communication on Miscommunication

You always risk people misunderstanding you when you say anything.

We're all islands shouting lies to each other across seas of misunderstanding.

What if you were sent a message, but you never received it? Or, put another way—what if the most important message of your life was sent to you, but it never reached you? It’s hard for us in the digit...

Communicating with people is often easier said than done. Take for instance this apocryphal story of the census taker who had to venture many miles down a country road to reach a cabin. As the man pul...

A man went in for his annual checkup and received a phone call from his physician a couple of days later. The doctor said, “I’m afraid I have some bad news for you.” “What’s the news?” the man asked...

There's a humorous, apocryphal story about a man standing by a river. On the opposite bank, a woman calls out, "How do I get to the other side of the river?" The man replies, "YOU A...

Communication usually fails, except by accident

The single biggest problem in communication is the illusion that it has taken place.

The greatest problem with communication is the illusion that it has been accomplished.

Communication is something we usually take for granted, it seems simple enough, after all. But one thing I’ve noticed (Stu) over time is that, especially in complex organizations, communication often ...

The overall purpose of human communication is - or should be - reconciliation. It should ultimately serve to lower or remove the walls of misunderstanding which unduly separate us human beings, one fr...

Two monologues do not make a dialogue.

The most important thing in communication is hearing what isn't said.

Men hate each other because they fear each other; they fear each other because they don’t know each other; they don’t know each other because they cannot communicate with each other; they can’t commun...

I often watch speakers stand before an audience and work to build a case for their ideas. They would be more successful if instead they tried building a relationship with the people in the room. The w...

"The single biggest problem in communication is the illusion that it has taken place .” George Bernard Shaw Three-year-old Matthew was chewing on an apple when he asked, “Daddy, why is ...

As a stranger walked down a quiet residential street, he noticed a man struggling with a washing machine at the doorway of his house. The homeowner was clearly having a hard time, so the passerby, wan...

E-mail is the great scourge of modem communication. It facilitates the passing on of simple information, yet it forces complex matters to be presented In a fashion that makes what is difficult appear ...

The right word may be effective, but no word was ever as effective as a rightly timed pause.

I actually want to believe that when it comes to communication, my biggest problem is outside of me, not inside of me. I want to think that it’s my kids, my wife, my neighbors, my boss. I want to thin...

Time talks. It speaks more plainly than words. The message it conveys comes through loud and clear. Because it is manipulated less consciously, it is subject to less distortion than the spoken languag...

Human speech is like a cracked kettle on which we tap crude rhythms for bears to dance to, while we long to make music that will melt the stars.

Loneliness does not come from having no people around you, but from being unable to communicate the things that seem important to you.

Talk low, talk slow, and don’t say too much

George MacLeod of the Iona Community related a conversa­tion that he had with a Marxist who had never heard an explana­tion of basic Christianity. The man listened with wonder and sur­prise. Finally, ...

The speed of communications is wondrous to behold. It is also true that speed can multiply the distribution of information that we know to be untrue.”

Famed pastor and educator A. T. Pierson (1837–1911) lamented his own human inadequacies in communicating to his congregation the depth and levels of the “unsearchable riches of Christ:” “Unsearchabl...

One of the most critically acclaimed fantasy films in recent years was a piece of science fiction called Arrival . It is the story of beings from outer space who arrive on earth, igniting a wildfire ...

Most conversations are simply monologues delivered in the presence of a witness.

Good communication is as stimulating as black coffee, and just as hard to sleep after.