Why is it that you can speak quite easily, and freely, to some people, but not to others? It is all a question of your communication style, or a matter of knowing your approach, so that you can build the necessary bridges for more effective interactions. 

One ideal concept for achieving better communication skills, if ever there's one, is Neuro-Linguistic Programming [NLP]. 

NLP is a scientifically proven, alternative method of 'ordering' your thoughts, attitudes, feelings, behavior and, most importantly, language. It is just as much as responding effectively to other people, as much as understanding and respecting their views, opinions, and needs. Its goal is focused ' to give individuals a host of choices in their repertoire of response. 

Experts believe that NLP teaching is based on a very logical premise: that the unconscious mind a la Jungian psychology is far more powerful than the conscious mind, and that all of us already have, within us, the resources to achieve excellence.

The 'neuro' part of NLP refers to the concept that all behavior results in sensory stimuli ' sight, hearing, taste, smell, touch, and feeling. Which explains why NLP provides us the facility to get in touch with the senses, and be able to 'read' thought processes in others through eye movements, subtle changes in breathing and skin tone, besides preferred language choice. 

What's more, NLP also includes changing internal conflicts, negative thoughts, and behavior patterns, for more positive states. 'Linguistic,' of course, reflects how we all use language to formulate our thoughts ' to communicate to others our opinions, emotions, and needs. 

'Programming' explains how we organize our behavior to produce results.

It goes without saying that what you say, or do, influences the other person. NLP, quite simply, entails an examination of the entire system of feedback, and response ' both behavioral and biological ' occurring in the interactions between a human being and oneself, other human beings, and also the environment. 

Reason? All of us have internal 'feelings,' and a sensory system responsible for processing a set of characteristics about our immediate milieu. According to NLP, these characteristics will be unique to every individual. 

Though practice makes perfect, many of the techniques, used in NLP, may need professional support, or training. However, the fact remains that a few of them ' and, the most important ' could be mastered, subject to one's own requirement/s, over a period of time. 

Experts contend that NLP behavior is not just external, observable behavior, like walking, but also activity in any sphere ' from eye movement to hearing, or internal visualization.

Example: you've just jumped out of the way of a speeding car, seconds before it might have mowed you down. In such an event, you'd probably experience the symptoms of mild clinical shock. When you recount the story later, similar symptoms may recur, because your mind triggers off a physical reaction. However, the way you react to imagined or remembered events can be altered, from a negative to a positive experience, through NLP. All you'd need to do is dwell on all the things that went wrong ' and, allow the 'self-fulfilling prophecy syndrome' [negative image/s] to come into action. 

You'd, perhaps, wait for the same bad things to happen another time. Not that they won't happen. But, if only you replace 'bad' memories, with positive feelings/patterns, the self-fulfilling prophecy will work for ' instead of against ' you. The outcome will, thereafter, be all the things you wanted them to be.

That NLP is a complex theory based on the fact that each one of us is unique, yet composed of similar physiological, biological, emotional, and spiritual, parts that are intrinsically linked, is pass'. In actual terms, it captures, as it were, the language aspect, style, usage of unspecified nouns, verbs, comparisons, judgments, generalizations, presuppositions, cause and effect, not to speak of intuition to 'read' a person ' to the extent possible. 

All you'd need to do is apply certain pointers, as cited elsewhere ' to 'anchor' a positive feeling, such as confidence, by mentally 'living' your desired state. You could use touch, press finger and thumb together, where the feeling is most intense ' to fire the 'anchor.' The feeling of self-belief will recur! 

To paraphrase Pythagoras: 'Choose always the way that seems the best, however rough it maybe, custom will soon render it easy and agreeable.'