Improve Your Social Skills And Be Smarter In Your Relationships
Do our social skills play a role in how we feel? What do you think… how did you feel when you communicated effectively with another person, or when you handled an argument in a way that kept the relationship from being harmed at all?
Now that you have something in mind… What emotions have emerged when things went wrong?
Quite simply, this ability to build and maintain good relationships plays a role in your emotions and your well-being. What’s good about it? Well, this property is not fixed and you can actually increase it.
Keep reading to learn more about how to get in touch with people more intelligently!
Humans are social creatures: the importance of social skills
We communicate with people all the time in our daily lives. This can be anything from ordering a coffee, talking to a colleague about a joint project, or telling your partner how much you love them. There are lots of comprehensive social interaction scenarios in our daily lives.
And how successful these scenarios are will depend on how intelligent or sensible you are when it comes to developing your social skills.
This is how you create the difference between satisfying and unsatisfying relationships with family, friends and lovers. But that’s not all.
With good social skills, you can effectively interact with other professionals and get along with your employees. In addition, you will be able to resolve conflicts and speak in public in a pleasant, relaxed way.
You will also help your children to develop in a healthier way. And finally, you will be able to grow as well. Why is it?
Because having good social skills also means better psychological adjustment, better health and happiness. It also means better social support systems.
Communication: The key to social skills
Your ability to communicate – and how developed it is – is a big part of your social skills. A key concept in this regard is self-confidence.
Self-confidence is a way of communicating where you express your thoughts and opinions, while still keeping others in mind, in situations where it may not be so easy to do so.
Therefore, an ingredient in communication is both to have self-respect and respect for others.
It is a balance between aggressive communication (where you are just trying to protect your rights) and passive communication (where you are just trying to protect others). A basic part of this is to sometimes say “no”.
It is also very important to put many kinds of social skills into practice. Some actions will help you to react effectively in interaction with other people.
To do so, it is important to listen and pay attention to what the other person is saying, without assuming underlying motives.
On the other hand, you should also express what you feel and believe. Like you, the people you talk to are not mind readers, so it will be easier to make contact if you also explain your point of view in different things.
Being able to start, maintain and end a conversation when needed is one of the basic things about good social skills.
It is more than just communication: other parts of social skills
Communicating effectively is the ultimate goal when it comes to trying to improve your social skills. But to reach the goal, you also need to be proficient in other areas. These other areas will help you make it so that your relationships with other people are satisfactory and of high quality.
An example of this is having a prosocial behavior and a willingness to cooperate. That is, to do certain things for the sake of others, even if they have not asked for it.
This does not mean that you stop worrying about your own problems and radially push them away. But that means we have to find a balance between the two.
It is also very important to learn how to prevent problems. Being able to effectively identify, anticipate and confront possible conflicts will help you find a solution that satisfies everyone in a good, calm and fair way.
Work on all these things and improve your social skills!
Photos by Priscilla du Preez, Bryan Monkey, and Phil Coffman.
