I have noticed that many of the skills one develops from being deaf are transferrable to other aspects of life. Recently I have been working on a show called Follow Alana and with the show comes frequent interviews. One of the regularly asked questions I get during interviews is “Have you ever been frustrated by your deafness and how do you overcome your frustrations?” The answer to the first question is a resounding yes
I do not think any person can reasonably suggest they have never experienced frustrations when it comes to hearing and communication challenges). However, what I have learned is several of the skills and strategies I have developed as measures to combat and overcome my struggles with deafness are transferrable to other areas of life. In particular the skills I have noticed are developing listening skills, meaning from context, self-advocacy, and resilience.
The first and perhaps most obvious skill all individuals with a cochlear implant or hearing aid need to strengthen is their listening skills. We are taught from the beginning of verbal therapy how to listen, from the basic sounds (which in English were “b-b-b”, “sh-sh-sh”, “m-m-m” and so on) to complex sentences. We are taught to direct all of our focus to hearing what is being said and deriving meaning from context. Naturally this turned out to be a valuable skill not only in understanding what individuals are articulating to us, but also in the body language that we reflect back. In particular, I have found that employers appreciate strong listening skills as it shows care, respect, and an earnest desire to understand what they are communicating. This is one example of a skill that was strengthened through my experiences being a deaf person that transferred to a different area of my life.
Meaning from context has been a surprisingly useful skill for me in circumstances irrelevant to deafness. The most reoccurring circumstances I see this in is being a native English speaker living in Taiwan where the primary language is Mandarin. Although there is the constant frustration of language differences, I find I am able to generally understand what others who do not speak English are asking of me. One of my verbal therapists, Dr. Jill Duncan worked with me heavily on strengthening my “meaning from context” skills and I have noticed myself subconsciously transferring what I have learned to Chinese. For example, in the show Follow Alana, my director often uses Mandarin to communicate with me and my team. Even though my Mandarin is extremely limited, I find myself putting puzzles pieces together through the few Mandarin words I am able to pick up, body language (sometimes signaling what it is I need to do), and the environmental circumstances. By putting the few pieces of the puzzle that I have together, I am generally able to gather the overall idea being communicated, hence the strategy: “meaning from context”.
As a deaf individual, my parents campaigned hard for me to develop and strengthen my self-advocacy skills. Perhaps they encouraged me to advocate for myself harder than they would have had I not been born deaf. They recognized that as a deaf individual living in a hearing community, it was more urgent than ever for me to advocate for my unique needs. Even with all their encouragement, I still find myself hesitating at moments to voice my needs, particularly if I feel I am interrupting an environment or potentially making someone uncomfortable. However, the training I received while growing up overrides my initial hesitation and I find I am able to express my needs. One of my earliest memories of this is on the first day of first grade. In the car ride on the way to school, my mother used the opportunity to teach me my first steps in self-advocacy. It was critical, she explained, that I stand up in front of the entire classroom, introduce myself to all my peers, explain my deafness, apologize if I could not hear them when they were speaking, and most importantly, clearly explain what it is that I needed from them. For example, she said, you can politely ask them to face you when speaking, or to speak louder in noisy environments. Although nervous, I followed her request the first day of first grade with successful results. I continued to do so each grade afterwards and continue to practice self-advocacy in my adult life.
Last and perhaps most importantly is resilience. Unsurprisingly, being a deaf person in a hearing world means facing constant challenges that your peers may not. These examples include communicating in a variety of different environments, having a meeting with multiple co-workers talking at the same time, or simply trying to understand different accents. These constant challenges require one to build resilience and determination to overcome any challenging environment that may be difficult to hear and understand in. Through this determination, one develops a variety of strategies to overcome these difficulties such as asking a person to speak louder, moving to a different environment, taking notes to ask questions later, and so on. Similarly, with the meaning from context strategy, I have subconsciously transferred this skill to other aspects of my life unrelated to deafness. I have noticed the same determination emerge when I find myself struggling with a certain topic in school. There is an innate perseverance and understanding that with patience and the right strategy, I can learn the material being taught to me.
From an early age, I have valued the idea of “turning your disadvantages into advantages”. Developing skills that support my needs as a deaf person is one example. These skills are also transferrable and applicable to a variety of other areas in my life. Personal skills that I have noticed are listening skills, meaning from context, self-advocacy, and perseverance. However other deaf individuals may also discover other skills they are applying to multiple aspects of their lives in a subconscious manner.
