[沟通的艺术】交谈中让你看上去很蠢的五大错误

[沟通的艺术】交谈中让你看上去很蠢的五大错误

与人交谈中我们难免犯错，但是有些根本错误会让我们看起来十分愚蠢，来看看本文提到的五大错误，避开这些雷区，让你把握沟通的艺术。

5 Conversational Mistakes That Can Make You Look Dumb

交谈中让你看上去很蠢的五大错误

by Henrik Edberg

撰文：亨利克·埃德伯格 翻译：暖盈929 1

“The real art of conversation is not only to say the right thing at the right place but to leave unsaid the wrong thing at the tempting moment.”

“交谈的真正艺术不仅仅是在恰当的地点说恰当的话，还要在受到诱惑的时候把不当的话咽下去。”

Dorothy Nevill

多萝西·内维尔

Social skills and relationships are probably two of the most important things in life.

社交能力和人际关系大概是生活中最重要的两样东西。

So it always strikes me as a bit odd that while we learn so much when we grow up there is often somewhat of a lack of advice on how to improve our communication skills.

因此有一点总是让我感到有些奇怪：在我们成长的过程中学习了很多东西，但通常会多多少少欠缺一些关于如何增强沟通技能的建议。

If there is something that we should learn more about in school, then this is one of those things since it can improve lives and society in a big way.

如果说有些东西我们应该在学校多学习一点，那么沟通技能就是其中之一，因为它能在很大程度上改善我们的生活和社交。

Of course, if you do some digging and browsing and looking you can find solid and time-tested information from throughout the ages on this topic. And since communication and relationships is a pretty intuitive and free flowing process, advice that applies in all situations is pretty hard to find. Much of these things you have to learn from experience.

当然，如果你进行一下挖掘、浏览和观察，你就能找到各个时代关于这个话题的可靠且经得住时间考验的资料。因为交流和人际关系是一种非常依赖直觉并自然发生的过程，那么要寻找适用于所有状况的建议则相当困难。大部分需要你从经验中去学习。

But there are some good pointers. Here are five of them. And I think that if you avoid these five mistakes at least most of the time then you can really improve your relationships, your communication skills and your life.

但是也有一些很好的指南。以下是五大交谈中的错误。我认为，如果你能至少在大部分时候避免这五个错误，你就能真正地改善你的人际关系、沟通技能和你的生活。

1. Bragging. You may think bragging about your new car or how you make money wise will impress people. But consciously trying to impress anyone quickly becomes pretty apparent and transparent. And you are likely come across as an annoying try-hard and insecure person with low self-esteem rather than the coolest kid in town.

1. 自夸。你可能会想，炫耀一下你的新车或者你如何明智地赚了大钱会给人们留下深刻的印象。然而，有意识地试图快速给任何人留下深刻印象会变得十分明显。况且，你很有可能让人认为你是个没什么自尊、费尽心机且不可靠的人，而不是城里最酷的那个人。

2. Being judgemental. Now, what I’m talking about here is being judgemental about what Paul does for a living, what Lisa defines as her unique fashion style and what Larry did in a drunken haze last weekend.

2. 评头论足。现在我在此讨论的是，对于保罗以何为生、丽萨如何定义自己独特的着装风格以及拉里在上周末醉醺醺地都做了什么这类事而评头论足。

If you keep up such topics in conversation then soon the people you talk to will probably start to assume that you talk the same way about them when they are not around. And that can put a negative dent and barrier into your relationship.

如果你继续在交谈中谈论这些话题，那么很快，与你交谈的这些人大概就开始猜想，你会以同样的方式在他们背后进行谈论。那就会为你的人际关系增加负面的影响和障碍。

Besides, being judgemental might make you feel superior for a short while. But overall, it puts negative energy into your own mood and thoughts. And that isn’t especially fun or useful.

此外，评头论足或许让你感觉自己一时高人一等。但总的说来，它会将消极能量注入你自己的情绪和思想中。那就格外没有趣味和意义了。

3. Putting the spotlight on ME, ME, ME! An obvious and obnoxious one. A couple of common ways to put the spot-light on yourself are:

3. 主角是我，我，我！多么明显且让人厌恶的一点。将自己视作全场焦点的几个常见方法有：

Talking too much.

说得太多。

Hijacking someone else’s story by interrupting and then relating it to some anecdote in your life. Thereby taking the focus off the other person and on to yourself once again.

抢劫似的打断他人的话，然后将它与发生在自己身上的轶事联系起来。从而把焦点从别人那里移出来，再一次转到自己身上。

Not really listening, just waiting for your turn to talk again.

并未真的在倾听，只是等着轮到自己再次发言。

Trying to steer the conversation back to your favourite subjects. And then clinging desperately by talking about them as long as you can.

努力将谈话转到自己最喜欢的话题上。然后拼命似的尽可能长时间地谈论下去。

4. Always be giving advice. I’ve been guilty of this so many times.  And I think a lot of people don’t really realize that it might be something to hold back on a bit. If someone is telling you about a problem or situation then it’s easy to assume they want your point of view and advice. And it’s easy to feel clever by dispensing your wisdom.

4. 总是给人提建议。我已经多次对此感到内疚了。而且我认为，许多人并未真正意识到或许要对此进行克制了。如果某人正给你说一个问题或者情况，那么我们很容易就假定他需要你的看法和建议。我们很容易就通过施展智慧而感到自己很聪明。

But sometimes people just want to you to listen and hear them out. It might be a way for them to handle, understanding and solving their own problem. So just listen instead of busting out your problem-solving skills immediately. Assuming a parental role where you are telling what someone what to do can become irritating.

然而有时候，人们只不过是需要你来听他们把话说完。这可能是他们处理问题的一种方式，理解和解决自己的问题。因此，只听就好，而不是马上展现自己解决问题的技能。设想一下，你扮演着父母的角色告诉别人要做什么，这会变得令人恼火。

When they are done talking they might ask for your input. Or you can ask if they want to hear what you would do in a similar situation. Or if they want someone to bounce around thoughts and ideas with.

当他们说完话的时候可能会要求你也来说说。或者你可以问一下是否他们想听听你在类似情况下会如何去做，抑或他们想让某个人来发表一下想法和主意。

5. Worrying about making mistakes in conversations. One big problem in conversations is to turn the focus of your mind too much inwards. As soon as you do that conversations stall, you can feel flustered and everything becomes awkward.

5. 担心在交谈中犯错。交谈中的一大错误就是将太多的焦点放在自身上。你一进入这个交谈误区，就会感觉十分慌张，一切事物都变得不合适宜。

You can escape being worried about looking dumb and making mistakes by not focusing on it. Work on focusing your attention more and more outwards, towards the person you are talking to.

你可以通过不把注意力放在谈话上从而避免担心自己看起来有点蠢或者犯错。努力将你的注意力更多地向外释放，放到听你说话的那个人身上。

If you think you look dumb then it is probably because you were worried about it and became self-conscious. If you can decrease the worry you can decrease the time you feel self-conscious. And if you aren’t self-conscious then you are far less likely to feel bad and affecting the conversation. Even if you said or did something that might be perceived as kinda dumb. If I’m not self-conscious then I have found that don’t react that badly to what I said/did (even if it was kinda dumb). Most of the time I just move on with the conversation and the people I’m talking to follows.

如果你认为自己看起来有点笨，那么大概是因为你对此十分忧虑而且变得害羞。如果你能减轻自己的忧虑，你就会减少感觉害羞的时间。而且如果你不害羞，那么你就不大可能感觉不佳从而影响交谈了。纵然你说了或者做了某事，或许会被视为有一点儿蠢。如果我不是那么害羞，我就发现那对于我说的话/做的事情的反应没有那么糟糕（即便有那么点愚蠢）。大多数时间，我只是继续交谈下去，跟我说话的人也继续。

So, should you try to decrease the attention and focus you put on yourself?

因此，你是否应该减少放在自己身上的注意力和焦点呢？

Frankly, at the moment I find it more fun – and difficult – to forget about myself entirely. I just try to be and observe the reality around me. I focus on that. And not on myself (well, a little self-focus is hard to avoid but I try the best I can). It doesn’t work for that long, at least for now. But I find it more interesting experimenting and experiencing with that frame of mind.

坦率的说，此时我发现全完忘掉自己是更加有趣且困难的事情。我只是努力观察我周围的现实情况。我的精力集中于此，而不是我自己（好吧，很难避免一点点的以自我为中心，但是我尽我所能）。这没有持续很长时间，至少现在是这样。但是我发现尝试并体验那种心情更加有趣了。

3 Solutions for Better Relationships

3种方法提升人际关系

Try to avoid doing these mistakes. Don’t just sink into the regular unconscious routine of life. Try to be conscious and aware of how you think and what you say as much as possible. This will allow you to more easily observe your behaviour and bit by bit decrease the number of times you make these mistakes.

努力避免犯这些错误。不要只是陷入到有规律无意识的日常生活中。努力去自我察觉，尽量多地意识到你是如何思考、你都说些什么。这将会使你更容易地观察自己的行为，逐渐减少你犯错误的次数。

Replace your habits. Since these mistakes quickly become habits you may not just be able to put a stop to them. Instead try a time-tested way for changing habits. Replace the habit rather than removing it. Instead of for instance judging people, try to see a positive side of everyone you meet for 30 days. It might be hard, but there is just about always something positive in everyone. Adopting this new habit not only replaces a less useful one. It has the added benefit of improving your outlook on the world and can pretty radically change how you view your closest environment such as friends, family and co-workers.

改变你的习惯。因为这些错误很快就变成了习惯，所以你可能不会停止犯这些错误。相反，尝试一种久经试验的方法来改变习惯。要改变习惯，而不是戒除习惯。例如，不要评判他人，而是努力在30天内看到你见到的每一个人的积极的一面。采取这个新习惯不仅替代了之前没大有用的习惯，它还有额外的益处：提升你的世界观，可以从根本上改变你对最亲近的环境的看法，比如朋友、家人和同事。

Focus less on yourself. All of these mistakes are pretty much rooted in being too focused on yourself and boosting your own ego. But you don′t have to keep on boosting your ego to feel good. The most helpful way I have found so far for overcoming the ego boosting-addiction is by reading – and applying – something by Eckhart Tolle. He discusses the ego in-depth in his books/tapes/dvds and they are great ways to understanding how the ego works in your life and how to get a handle on it. Very useful information that improves your life once you start understanding and applying it. I highly recommend checking out his most famous book The Power of Now , either at a bookstore or at your local library.

少关注自己。所有这些错误大多源自对于自己的太过关注而增强了自我意识。但是你不必一直增强自我意识来获得良好感觉。到目前为止，我所发现的克服自我意识膨胀的最有帮助的方法就是阅读以及应用埃克哈特·托利的作品。他在书/录音/光碟中深入探讨了自我意识，里面提到了许多方法来了解自我意识是如何在我们的生活中造成影响以及如何驾驭它。一旦你开始了解并加以应用，这些信息是十分有用的。我强烈建议查看一下他最著名的一本书《当下的力量》，在书店或者你当地的图书馆都会找到。