Valerie Rivera

Comm 2110
Final Report on my Personal Change Report
December 11, 2015
Submitted to Professor Billington
This is a final report on how attempted methods of my journal entries and personal change report
has affected my interpersonal communication with friends family and total strangers. I really
wanted to change the biggest problem what I titled myself of having while reading the material
for this call. Which is I am/was an ambush listener, I may look as if I am being an active
listener but my feedback is usually criticism (Beebe, p. 128) instead of feedback that is about
what the speaker had shared. With the help of the text I now find that I am not criticizing my
speaker so much as I did before I started this class, I was a horrible bad ambush listener. I used to
look at people by their personal appearance which supposedly tells me if they are seen as reliable
person in society instead of hearing what the speaker has to say. What helped me realized I was
doing this and what helped me not was that I used methods that the text provides to help me
improve to be more of an effective listener.

Unwanted Communication Patterns

When I am being a listener I easily get distracted by details of individuals. This usually happens
if I dont know them well enough or at all. Or if I just for some reason dont like you I will
ambush you. It can easily be seen that I know that I will have a hard time with correcting my
communication problem but I need to fix it because I know that its affecting my communication
process. I would like to just be able to absorb messages from any stranger and would like to
interpret the whole message not just parts of it. Also not to be judgmental, in general. I have
always been like this growing up, I talked back a lot as a child; even though I was taught to
respect others.
Examples:
At my old job we had mandatory staff meetings. At that job we dressed very
unprofessional. Some even looked like they just rolled out of bed and came to work. I
personally would make sure that I was presentable before I went in that my hair and teeth
were brushed and my face washed if I was running late one morning. Anyways the head
lead had to give a presentation on the parts and functions of the brain. I already knew all
of that from Psychology senior year. And again this was not that first time someone gave
the exact same presentation for a meeting. But the whole time she was giving it all I was
doing was listening with my eyes. I looked at what she was wearing and that her hair was
a mess (its really curly)so imagine how that looks if you roll out of bed. At the end of the
presentation we were given a quiz. I passed only knowing that I knew the information
before. But if I wasnt familiar with it I would have failed. Because I was so caught up in
how i felt that she should not be giving this information from us because of the way she

look and also that she was just reading off the slides that I didnt have to listen to her.
Which totally wrong to act as a listener.
Another example of my flaw of being an ambush listener was when my husband
and I were spending sometime with my husbands cousin. Now his guy is his favorite
cousin but the way he look is like the word trouble. He has a nose ring (not just a stud
one) and hes ears are pierced and he's 24 and still living with mom and dad (not going to
school) also he cant keep a job. So I think that we can say that out of the two my
husband is the better one. (Well he does it himself I just make sure he stays that way.) So
when he goes out with us its hard for me to communicate with him. I feel that none of
the conversations are intelligent. Because when ever he says anything all I look at is his
piercings and think this guy has no clue what is going on in the world.
I don't care to listen to one word he says because he looks stupid and grows and also all
that other stuff that, he cant keep a job and that he still live as home. But really I need to
pick a topic to talk about and see where it will go, if there is anything up in that head. See
bad ambush listener.
I know that it is wrong to do what I do within these examples. Like I said I used to be really bad,
like out of control before this calls and I actually saw that I had a problem with listening. The
first example I wasnt getting all the information I needed to retain in my memory. Its good to
listen to reviews of information that you already know and I missed out on it because I was too
focused on the speaker and not the words. The second example just makes me sound like Im the
meanest person ever. I act as if I cant even look at the guy without thinking something rude. If I
had taken this class before and known that I had real word titling problems I would not have
messed up relationships for myself and also restrict myself from learning.

Strategies:
I have learned to use the method of listening and responding to help me be more of an effective
communicator. I needed to respect my speakers in what they were saying not what they looked
like or if they were qualified to say what they were saying.
1. The book says that listening a very complex process and for me to reach my long
term goal I have to go through the first method of selecting, one sound from all the sound
that seem to be trying to compete for my internal attention. (Beebe, p. 121) I was able to
focus on my speaker without any distractions. I felt that I was able to use the method of
selecting. I need to be attentive of the sound that is coming out for the speaker and the
personal physical appearance of the speaker. This grabs my attention of only addressing
my eyes to the speaker's mouth and eyes to get that non-verbal message as well. I am able
to select the sound of the speaker and listen and hear what is being said so then I can
decode the message. I know that to overcome my listening barrier I need to focus on the
message, not the messenger (Beebe, p. 130).

2. The second is attending to the message. That I am able to listen to what is being
said and that I am able to send feedback in return to show that I was being attentive when
the speaker was listening. I can now see that I am capable of attending any one
interaction. (Beebe, p. 121) Also I will the the strategies of Stop, Look, and Listen they
will make me a professional listener (Beebe, p. 131). I will try to put my own thoughts
aside and make that topic as important to myself as it is to them. I will avoid my selftalk, so I can find myself giving my undivided attention to the speaker present. I will not
only just be there physically there but mentally as well(Beebe, p. 131)
Just with those two strategies the rest will fall in line. Wit being able to select the sound and
attend to it I will be able to understand it, know the meaning. So then I will able able to
remember the meaning and respond to the whole communication process because I understand
and remember it. Because thats what ist all about, interpersonal communication is the
transactive; it involves both talking and responding.(Beebe, p. 122)

Constraints:
I cant say that I have been able to use the strategies to every single conversation that I have. I
still choose to look at the people I feel comfortable getting information from. Like when I ask for
help at the mall or something I look for the clean cut people, someone who reflects me. This is
good and bad because I am being judgmental and not giving everyone a chance to prove them
self.
Another problem I ran into was that I would be so into listening and attending to what the
speaker is saying that I would realize that what is being said is false information so then I would
stop listening and not want to listen because what it being said I can't use it. Instead of correcting
them (responding), helping them know that they should go back and look over the information
and see if it is really a reliable source.

Implementation:
When I read in the book about how people ambush their speakers and are not able to be an
effective communicator in my relationships. I realized that was what I was and that I was one for
so long and that I didnt want to be one anymore because it was holding me back from learning
information and building relationships. Almost everyday I am able to practice these strategies.
The main goal of all this was for me to gain a better relationship with my husbands family
members. With all of the ones I dont like because of their slacking appearance. I have not been
able to succeed in this because its really hard when youre not the only one in the family who
doesnt like their appearance. I just need to not care about what others think about them and for
myself I need to be open minded and start a clean slate for them. And approach them with the
methods that will help me overcome my ambush listening. I liked working with with
communication pattern because all the methods seem to fall in place when you do the first to
correctly.

With my other relationships I was able to use the methods and see result. Such as with my work
place, my husband, and family. At work I saw able to strengthen my co-worker relationship. By
selecting the speaker's voice and then attending to it. I loved that I recognized that I was an
ambush listener because at my work like I said they are very unprofessional with their personal
appearance and with these methods it helped me a great deal because I was not remembering
those important messages my speaker was saying. Now I am able to select the speaking voice
and the non-verbal facial expressions.(Beebe, p. 121-122)
I also love that know I am not judging everyone who speaks to me. I see that I used to be on
guard for some reason. That I didnt want to listen to anyone that I didnt feel comfortable to
trust. I just stopped judging people, I decided I would judge people after I got to know them a
little bit. So with the help with the strategies I have learned that I should be open minded and just
think that I want to be friends with everyone and that I should at least find one thing in common
and try to build new common interests together when I am trying to get that trust to listen to
them and not listen with my eyes by what they look like. Because I know that I have miss out on
important information on things that could have helped me in my life skills and with the way I
work and interact with others.

Results:
My family, I asked them if they recognized a difference in the way I communicate with people
and them and they said now that you mention it that they did. They said that I dont come off so
rude to people in my calm manner which it made my rudeness seem even more rude. My friend
at work said that I was able to perform tasks better when she gave instructions on how to do
things.
My husband, we have been arguing less because I have been paying attention and making sure
that he pays attention so then we are both loving the way we are attending to each other and
remembering what the other had to say and not having to waste time on asking the other what
they said and making sure that things are getting done and correctly done.
I will tell you that the best feeling it learning how to be an effective communicator and that you
show people that you can change and make stronger and better relationships. Then because you
are learning to grow in a progressive way you get to share what you have learned when people
notice that you are changing and that they want to change with you so both will be successful
together because they are working together to make a relationship meaningful and that you know
that it is worth working for and that when you both get old you will be happy with what you
worked for.

Recommendation:
As anyone can see I will continue to work toward being an effective communicator and hope that
everyone else wants to work with you. I always say that there is always room for improvement
and you should want to look at yourself and want to fix yourself to make yourself feel better and
want others to be around you. Because you make them care what they have to say is important

and not that you dont like them. Thats an ugly feeling when someone doesn't like you and they
dont even know you and dont know why they dont like you. Everyone should at least get to
know everyone before they think they are not qualified to be saying what they are saying.
I am glad that people did see results in me that I was able to recognize what was wrong with me
and to admit that there was something wrong with the way I think and how I interact with others
and that I am working for improving myself. I dont want to be an ambush listener. I want people
to think that I give everyone a chance to show me what they are all about by the way they speak
to me and what they talk to me about. I am very grateful for this class, that term ambush listener
has changed my life a great deal in this short time and I know that since I am aware of it and how
to fix it that I will overcome it one day.

Works Cited
Beebe, Beebe, & Redmond. (2015). Interpersonal Communication: Relating to Others. Boston:
Pearson