April 11, 2010PowerPhrase: I’m trying to get it real
My colleague Jean sent out an email last week entitled “Get real.” Her point was that she had delayed writing because it took time for her to get real about what she had to say. The message continued to talk about how slow her business is and how she is dealing with that.
I responded to her with these words.
You delayed writing because you needed time to get real. I wanted to respond immediately but didn’t because I decided to take some time to get real myself.
You’re right. It does take a while to let go of the platitudes and unconscious communication and figure out what’s genuine. My hubby told me today that he doesn’t fake anything with me anymore. What a joy that is! He had a sign on his door that was a quote from Harrison Ford – “I’m trying to get it right.” Harrison was talking about his relationship with Calista – Bob about his with me.
I put a sticky note over the end of the note today and it now reads, “I’m trying to get it REAL.” “And you’re doing a great job.”
It will be exciting to see what emerges from this for you!
It can take a lifetime to get really real with someone. Actually it takes a life time to get real with ourselves. It’s the greatest gift we can give anyone.
So, like Bob and Jean, when I post to my blog, well,
- I’m trying to get it real.
It’s my gift.
4 Comments »
RSS feed for comments on this post.
| TrackBack URI
You can also bookmark
this on del.icio.us or check the cosmos
I think the statement Get Real is a copout. As Adults in this new world of changing words like terroist to enemy combatants.
Why can’t we just say want we need to say instead of waltzing around the issues. Are we now so politiaclly correct???
It is want it is.
Comment by Maria Howard — April 14, 2010 @ 9:18 am
Maria, my answer to you is, because if we did, I wouldn’t have a job encouraging people to speak!
But my more serious response is that there are so many things we could say at any given time and so many ways to say them, and our challenge is to do it in a dynamic and constructive way. When I first took on my passivity I spoke with a lot of “raw assertiveness” that wounded and built walls instead of bridges. Political correctness can often obscure, but the right touch of grace allows our message to be heard.
In my SpeakStrong book, I have a several chapters designed to helping people figure out what to say – and another 40 chapters on how to say it.
Comment by merylrunion — April 14, 2010 @ 11:35 am
I think Maria hits good point, though. Personally, I’m not a big fan of beign “politically correct” when you speak, because it comes too close to what George Orwell called “Double-speak” in 1984.
But I think it also needs to be said that there is a big difference between considering your words carefully (“say what you mean, without being mean”) and being “politically correct”, just because you are following the herd, or using mis-placed good intentions.
Comment by Ken Rhodes — April 26, 2010 @ 12:10 pm
Thanks for your observation, Ken. I’m looking back over my response to Maria and see it didn’t appropriately acknowledge her point. I don’t like “political correctness” at the price of clarity either!.
Comment by merylrunion — April 26, 2010 @ 12:16 pm