication highway, change happens fast and lasts.

How do you give constructive criticism in a calm and loving way? Is that even possible when you come home in a bad mood? Yes, it is, when you use the Talk2Me© Communication Roadmap. You want to keep the green light of good communication glowing in your home.

HOW DO YOU START GIVING CONSTRUCTIVE CRITICISM IN A CALM AND LOVING WAY?

How do you start using criticism constructively? By stopping old talk habits that make your communicator wheels stay stuck spinning ’round and ’round in a rut and CHANGE…

1. Stop criticizing and nit-picking.

2. Start complimenting your talk partners, on a daily basis.

3. Stop using an aggressive tone of voice when you communicate.

4. Speak more calmly. (Don’t make others feel under attack.)

5. Stop fretting or worrying over the small things.

6. Let the little things go. (Understand when getting upset is necessary.)

7. Don’t take out or direct your frustrations at your loved ones.  (Your mood dictates your reputation of trustworthiness.)

THE COUPLE REPORT

Many couples and most people don’t like to bark orders at each other. After all, this isn’t a dog-eat-dog world. Said one inventive couple, who wanted to change the stormy climate to calm:

We’re cured. We want to be talked to in a calm manner like equal adults. These Talk2Me© rules are common sense, and when they are used, level-headed and positive communication is created. Don’t ever speak to other people like they’re little children or robots.

ABOUT “TALK DOC” DENNIS O’GRADY, Psy.D.

Dennis delivers Talk2Me© Leadership Communication workshops which provide a Communication Toolbox full of positive communication tools, to set people up for success. Dr. O’Grady can be reached at (937) 428-0724 or at www.drogrady.com.