Communication means that there is at least one sender and one recipient, and in between, there is the message. The kind of communication tool you choose to use also affects the message being conveyed. Will you choose a pencil? Pen? Phone? Email? Text? Picture? Or perhaps a face-to-face opportunity? Your method of choice for communicating with one person or a group of people guides how effectively you send your message. Additionally, there are always emotions behind a message. You could just be sharing a picture of yourself on the beach or sending out a call for help on a class assignment, or perhaps feeling sad because a friend is sick. Each of these situations would affect how you might communicate. Have you ever sent a message to someone too quickly? For example, you heard that a friend just broke up with her boyfriend and is terribly heartbroken. You immediately think you should send some kind of 'hope you are ok' comment and decide to use Facebook to do so. Later you find out that she didn't want people to know about it at all and you jumped the gun on your condolences. How did you feel? Could you have gone about it in any other way? Perhaps waited until she told you about it herself? Aprivate email or phone call? This is the type of situation where you have to step back for a moment and clarify for yourself that what you are about to send will be received the way you intended. Learning a little about the concept of emotional intelligence (EQ) will also be helpful to your decision about how to communicate in various situations. Additionally, other significant variables play an important role in communicating. These range from ethnicity to culture to age to gender and are meaningful to what one is trying to 'say' to someone else. As an example, in some European cultures, it is common to greet people by kissing them on the cheeks. People that were not raised in a culture where cheek kissing is widespread might be uncomfortable with this type of greeting. Another example is generational differences in phone use. Many younger Americans prefer texting and emailing, while many older Americans prefer to communicate by phone. Unfortunately, sometimes the message is lost or misconstrued because neither the sender nor the receiver has considered these important aspects of successful communication. It is also essential to understand the audience and context of your communication. In other words, to whom are you talking? Why are you talking to this person or people? What, exactly, do you hope to achieve out of the communication you initiate? An effective communicator understands the audience to whom they are trying to send a message. This means using the venue that makes the most sense for the particular situation - face-to-face conversation, phone, email, text, written letter, or picture. This way your message can reach your audience (professor, boss, colleague, friend, parent, teammate) productively, and hopefully, the message you intend to convey is received accordingly. An example of context might be the following: you need to ask your professor about a grade you received on an assignment because you think the grade was too low for the work you did. Would it be appropriate for you to send a text asking why you received the grade? Might it be better to give your professor a call and hope she is available to talk with you? Or do you think it could be more useful and productive if you found out the professor's office hours and went in to discuss your concerns in person? These are decisions you have to make carefully so you can make the most of what you are trying to communicate.