LISTENING

Information is very important to every one of us. If you want to go into a business, you need information. Also, if you want to choose a school, you need information. Any body who wants to succeed in life must seek information. It can be obtained via the internet (google, ask me), newspaper, when communicating with some one, etc.
Communication and information go together. You can't talk about communication without talking about information. Communication is said to be complete when the intended party understands the information being communicated. People communicate via sign language, words, dressing, singing, etc. However, most times people end up not understanding what is being communicated because they do not understand the language, gesture, being used to communicate information. Another barrier to communication and information is LISTENING. Most times people don't listen when information is being communicated even when they are paying serious attention because their mind is some where else or occupied with other things.
James 1:19 says, (19 Understand this, my dear brothers and sisters: You must all be quick to listen, slow to speak, and slow to get angry). Many of us have had problems in our offices, business, marriages, career, etc because we don't listen. We speak faster than we listen. One major problem in marriages and relationships is communication because people don't listen and this results in misinterpreting ourselves, fighting and quarrelling. If we listen more than we speak, issues we have in life will be reduced.
Also, when information is past from one person to another, it becomes distorted by the time it gets to the seventh or ninth person. It is either the message is not communcated properly from one person to the other or the other person is not listening. My sister in law told me that she went for an official training recently and the resource person whispered something to the first person on a row and asked that person to relay it the next person and he to the next person until it gets to the last person on the row. By the time the information got to the last person on the row, the message had been distorted. It was either the persons didn't listen to the message being communicated or the resource person communicated wrong information, or they did not understand the message. Please, we need to take this seriously by developing listening skills if we want to become better persons than what we are today. Wilson Ileogben.