Ronda, Spain, Spanish, Themes, and Everything Else

We went to a work-related picnic the other day where there must have been about 17 or 18 adults and a bunch of kids. The group was unusual in that the normal clique's didn't turn up, so conversations weren't dominated by a vocal minority. In fact the complete opposite. Small groups of 2-5 people seemed to regularly form, dissipate, reform etc.

I remember at one point having a local conversation, watching the children play tag on the field, and also being aware of a not-quite conversation that seemed to be happening at a global level. Now that doesn't make sense does it? By global I mean an overriding conversation that was happening across all of the local conversations. My own local conversation was about the cost of petrol, other groups were talking about people at work or something that had happened at the pub. The global conversation was about the kids, who regularly interrupted the adults.

Interestingly the global conversation was ongoing. Each small group continued to have its own conversation and would then pause to join the global conversation for a brief moment, and then resume locally. What was even more interesting was that different groups would pause their local conversation at different times yet still seemed to be aware of the global conversation and would contribute when they needed to.

The ability to be actively involved in two conversations at the same time seems to be something we all take for granted, certainly when I've mentioned this to other people, almost everyone agrees that they are quite comfortable with this type of multi-tasking.

So why was it that some of the people at this picnic seemed to struggle? Let me give you an example, one of the ladies I was chatting to seemed to be incapable of following the global conversation, and worse seemed to want to try and hold my attention. She wasn't alone though, I noticed a couple of other people seeming to be unable to follow both conversations.

Of the three people I observed not being able to follow two conversations, I know that one is on medication for epilepsy, another is known to be having some troubles with his family life, but the third puzzled me. She is a [supposedly] happily married mother and career woman who by all accounts is doing well. Generally a well-balanced individual. Being a counsellor I find another person's mental state to be fascinating.

Now anyone who deals with the human brain and the way it works would rightly suggest there could be any number of reasons for this person's distraction, but it got me thinking about relaxation. You see this picnic was held on a Sunday afternoon, a traditionally relaxed time of the week, it was a social function, and it was very light-hearted. It occurred to me that our ability to communicate is so fundamental to our being and that this ability is affected by so many variables that as individuals we really owe it to ourselves to be able to relax on demand,because without this ability we may inadvertently communicate less effectively. Not a problem at a picnic, but a very different kind of problem when decisions need to be made.

Learn to relax. On demand. You'll enjoy life more and communicate better.

Ronda, Spain, Spanish, Themes, and Everything Else

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