Are you a "good" communicator? 

I mean, just quickly, on a scale of 1-100, where do you fall? Are you happy with that level? Why is it so high? What is keeping it low?

Are you a good communicator with everyone, aka, the whole planet? Or are you very good with only a small range of people in a limited location?

Would you be good at communication if we told you all you can use is dance? Can you dance everything you want to say to someone? 

Are you a bad communicator? Do you fail to accomplish what you want to accomplish when you talk to others? Can you talk well about emotions? Complex topics? Can you connect, bond, deepen? Can you influence someone? Can you stop someone from doing something you believe to be wrong?

Ah, communication. And the ever-lingering question -- is it working, or are we failing?

I think more than anything that this question of communication competence is what drove me into the communication field. I would say that my father was a flawed communicator. Even highly flawed. He was often silent. He didn't like to explain things. He was only really expert in construction. (He was a general contractor, and a good one, so, yes, he knew construction very well. But I sure didn't. Would I have thought he was a good communicator if I also knew and loved to talk about tools? Um, maybe?)

So, what do you do when you grow up in an environment of failed communication? Well, one option is to decide to get very, very good at communicating, because you know what you had in your past was not much fun. 

That would be me. When I went away to college, I started as an English major, because I had learned that if your family didn't talk to you, people in books would. And those were great conversations, the interaction you had with authors. So smart. Giving. Creative. Exciting.

But I soon found out that while I love reading, and writing, it's not enough for me. It's a vacuum. What I wanted was talk. Live human talk. Lots and lots of glorious verbal communication.

So I double-majored, in English and Communication Studies. 

And from there I launched into years of graduate school courses not just in rhetoric, but in all areas of communication. Relational communication. Conversation. Communication theory. 

I wanted to understand it all.

And I still do. And so I keep learning. 

Because nothing is more fascinating than how humans talk to humans. It contains literally... everything.

If you're good at communication, I would say it's highly likely you enjoy your life. And others enjoy you enjoying your life. Deep, fulfilling, resonant, successful talk? The ability to connect and engage in this synchronized human ballet of words, movements, expressions? 

It's one of the best things we've got. 

And if you're not good at communication? Not good enough, not as good as you need to be in order to accomplish what you want with others?

Then come on along. There is so much to learn. And it makes such a difference when you do.

For everyone.