Hi. This is my first entry in Journaly, and I thought it would be a good idea to start off (writing my first entry) with this theme.

What do you think makes a good conversationalist? There are tons of articles and books telling you how to be a good, effective, and successful communicator.

Are you personally interested in this topic or do you already have a decent level of confidence that you are a good communicator?

I always wonder how I can be a better conversationalist who can make everyone around me feel comfortable while having a good conversation. By "good conversation" I mean not only daily life topics but also a wide range of deep themes, naturally keeping the conversation going without forcing myself or other people to wonder (or; fish for something to say) what to say next. I myself am not a great conversationalist, unfortunately. It's hard to admit, but it's true. I often draw a blank when I'm asked a question, and I always feel pressured to ask something in return only to fail to find anything to say.

I believe personality plays a huge role, too. My personality is rather introverted. I prefer calm, quiet, sparsely-populated circumstance rather than a vibrant, noisy, and busy setting/area with a lot of things going on at the same time. However, when you get older and want to function in society at a okay level, you need to be a good conversationalist. I found myself having a difficult time building nice relationships with people because of my habit of falling silent and not asking many questions. So, I'm currently working on improving this part of myself. As a part of this self-improvement project, I thought it would be a good idea to write anything that comes in my mind and publish (post) it, to seek opinions and comments from other people while (hopefully) improving my proficiency of English and Spanish at the same time. Two birds with one stone, right?

Yesterday, I was talking with someone about this issue. Then I realised that some people are naturally better at spontaneously expressing their thoughts even if their thoughts are not necessarily organised. The person I was talking to yesterday came up with a great metaphor of this difference between other people and me. By the way, we were having a very honest conversation, so none of their comments were intended as criticism towards me. I genuinely appreciate their honest opinions, and it was a great time for me as well to try and explain what was going on in my head. They said, "It's as if you respond to a conversation by telling the 'title' of a chapter while other people tell a 'chapter' itself." I thought this example paints the situation perfectly. I almost instantly got what they meant. For example, if I was asked "what did you do today?", my shortest answer would be "I organised my bookshelf" while other people might respond to the same question by describing all the details about what they felt or what they found when they were organising their own bookshelves. I realised, then, that I have this habit of answering the question with the bare minimum of information. That's why, it totally makes sense why people tend to feel anxious and start having second thoughts like, "Did she get tired of talking with me?" or "Is she not interested in having a conversation at all?"

This led me to decide to set this goal of "becoming a better conversationalist" at the top of the list of things that I want to do/achieve. I know the end of the year is already approaching, but it's never too soon or too late to start something, right? I always try to start actually working on it as soon as possible so that I won't lose motivation. So here I am, trying to describe my mundane life both in English and Spanish, hoping this project makes me into a better person while learning languages :)