Intentional Speech in our conversations

It’s happened to all of us. We start a conversation with someone and it unravels in front of us. We end up with misunderstandings, conflict or confusion. And, in reverse, sometimes all our mental energy and effort when we are listening to someone, is focused towards trying to figure out the purpose of the conversation they have started, not the message.

In order to help your conversation partner cooperate with you and reduce possible misunderstandings , your could try starting important conversations by inviting your listener to join you in the specific type of conversation you would like to have.

In other words, explain your conversational intention and then invite the consent of your intended listener.  When people agree to talk with us, and they know our intentions, then they can be more present in the conversation and more able to either meet our needs or explain why they can’t.

This is a 2-step process. First we offer an explanation of our intent and then we finish with an invitation to consent.

For example: We can start with the intention

Hi….I would like to …….

• share information
• give instructions
• make plans
• negotiate about
• explore possibilities
• make a request
• ask for support
• clarify
• tell you about my experiences/feelings
• hear what’s happening for you
• entertain you with a story/joke
• coordinate/plan our ….
• express my affection for you
• check/clarify/confirm my understanding about…
• resolve…
• make an offer
• accept or decline an offer
• persuade or motivate you…
• make an apology
• offer an interpretation of/in regard to…
• offer an opinion on…
• change the subject
• have some time to…
• leave/end this conversation so that I can…

and then invite consent to participate:

• have you got time to talk?
• is that ok?
• can we talk about it?

Here are some examples:

Hi Roxanne, I need to get some specific information on the project I am working on. Have you got time to talk about it right now?

Hey, Maria, I’d love to tell you about something funny that happened on the weekend – are you curious to hear more?

Hey Hamid, I need to explain the next stage of this job. I think it will take about 10 minutes.  Is now a good time for you to hear it?

Hey sweetie, I have some appreciation I’d like to share with you around doing the gardening this weekend. Would you like to hear how I feel?