| There is a concept called Johari Window in Psychology. It is a cognitive psychological tool created by two American psychologists Joseph Luft and Harry Ingham, used to help people better understand their interpersonal communication and relationships. The Johari Window has four regions divided into who know about the person; whether the information is known or unknown by the person, and whether the information is known or unknown to others in the group. Its first perspective is called Open Area, what is known by the person about himself/herself and is also known to others. The second perspective is called Hidden Area, what the person knows about himself/herself that others do not know. The third one is called Blind Area, what is unknown by the person about himself/herself but which others know. The last one is called Unknown Area, what is unknown by the person about him/herself and is also unknown to others. Every human being has these four perspectives in his/her mind, but the size of the perspective each person has is slightly different from individual to individual. There are some people who have big open area while others have the hidden area or the blind area than the other perspectives. What is clear is the size of the open area depends on the intimacy level in human relationships. The open area each person has between closest relationships is bigger than that of not intimate relationship. Consequently, the relationship has to have the biggest size of the open area is among family members, because it is in our family that we undoubtedly build and establish the strongest and closest relationships. Well, in order to increase the size of the open area, the hidden area or the blind area should relatively decrease. To mention, the hidden area can be reduced only through self-disclosure, actively opening one¡¯s self to others, while the reduction of the blind area is normally achieved through the process of asking for and then receiving feedback. It needs three essential drivers to stimulate these two behaviors to increase the open area, self-disclosure and feedback; The first driver is proximity, referring to closeness physically as well as in distance. Some adages our elders have been talking about often deal with the notion of proximity. ¡®Do not use the different room even after domestic skirmishes¡¯, ¡®You are always supposed to sleep at home, even if you can have a meal out of the home¡¯, ¡®You can manage to live in a small house, but can¡¯t live at home filled with people who have narrow-minded¡¯. The second one is familiarity referring mainly to frequency of meeting. It implies that frequent contacts would increase the odds of self-disclosure or feedback. A complaint we usually make to people we haven¡¯t seen much, saying ¡®Hello. Let¡¯s meet more often. I haven¡¯t seen nothing of you!¡¯ is a growing due to lack of familiarity. A famous saying, ¡®out of sight, out of mind¡¯ rooted from the lack of this familiarity also. Finally, the third one is similarity, which means common subjects to be shared in having conversations or relationships such as goal, problems, matter of interest, situations involved, etc. When there are common factors among other people in relationship, for instance what they want and what they crave for is shared in common, self-disclosure and feedback would increase inactively. These three drivers that increase the open area can not be achieved by one or two cases involving one or two limited methods, but rather need constant and continuous efforts. Well, how could we do this? One of the best ways to increase the open area considering the three factors mentioned above is to regularly eat out together with family in a place that is preferred by all family members. In general, the places where families usually eat out are near their home or at well-known restaurants. These practices can be effective to enhance the proximity or familiarity to some points, but don¡¯t improve the similarity due to not enough common subjects, with which family members can expand in their communication. Now, let¡¯s change the practices for dinning out with family members attending, have it at the places my family members hang out mostly; where my husband is working around, where my wife spends almost all day long and where my son/daughter flocks together with his/her friends mostly. Through this newly suggested dinning out at the place my family members spent most of their time a day, we can understand what kind of environment my family members are exposed to. Eating out at a restaurant situated at where my son/daughter hangs around this month can give us a chance to experience what my son/daughter has experienced, and feel what he/she has felt while in such environment. Next month we get together to have a meal at a restaurant in the area my wife stays most of her time, through which we can get to know where and why my wife spends her time most. The following month all family members go to a restaurant near my husband¡¯s workplace, and have a chance to see which restaurants, pubs, cafes my husband goes to frequently and understand its surroundings my husband has to stay in during most of his time everyday. Eating out intends to give my family opportunities to meet each other on a regular basis(familiarity), to narrow distance among us(proximity) and to increase the common subject about which we talk more(Similarity). Based on the true thesis that a setting is the basic element of storytelling, we make more settings for storytelling on my family members through this newly suggested eating out. This practice can not activate self-disclosure and feedback on that day, but also makes stories on families richer with setting all family members knew very well by experiencing together at their bases. Wife¡¯s concern about her husband will diminish with her understanding on the environment where her husband goes into frequently and the kinds of environment he is exposed to. Husband can understand his wife¡¯s disposition more with knowledge on where his wife spends most of time a day. Parents can give substantial advice to their son/daughter with their fully understanding on places where their son/daughter flocks together with his/her friends mostly. In addition, family member who has this get-together at his/her base tends to disclose himself/herself more than any other times with anecdotes happened around there, stories relating people coming there, reasons whey he/she feels comfortable staying in there and other personal subjects, based on his/her emotional security stemming from familiarity with the area. Other family members can understand him/her more by those disclosed stories and the communication with him/her will deepen and broaden resulted from the setting of stages on what he/she usually has performed. In conclusion, eating out as suggested above will bring different effectiveness from that commonly family dinner has shown to date. Through understanding where our family members spends most the day with an natural and physiological activity of eating out together, we can feel what environments has caused them to feel happy or gloomy, through which our sympathy with him/her will increase. That is the best way to enlarge and increase the open area. |