Are you listening?

I choose to watch a show called Hot in Cleveland. In watching the show with no sound I was able to see that the show was about four women who lived in the same house. I did not think the relationship between these women was a relationship based off of being relatives. Within the show the four women seemed to be dealing with issues within their personal lives that they would share with each other. Through their nonverbal behavior I detected that one of the women was in a friendly relationship, with a man, but she wished could have been more, another women in the show was an admired someone I thought could have been her boss, the third woman was dressing like a young teen and seemed to always be upset (her face was angry a lot) and the last woman was older I did not think of her a grandmother to the other three but thought that she could have been a friend.

When I watched the show with the sound on I was able to see that the first woman was interested in forming a relationship with a man who happened to be her co-worker. The second woman did in fact admire the man she was talking to but he was not her boss he was a fellow co-worker. The third woman who dressed young was going back to college and was not angry but was frustrated at not being able to fit in with the younger students on campus. And the last woman was indeed not the grandmother but was a friend to all the women in the house. I am still unsure if the relationship between the women was one of relation.

If I would have watched a television show that I already knew it would have been easy to assume that I knew what a particular character was feeling since I would be familiar with that character.

While I was able to pick up much information from their nonverbal behaviors I still needed clarification to what some were feeling. What I have learned from this experience is that knowing what someone feels does not only come from watching their behaviors but also truly listening to what they have to say.