This second answer had no more appeal to me than the first one; firstly because I could neither make it with my craft materials, nor could I buy it in the shops and secondly because it seemed equally non-inspirational.

Health ? As a child we take it for granted. As a young adult we start to realize how its absence can have devastating effects in the middle of an important project at work … so we get annoyed when we fall ill…. curse our illness as if it’s  nothing but an unexpected obstacle on our path.

With more and more life experience and a few more serious health crisis’ under our belt be become more respectful towards this secret language of our body.  Those fortunate enough to have become more aware, realize that the body “talks” to us through pain and other bodily symptoms. We begin to listen. This is a breakthrough. We still get our body’s messages wrong from time to time as we are perfecting our communication with each other but we are improving.

Finally, we develop a whole new relationship and we realize this body of mine is on my side. It’s not there to stop me or hold me back from my important projects. It’s there to support me, to keep me going in the long run to provide the right environment for my mind and my ideas to flourish – it’s my friend !

Through a headache it warns me that I am taking on too much today, that I should rest. Through a flu it tells me to drop it all and THINK before I pick up the many pieces again. Maybe a few pieces don’t deserve my attention anymore, maybe I am stressing about things that are not worth it when I take the time to step back and see the big picture.

Life threatening illness can alert us to much more. They shake up your life entirely. They put your life as it used to be to such an abrupt and brutal hold that your head gets knocked against the wall before you can even begin to think again.

Those lucky enough to get through it (and I will ever be grateful to have been one of them and be able to be around for my little daughter) will feel like they start a new life.  Nothing will be like before. What mattered so much before, is a small matter now. Suddenly, things become so much clearer. As if for a moment the clouds disappear and you see clearly into the blue sky: you understand the few things that truly matter to you, and they are so different from what you put most of your energy to before….

Health is now everything. It’s safety. As long as we are healthy, we can think new solutions, create new paths for us and our families and get back on our feet regardless what life throws at us.

Life can take away our job, our house, our car, our little treats and luxuries… but it can’t take away our opinions, our thoughts and ideas, our experiences, capabilities and beliefs.

As long as we are healthy we can use these latter ones to build up the first one’s again.

Health is everything.

It’s not just important.  It’s your safety net.  It’s your friend.

Make it your best friend !

Communication is a key aspect of human life. It is our ability to communicate and our need to communicate that makes us human. If we “think” and “therefore we are”, it would not be a stretch to place discourse and the exchange of ideas with other human beings on equal footing with thinking as one of the corner stones of our existence. On some level it is the very reason for our existence. In a strange twist of word play, to excel at this reason for our existence, you must ultimately depend on Reason itself.

Communicating effectively is not simply a bonus business skill or a neat trick for cocktail parties, it is more like an essential survival skill for every member of the human race. This communication between sentient beings is impossible without the reasoning skills of the human brain. While so much of day-to-day human communication might resort to emotional outbursts and random shouting, reason is an essential element of any communication you want to undertake with some positive outcome in mind. To cultivate your ability to use reason in your communications, you need to master a few virtues:

1. Enlightenment
   To be enlightened is to have an open mind and to think rather than assume, to understand rather than to pass judgement. This allows you to approach an other human being without preconceived notions and to communicate with them on equal footing. Since so much of communication involves either information or persuasion, an enlightened attitude naturally puts the other person(s) in a receptive mood to listen to what you have to say. For communication to be effective, a receptive audience is a basic requirement.
2. Knowledge
   When you are communicating to inform, knowledge is a prerequisite, because what you do not have you cannot give. The same holds true for persuasion but even more so. Not only do you need to know what you are talking about when trying to persuade people to your point-of-view, but the fact that you are knowledgeable builds confidence in the people you are communicating with. Human beings are very finely tuned to subtle hints of tone and body language that give away the fact that someone is ignorant, or doesn’t know what they are saying. Effective communication cannot occur in such circumstances.
3. Courage
   All communication is taking a stand, and all good communication is putting yourself and your beliefs out there in the firing line of opinion. Those are the pressures and consequences we live with. Those who have the courage of their convictions thus have a braver face to show to the targets of their communication. The audience, whether it be one person or an entire stadium of them, favours the brave and those with courage grab the hearts and minds of the listeners. You cannot communicate effectively without the courage of reasoning on your side.

Communication is an invaluable element of human existence and communication that works separates the successful from the unsuccessful in all human endeavour. As long as you have the steady hand of reason guided by the enlightenment of your spirit, the knowledge of your intellect, and the courage in your heart, you are well on the path to effective communication.

This post was guest blogged by Samir Bharadwaj. He is a freelance writer and design generalist who blogs about his ideas, and ideas in general at Samir Bharadwaj dot Com.

Personally, I viewed this as a communication failure on my part. I could have tried harder to really understand my colleague’s viewpoint, actively listened to her, interpreted correctly what she had really been trying to tell me. I did not, I disregarded her viewpoint for my own, insisted on winning the argument and turned the discussion into a tit for tat game, my contest for the sake of my own power, merely exhibiting a weakness in character. I wanted a short-term win and was not willing to listen.

Communication effectively is really about listening first, and really absorbing as well as relaying one’s own message. We jointly ruined a golden opportunity to really connect and create a win-win for both parties.

The issue we argued over is almost irrelevant, as it has been pushed into the background. What really mattered was winning individually at the cost of a joint win. Here the tactical or short term result took over from the strategic long term benefit; and egos determined a non conclusive end. Result, I feel angry, bitter, resentful and incomplete. I blame my colleague and yet know deep down, that I am equally if not more to blame for escalating the discussion into the region of only my view can be the right view.

Lessons learned from today for me include: give in to listening, see both sides of a given viewpoint, value the difference in opinion and look for the positive intention behind, reach the middle ground, the behavior is not the person, remain open-minded, do not judge, aim for the win-win ( it is always achievable). Retain and keep a sense of perspective, keep my sense of humor and above all accept that no one way or opinion is the right one. We all mean well, irrespective of the actions we may take.

Having thought long and hard about the argument, all of the above points are now firmly embedded in my head. I know that win-win is the way ahead. Valuing the difference in opinion is a great learning for all of us. My first action tomorrow, will be to re-connect with my colleague and make sure I thank her for expanding my life experience. Hey ! I have had to think about moving forwards, defuse my pride, plan to listen and re-open the door of communication and connection. I may have had a slightly miserable evening, but the emotional roller coaster has been worth the lessons learned.