Weekly Training Sessions.

Lesson 6: Keys To Being Understood.

A Warning For The Group; I saw something this morning that I wanted to bring up with you guys today, because it is something which I consider unacceptable and want to warn you about.

This morning one of our members was ingaged in a debate, and found herself in a bit of a pickle with two atheists. She tagged myself and another believer for assistance, and when I arrived I found that the other believer had rebuked her for this, telling her to fight her own battles.

That is completely unacceptable behavior, and I don’t want to see anyone from this group treat a fellow believer, or anyone for that matter, like that. This group is built to provide support, as well and training and encouragement.

When we are having trouble in a discussion, we should seek the help of others. Seeking help is the beginning of wisdom, and an excelent way to learn.

Now in this I am not saying we should badger one another and be super needy, but we should recognize when we need a hand. I also don’t want us to swarm the atheist/s and make them freak out. Keep the numbers fair. Okay, moving on.
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Why is it important to be understood?

The method of trying to be understood is contrary to methods which atheists commonly use against us, which is to confuse us with huge words and elegant speach. Here’s an example from last week;

Atheist; Conservatives are often hard to deal with and your main goal in a debate with them is looking good, however you may achieve that.

Nikki112211; So basically you are just saying to lie to people about what and who you are, and to deceive people.

Atheist: Of course not, I’m just pushing my boundaries in the open communication dialog market place idea expression discourse, to put myself in a less stigmatised position.

Me: Pushing you boundaries = lying.

Open comunnication dialog market place expression discourse = debate.

Less stigmatized position = less tense, or sounding not so bad.

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So you can see that atheists often try to confuse us by making themselves difficult to understand, and coming across as super-smart because of it. Their mission is to seem superior and make us out to be idiots. Ours is the opposite, we go out to make our message simple enough for a toddler to understand, which takes away their reason for not understanding and agreeing. We are also not there to embarrase them.

Making ourselves understood gains us influence, reputation, and respect.

Grammar; This is a very important part of being understood. If you don’t have good grammar, you will be written off as childish, or simply not properly understood.

Punctuation; Having proper puntuation is important for simplifying sentences and adding order to your writing. You want your answers to be as easy to read as possible, or people will give up before they even begin.

Spelling; Also very important, as it is incredibly difficult to pay attention to someone who is constantly misspelling stuff. It also will effect your reputation.

Analogies; Always try to have two or more analogies prepared for concepts you are trying to explain, but try to ensure they are very accurate and cannot be twisted against you. Many arguments are won or lost based on the quality of analogies used. Which is weird because they truly are just analogies, but makes sense because analogies are meant to make your argument understood, so if your analogy cannot be properly understood, neither can your argument.

Rewording; Become a master at rewording your sentances and arguments. Each person thinks a little differently than the next, to make sure you have a reworded argument prepared if the person doesn’t seem to get the first.

Repeating; Repeat your point often, not only so they cannot forget, but also so you do not forget. Repeating your point makes people think about it over and over, and eventually, through rewording and repeating, it may click in their minds.

Definitions; Often in a debate I will use the definition of particular words to ‘win’, or to point out errors in their thinking. For example;

There cannot be multiple gods, because the definition of ‘God’ is ‘Supreme being’, and the definition of ‘Supreme Being’ is ‘one above all else’. There can only be one Supreme Being, one God.

This is also very good for making sure people fully understand you, for another example; The definition of ‘homophobe’ is someone with a dislike or prejudice against homosexual people. So based on this definition, homophobia is a dislike for the people, not the idea, therefore I am not a homophobe.
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Please Note; As some of you are aware from my personal account @TaniaMckenzie , my schedule has been changing to fit changes in my life, and so this past week I’ve spent my devotions trying to figure out how to keep pouring out on wattpad.

Yesterday I nailed down a couple of changes, which I will announce on my personal page as well once I’ve released this chapter, but this is the order of my priorities now;

-God

-Family

-Friends

-My Church

-The Truth Seekers

- ‘Atheism VS Christianity’

- ‘Great Mercy’

I’ll admit that was tough, as I’ve been working on ‘Great Mercy’ for over a year and was hoping to complete it and publish it on Kindle this summer, but now it may take much longer. But God has called me to give The Truth Seekers first priority on Wattpad, so that’s what I am going to do.

He also told me to make a couple changes to the way this is run, so here’s a warning for what to expect next week;

-I am going to begin giving you guys homework with due dates. If you fail to complete the homework more than once every four weeks, without good reason, you will be removed from the group. That means 70% participation is required.

The reason for this is simple;

A: I’m too nice to kick someone off for not participating unless I have a boundary set.

B: This allows me to evaluate the group more effectively.

C: If people want to move up to admin, or other such positions, I will be able to better evaluate their readiness.

So I want to hear your thoughts, and if you forsee some future issues, please let me know so that I can address them. Have a great day!