A conflict with my mom

For some strange reason, I can't really recall any significant interpersonal conflicts except those with my mom. Most of the time, we have a great loving relationship with one another, but when we disagree, we tend to be pretty stubborn.

The memorable incident occurred when I was 12. It was a sunday morning and I was lazing around on my bed. My mom wanted me to get up, but I had no intention of doing so. At that time, Chinese New Year was around the corner, and my mom had painstakingly cut out articles discussing my zodiac sign - the bull. She urged me to get up and take a look at her handiwork. However, I didn't see what the urgency was and simply wailed, "I want to sleep!".

My mom then got very upset and started wailing and crying. My dad tried to console her by saying, "kids these days are different. You can't expect them to be so obedient." Then he asked me to apologise.

At that time, I was just sitting up on my bed but staring indignantly at the floor. I hadn't done anything wrong, so why should I apologise? So I just got up and went off to wash up, but my mood was soured.

What would you have done if you were in my shoes?

why effective communication skills are important for I. I mean me.

Last semester I read a module which I enjoyed tremendously, mainly because the teacher was so great. Unlike other teachers, his 1st priority was to help us to learn, and thus the way he taught was very different. Towards the end of the sem, some of us went to his office for consultation, and after clearing our questions, he went on to talk about more general stuff. Then he turned to face me and praised me (although I can't remember his exact words), but said that there was 1 thing I needed to work on: communication.

Over the years, I inevitably had to interact with my fellow humans and there were many occasions when I thought I had a brilliant idea, but somehow I wasn't able to convince people to adopt it. Or maybe I was teaching someone a difficult concept, say for physics tuition, and I would become tongue-tied trying to explain it clearly. And of course, I knew I wasn't the most eloquent of speakers.

Yet, it was only when my favourite teacher gave me his advice did it really strike me how important good communication skills would be to help smoothen my future path. I have so many ideas to share, passion for so many causes, and want to help people in so many ways, but I need to communicate with people to succeed. Therefore in this course, I hope I will be able to pick up the necessary communication skills to do all of these much better.