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You are now ready to begin your first step in an exciting and practical learning process. This course will provide you with effective tools to use in your life.

This course is laid out in a step-by-step manner, with a sequence of study and exercises for you to do. And since the entire course is self-contained from within your personal logon, you can simply log in at any time to progress through your assignments to full completion.

Important Note

In doing this course, be very certain you never go past a word you do not fully understand. The only reason a person gives up a study or becomes confused or unable to learn is because he has gone past a word he did not understand. More

Important Note

In doing this course, be very certain you never go past a word you do not fully understand. The only reason a person gives up a study or becomes confused or unable to learn is because he has gone past a word he did not understand.

The confusion or inability to understand or learn comes AFTER a word you did not know the meaning of. It might not only be the new and unusual words that you did not understand.

One of the most important facts in the whole subject of study is that you must never go past a word that you do not understand.

In every subject that you took up and then left incomplete, you will find that there were words that you read but you did not know what they meant.

So while doing this course be very, very certain you never go past a word you do not fully understand.

If what you are studying becomes confusing or you can’t seem to understand it, there will be a WORD just earlier that you have not understood.

Don’t go any further, but go back to BEFORE you got into trouble and find the word you did not fully understand. Wherever you see a word that is underlined, you can click on it and it will immediately give you the meaning of that word.

As you go through the course, you can also click on the menu at the top of each course page where it says “Glossary” (which is a list of words and what they mean) and it will take you to a list of words used in the course and give you the meaning of each.

If you cannot find the word you are looking for listed in the glossary, get a simple dictionary and look up its meaning there.

Welcome to the Communication Online Course

Communication is one of the most important parts of life.

To understand anyone or to find out about anything around you, you have to be able to communicate.

Communication is one activity in life that everyone shares. It is one of the most important parts of understanding. And if you want to improve your understanding, be more successful, be a happier person and help make others around you happier, you need to communicate well.

Just as you can improve your understanding by communicating, you can improve your communication by understanding what communication is and how you can better your ability to communicate with others.

L. Ron Hubbard deeply explored the subject of communication and made important discoveries that he recorded in his lectures, books and writings. He developed highly successful ways to help people understand the parts of communication and learn how to improve their ability to communicate with others. His discoveries on just this one subject—communication—are used daily by millions all over the world with tremendous success.

In this chapter, you will learn what good communication is and how to recognize bad communication. You will learn what the parts of communication are and how to use them in communicating with others.

Understanding the parts of communication and learning how to use them will give you valuable tools you can use forever.

As L. Ron Hubbard once wrote, a man is as alive as he can communicate.

Important Note

In doing this course, be very certain you never go past a word you do not fully understand. The only reason a person gives up a study or becomes confused or unable to learn is because he has gone past a word he did not understand. More

1.‎1 READ THE ARTICLE

What Is Communication?

How do you talk to someone so the other person will listen and understand? How do you listen to someone else so they know you are interested and are following what they say? And, when you say something, how do you know if you have been heard and understood?

These are all points about communication that have never before been carefully looked into and explained.

People have known that communication is an important part of life, but until now no one has ever been able to successfully tell anyone how to communicate.

Before Scientology, the subject of communication had not been given its correct importance or put into a course that could be studied to get the full results—an ability to communicate well. Many books and articles that were written about communication did not look at the subject as a vital or necessary part of life or show how it is used in relationships with others. They talked about communication as if it was something done by a machine. But all life depends on knowing and understanding the basics, the most important and beginning parts of communication.

To be able to really communicate with anyone and do so very well, you must understand the subject fully.

In Scientology, the exact meaning of communication has been worked out, tested and proven for more than half a century. It has led to a much deeper understanding of life itself.

There is a very simple way of saying what communication means: communication is the shift (or movement) of a particle from one part of space to another part of space. A particle is the thing being communicated. It can be an object, a written message, a spoken word or an idea.

For example, if you took a baseball and threw it to someone to catch, that would be a communication from you to the other person. If you said “hello” to someone, that too would be a communication, exactly following the meaning above. If someone sent you an e-mail, that would also be a communication.

Taking this simple statement about communication one step further, there is a full and exact formula (a particular method or procedure of doing or being successful in something) of communication that was carefully worked out and recorded by L. Ron Hubbard. It is most important that you know and understand the Communication Formula so you can use it with success.

To do so, first look over the meaning of the following words so you get a full and clear understanding of how they are used in the formula given below.

Cause is the point from which something happens or starts. If you say something to another person, you are being cause.

Distance is the space that exists between two points. For example, the distance between two people might be a few feet. The distance between two towns could be hundreds of miles.

Effect is the point that receives something. If you say something to another person, you are being cause and the other person is being effect. If the other person then says something to you, he is being cause and you are the effect point.

Intention is an idea that you are going to do something. For example, if you have a strong intention to become an artist, that is what results in you becoming one. In any communication, you must have an intention to send a message to someone to make it happen.

Attention is being aware of something, looking at or noticing. If you call somebody by his name, it is usually to get his attention. To communicate to another successfully, you need to get his attention.

Duplication is the action of repeating or making a copy of something. If you talk to a man and tell him about a cat and he gets the idea you are talking about a dog, that is not duplication. If he understands you are talking about a cat and gets that idea, he has a duplication of what you are saying. In any communication, it is important that the other person gets a duplication of what you are saying.

Understanding is the power or ability to understand, which means to have a clear and correct idea or a full and exact knowledge of what something means. You must bring about an understanding of what you are saying whenever you communicate.

The Communication Formula is cause, distance, effect, with intention, attention and duplication with understanding.

This is exactly what needs to happen in any communication for it to be successful.

Let us take an example of this formula in a casual conversation between two people. A man looks at the beautiful day and decides to tell his wife, Mabel, that he thinks it is a great day.

He starts the communication (he is being cause) and speaks loudly enough for the message to travel from his mouth to the ears of Mabel, who sits next to him (distance).

He really wants to let Mabel know that he thinks it is a great day (intention). He starts the communication by saying Mabel’s name to get her attention (“Wow, Mabel … ”).

He then describes the scene he sees so she gets a duplication of what he sees and the way he feels (“What a beautiful day. Just look at that sunrise. It is gorgeous!”).

Mabel receives the communication, looks at the sunrise and gets an understanding of what is being communicated.

The Communication Formula opens the door to understanding the whole subject.

By breaking down communication into its exact parts, you can see how each part fits together and can more clearly understand the whole subject. And with the increased understanding, you can improve any part of the formula and use it to improve your communication with others.

NOTE: In order to continue, you must complete all previous steps in this course. Your last incomplete step is
NOTE: You had several answers that were incorrect. In order to continue, you should re-read the article and then test your understanding again.