Instrumental Reflective Essay

Being instrumental reflective has more weaknesses than strength. By interviewing three people with different communication styles, I realize the tendency and pattern of my own style. I identify the reflective side as the “real me” because I use it most of the time. It serves as a good listener along normal conversation with friends and family members because conflict seldom happens through this approach. The only weakness for the reflective side is lack of confidence when I communicate at workplace. The instrumental side appears only when there are conflicts and problems that need to be resolved. The above example from Enesha and Kathy clearly explains how I change to instrumental in a sudden.

From my point of view, my communication style serves as a “problem creator” when dealing with others. Instead of finding solution to solve the problem, I always create more problems out of the original problem. Whenever there is an issue, I do negative things like criticizing and blaming to create another problem that might hurt the

In my opinion, the first thing is to develop genuineness. I believe the more I know myself, the easier I can handle and control my emotions. And the key is to recognize what triggers it by increasing self-awareness. The most effective way to develop self-awareness is to ask for comments after having conversation with others. After seeking feedbacks from my interviewees, I realize topics that involve personal value contain a higher chance on pulling the trigger. Therefore, subjects such as religion, politics, culture and race should be avoided through conversation. Also, it is important to predict what I will do or say when I face this kind of situations. Doing such prediction helps myself to understand how I will react, in order to take control of the situation instead of letting my emotion to