I've taken to building style elements for different purposes, just sharing some thoughts I have on these things. Mostly because I can :)
Most of you will find some elements of this interesting, informative or entertaining. I like words. I play with them, build with them, think with them, and enjoy building skills that employ them!
Title updated, based on this post, and because many of my titles suck!
I suppose there is meta in this, but there shouldn't be much. Truth is, I'm hoping to just explore some mechanics I see in play, and get feedback, or resonance from others on it, just because I find this kind of thing very interesting.
Take yourself out of it
When discussion tends to be flammable, like politics and religion generally are, the fuel for the flames happens when somebody is made the subject. Being made the subject transforms what is a rational discussion, or an emotional one, into one that directly impacts the participant. This generally chills speech, and or fuels meta.
One core way to avoid being made the subject is to express that idea without the words, "I, me, we, you, etc..." The word "one" helps with this, being objective, if dry and cold. The best way is to re-factor your idea into a story, or just detail it in general words.
eg: Obama betrayed us, by not passing the legislation. vs The cost of telling us "no" was lower than it was for the party that got told "yes".
The first example is strongly emotional. Perfectly valid for the person expressing the emotion, but toxic in that they automatically make themselves the subject. Most people will differentiate these things, see the underlying point, namely Obama needs to step up somehow, and continue on, potentially validating, or identifying with the emotion to keep things sane and productive. Some people won't, and that's where the toxicity comes from.
Value
There are two kinds of value; namely, the value of the discussion at hand, and the value judgments it may contain. There are very few absolute truths known to us, leaving nearly everything else a value judgment, or statement of observable fact.
When we say something is "good" or "best", we generally devalue the discussion, and our contribution to it, in that these things are a challenge, and not provable. An alternative to good, or best, is "solid". Solid, by way of example, reinforces the idea as being defensible, and communicates your acceptance of it, in a non-challenging way. These are subjective things, and when there is a very significant imbalance on the perception of these things, the discussion will focus on that, not the matter at hand, which brings me to...
The overall value of the discussion! There are many twists to this, a few of which I'll cover here.
One is productive. Are all parties getting something from the discussion that isn't self-serving or masturbatory? We all enjoy the ego stroke, or smack down, and we all need some validation, identification, and other human, "You are not alone, and are worthy" kinds of things as well. So it's not all bad! The key here is to watch for times when the discussion contributes more to the ego, than it does insight. In general, the context guides this. If somebody is crying for help, they really need to get it in some fashion, or the discussion isn't productive. If somebody posts up an idea, theory, or insight, the value comes from real feedback, additional insight, or synergy between the parties involved.
It's often powerful to end a discussion by simply saying it lacks the value worth continuing on. This takes most of you and them out of it, leaving all parties an out that's not flammable.
The other flip side is adding value. Passing along complex thoughts, or providing key bits of info, etc... all have value, as does thinking objectively, or in a challenging way, but being honest about that. Playing the devils advocate, for example, can be of high value, but only if that's made clear, the earlier the better. Adding your context in this way is generally of high value, because it reinforces the matter at hand, naturally keeping people out of the subject of discussion, where possible, and practical to do so.
Finally, some people will tend to phrase things in such a way that simple agreement expands on some expectation that isn't appropriate, or that is clearly agenda based. This is not always nefarious. Sometimes that's just aggression, and part of the sport! No worries. In any case, bad intent or not, if you feel the need to avoid this particular construct, simply express that you find the commentary to be valuable, or "considerable food for thought", or resonant. None of these things will advance their agenda in a concrete way, while at the same time, you can indicate there is common ground. That's potent in hostile situations where every attempt is made to use the conversation to sell something, or force a commit, or just break other people down.
Labels
Labels are slippery things. Truth is, working hard to eliminate the labels from your speech is time very well spent. Here's why:
When you use a label, you generally act as a tool for those of greater means currently manipulating the label, while also struggling to convey what it is you think is valuable to the discussion! This results in a loss of efficiency, robustness, and clarity. Your speech ends up low-fidelity, in other words.
Now, labels are powerful too, because they can convey complex things in a small amount of communication. The best balance here is to avoid them, for the net overall conversational gain. When their use is warranted, work hard to use them in a self-explanatory context, such that you are packing the core elements of the definition that reinforce your point into the message. I picture this mentally as "outs". An easy way to do this closing of the "outs", is to quickly imagine what the mound of sound, or your good right-leaning neighbor would say, using that to tighten up the speech. You anticipate, in other words, putting the burden on them to do some mental work to check that.
This subtle bit of effort is really, really potent, when combined with the other things here.
Eliminating labels will take you some considerable time. I suggest working on them one at a time, omitting them from the majority of your speech, compensating with better language over time. Each one removed makes this process easier as time goes on, because you will develop skill in construction that makes this possible.
Eventually, you will reach a label that is dear to you. You have defined part of who you are with this label. What to do? Don't give that one up, rather strengthen it, using it in conversation in positive and reinforcing ways, so that it is difficult for others to leverage that label, leaving your communication strong, clean, clear.
One alternative to this is to spend some time breaking down who you are, sans the labels. If you cannot express what you believe with ordinary words, not labels, you don't really know what you believe. Work on a few of these, and I assure you the exercise will be rewarding.
Logical / Flow constructs
I'm including this one because getting these things right can improve clarity considerably. The only thing more potent is work spent on common, well defined words. This doesn't mean big words, just very useful, precise and well accepted ones. Sometimes, complex ideas work like computer code does. One needs to find the elements of discussion, relate them, using the logic, and have it flow to complete the idea. A lot of things in this world follow basic relationships. Communicating them clearly brings resonance to your words. People can connect and relate your ideas to others they find to resonate, or to be true, or worthy.
It's often worth a bit of time to sort out the cases and express them well. When people fail in this, like when an obvious case is missed, it's no crime, but it does devalue the discussion, with the potential to diminish the impact. Where a case is incomplete, or slippery, use a story to communicate the idea instead. People like stories, and have a built in capacity to find the resonate elements, and ignore the non-resonant ones. This can have an excellent impact on the perception of common ground, reinforcing communication that may occur in the future.
I will, on occasion, break these down in long form for very precise and technically authoritative communication, or for lists and or cases where there is a clear response indicated for each member of the case:
if,
we are to complain about Obama and the product of his efforts on the state of things
,then
we must also bitch about the lack of civic commitment and involvement seen in the average American
; otherwise,
we fail in our attempts to realize solid solutions to ugly problems
, namely:
a dramatic increase in overall cost and risk exposure seen by ordinary Americans,
social conflicts, due to the last administration validating ugly character issues: bigotry, racism, theocracy, corporatism,
escalating debt, a product of diminished domestic production through very successful outsourcing efforts,
all of which are clear products of corporate influence in politics.
Each of those could have seen a significant expansion. The point here is not to show off long form as a means to an end, but as a useful tool for developing much more complex and articulate text. I have often been fascinated with how very complex ideas can generally be expressed as one sentence. A look at some of our core founding documents shows this form, and I appreciate it on both a technical level, and an emotional one. The technical is all about breaking things down to core ideas, connecting them together so they form a body of expression that actually operates as it should in the mind of the reader. The emotional one is all about admiring when this is done, because there is often a measure of skill and effort required that's noteworthy, that's all.
Remember the elements
Weyland went to the store today and was pissed off at the price increase of milk.
The elements are:
There is Weyland
There is a store
Weyland went to the store today.
There is milk, and it has a cost.
That cost is more than the expected cost.
Weyland is pissed at the cost of milk.
Etc...
When you are writing, it's often handy to break things into the elements. Write it, then do this, then remove words from what is written, or add words, until the elements together express what you have to say with a lot of clarity, and in a way that constrains those "outs". Break speech down to elements that has a lot of labels in it, for a great example of how ugly they really are in this way. :)
This works well for reading too. You can break down the elements, then address those with a very high degree of clarity, sorting out the others speech, so that you can present your return in a structured, easy to consume and very resonant way. I've found doing this to be very helpful in general, and very helpful in delicate, or ugly situations.
Less is often more
I put this one off because I was not sure what I wanted to say. I got there though, and I'll end the diary on this one. Clearly, I've some ongoing lessons to learn here, but I'll share what I know, and keep working on brevity.
Conversations are different from reports. A dry, rational, 'just the facts please' communication generally is expected in professional situations. Most people, when conversing in the way we do, tend to uphold that value because it carries some authority.
There is emotional authority, authority of person or character, and intellectual authority. Conversational speech, or writing, can hit home on all of these. When doing advocacy, there is no harm in having more of these hit home. The goal is impact, commit, action. That generally needs to work on all levels, not just pure logic.
Context is the key here. If it's confrontational, reverting to fewer, well connected words, with few outs, really works to diffuse toxic elements of the conversation. If it's complex, or technical, brevity is good too.
And reading takes time!
Our core metric for wealth is time. When we have a lot of it, we are wealthy. When we have little of it, we are poor. If a text is longer, it generally needs to have real, material value, or be entertaining, or it will be considered in a negative light by most readers.
Realize a high value with a look at the context, and where the potential for value exists, then adjust style according to the dynamics of the conversation in play.
Anyone else have nuggets to share? Maybe you want to take aim and shoot these down? I'm around for a while programming this evening.