THE SKILL OF PUNCTUATING

Who would have ever thought of punctuation as a communication skill? Who would have ever thought about taking punctuation marks and using them for framing and reframing? Or for Coaching? Wikipedia defines this subject accordingly:

“Punctuation marks are symbols that indicate the structure and organization of written language, as well as intonation and pauses to be observed when reading aloud.”

NLP Trainer, Fran Burgess quotes a famous line, “A woman without her man is nothing.” Then notes what happens with different punctuation:

“A woman: without her, man is nothing.”

“A woman, without her man, is nothing.”

Oh my! Punctuation can make a big difference. The way you punctuate your messages has an incredible power to entirely change the meaning and emotions of those who receive your message. With punctuation you have the ability to quickly restructure someone’s internal experience. Now in language we punctuate sentences to remove ambiguity and create clarity. We can use it to direct a person’s focus, attention, perception, and meaning-making.