Inside the Mind of a Supercommunicator, with Charles Duhigg

26:10So I wrote this book, The Power of Habit. And there's this core idea, which is that every habit has a cue, a routine, and a reward. And that we tend to focus on the routine, which is the behavior, but it's actually the cues and the rewards that really shape how we behave almost unconsciously. And it turns out that communication is a ton of habits, right? If you had to think really hard about every word you said, it would be impossible to have a conversation. It would take forever. So what we do is we rely on these habits that we've developed. And a lot of writing super communicators was about saying, here's the right habits because your brain has evolved to make these into habits really quickly.

26:51I just need to show you what the right skills are so that you grasp onto them. If then we find that certain cues push us towards certain communication habits that we don't like, like somebody says words that trigger us, that emotionally trigger us, and we then have a knee-jerk response, how do we break out of that loop? It's a great question. And this happens a lot in social, in every kind of conversation, but let's take social conversations as an example, right? When we're, imagine if we're talking about something like race or gender, and I said to you, you know, as a woman, you tell me how you think about this.

27:31It could very well be, and this is very legitimate that you hear that. And that's a cue for you to be like, look, I'd like, yeah, now you're pigeonholing me. Like I'm the woman, I'm supposed to give the woman's perspective. I'm so much more complicated than just a woman. I'm a woman, but I'm also a podcast host and I'm a friend and I'm a daughter and I have relationship partners and you used to be a journalist. There's all these things in your background, all these other identities that you possess. And so when we hear that cue, someone says, you know, as a woman, how do you think about this? We can build the habit to say, you know, let me answer that this way.

28:08I see this not only as a woman, but as a sister and as a professional and a business person and as someone who used to be a journalist. And this is how those different perspectives help me understand the question you just asked. And what you're doing there is you're bringing all those other identities onto stage with you. And the truth is all of us contain dozens of different identities. And when someone tries to push us into just one of them, that's when it feels like a stereotype. That's when it feels bad. But when I'm talking to someone and I say to them, you know, I'm just wondering what you think about policing, because I know that you're, you know, you're a father and you're also black, but you're also a lawyer.

28:50And that probably gives you a different perspective on policing. And I know that you actually are really involved in your community. And so you work with the police department. I'm just wondering, like, what do you think about policing, given all those different perspectives you have on it? that feels like an invitation for someone to share something meaningful. Right. Rather than trying to push them into, you're the black guy. I'm wondering what you think about policing. When we inevitably encounter some type of a triggering cue from a habit point of view, how do we create the gap between cue and response?

29:23Yeah. So there's something known as implementation intentions, which are key to designing any kind of habit, which is that at first we have to remind ourselves. So usually if then statements, if X happens, I will do Y, right? If then. And oftentimes it's just a matter of having a bad conversation and then asking yourself, where did it go off the rails? What was the cue for me that made me defensive or that made me angry or that made me want to want to turn away? And when you find that cue, and maybe it's someone pushing you into a corner, maybe it's someone sort of flaunting their own wealth or success in a way that like kind of makes you feel bad.

30:06You can say to yourself, okay, the next time that happens, here's what I'm going to do. Here's my plan. And the best thing that you can do is ask a question. And in particular, there's some questions that are more powerful than others, and they're known as deep questions. And a deep question is something that asks about your values or your beliefs or your experiences. and deep questions don't have to appear deep. If you meet someone who's a lawyer, you can ask them like, oh, what made you decide to go to law school? What do you love about practicing the law? Those are both deep questions. They invite someone to tell you something meaningful, but they don't appear overly intrusive.

30:41And so to your question, that implementation intention, if I can see where something went wrong in a conversation, I can tell myself the next time that happens, I'm going to ask a question, a deep question and see how that changes things. On the topic of deep questions, when you say that deep questions are often about beliefs or thoughts or feelings, what is notable is that that's distinct from facts. Yeah. And so much of small talk is, I want the facts. Right. Where did you grow up? Do you have siblings? I mean. Where'd you go to college? Yeah, exactly. What kind of car do you drive? It's like you go on a series of first dates and they're all insufferable because they're all the same litany of questions asked over and over.

31:27They're all dads, right? Because you answer that question, you're like, well, I grew up in Cincinnati. Yeah. And they're like, oh, I've never been to Cincinnati. Okay. End of that line of dance. So the rule here is don't ask someone about the facts of their life. Ask them how they feel about their life. Right. If instead of asking you, where did you, where did you grow up? I said, you know, I'm just wondering, like, what was the best part about growing up where you did? Did you grow up in a place that's good for, for childhood? Then like, you're going to mention to me that you're from Cincinnati, right?

31:57Right. But then you're also going to tell me so much more about what your experiences were like there. Right. And the best part is once you do that, it's totally natural for me to answer the same question I just asked without you having to ask it. Oh, you grew up in Cincinnati and you had like a great experience. It's funny. I grew up in Albuquerque, New Mexico. And like, it was the same thing. Like I was a big fish in a small pond and I, it felt wonderful. That's how we start having a dialogue back and forth is when you ask about feelings rather than facts. Right. What's notable about that is that feelings don't have to be touchy feely.

32:29No, not at all. It's just, Hey, what, what did, what did you think of that? Exactly. You didn't even have to use the word feel. What did you think of that? Yeah. What did you make of that? I saw that you really liked this one memo. Like, tell me, tell me why you think it's important. Like, why should I go read that memo? Yeah. Now suddenly you're asking someone to tell you something real and authentic and potentially vulnerable about themselves. Right. And if you reciprocate that vulnerability, then you can't help but feel more connected to each other, more trusting of each other. It's literally hardwired into our brains.

33:01Right. You mentioned that we're at the golden age of beginning to understand how we communicate. That was an interesting statement because humans have been communicating for hundreds of thousands of years. I mean, there was about a 150 ,000 year era where we were anatomically modern humans, but had not yet developed language. The writer Tim Urban refers to that as the unimpressive era. Yeah. Not a lot happened. But after that, for the bulk of human history, there has been spoken language. Yes. But it's only very recently that we've begun to actually study the impact of spoken language on human connection.

33:47That's in the human brain and the human body. Communication has always been our superpower. It's the thing that sets us apart from every other species. It's the thing that usually explains why some people are more successful than others is because they have the ability to communicate alongside their skills. And so this superpower of communication, the way that it works is actually kind of interesting. We're in a conversation right now. And even though neither of us are aware of it, what's likely is that our eyes have started dilating at the same rate. Our breath patterns have started to match each other.

34:20We're holding our bodies in similar ways and we're using similar gestures. And even more importantly, within our brains, if we could look inside both of our brains, what we would see is that you and I are starting to think alike. our neural activity is actually starting to look very, very similar if we were putting it on a graph. And within psychology and neurology, this is known as neural entrainment. And it makes a lot of sense when you think about it, because if I describe a feeling to you or, or an idea, the way that you actually make sense of that is you experience that feeling a little bit yourself, or you experience that idea.

34:57The thing that's happening in my brain starts to happen in your brain. And when they do, when they start to align, when we become entrained, that's when we feel connected. That's when we can really understand what the other person is saying. And that's why having the same kind of conversation at the same moment is so important is because if I'm having an emotional conversation and you're having a practical conversation, then we're using different parts of our brain. But when we're on the same wavelength, when we both say like, okay, look, we're going to, we're going to start by talking about, you know, the practical aspects of this, our brains become more aligned.

35:31And then when we move into the emotional, we'll move there together. Right now, you and I, we're sitting in the same room. We're a few feet apart from each other, right? We have all of these biological ways in which we are starting to mirror one another. What's interesting is if we were having this conversation over the telephone, the same thing would happen. Our pupils would begin dilating at the same rate without us even totally understanding it. When we have Zoom calls, people do the same thing that they do when they're in the same room together. That was exactly what my question was going to be.

36:02You read my mind. Because we're on the same wavelength. We're having the same kind of conversation. We're connected. And that's exactly what it is, is that when you connect with someone, it's not just your imagination. You're genuinely connected with them. You're connected with them physically. More importantly, you're connected neurally. Your brains start to look alike. There was a really interesting experiment by this guy, Uri Hassan at Princeton, where he had this young woman tell this really complicated story about her prom night. And he scanned her brain while she was telling it. Then she scanned the brain of the people listening to her.

36:34And what he found was that the brains of the listeners started to look more and more similar to the woman who was telling the story until it all seemed like they were actually having the same thoughts at the exact same moment. And the people who were most aligned with her, who were most entrained, they understood the story better than anyone else. They could understand the nuances and the small details. They remembered characters' names. This entrainment, this alignment, which we can create, it's just a set of skills to know how to recognize it and to invite others to connect with you and to connect with them.

37:12This entrainment is the superpower. It is the thing that makes people trust and like each other, that makes people want to listen to each other, that makes people want to build things together. Is that the shortcoming of communicating by text? There's a failure of neural entrainment? There very well can be if we're not giving enough information, if we're not recognizing the rules of sending someone a text versus having a conversation by telephone. I have two kids who are 12 and 15. They text all the time and they, they managed to imbue a lot of emotion into their texts, right? They use emojis that the emojis all mean like different, they're feeling different ways and they're kind of, it's almost like a code.

37:55So the answer is no, it's not that one form of communication is inherently better than another, but it is true that different forms of communication have different rules. And if we don't pay attention to those rules, if we don't remind ourselves of those different rules, that's where we make a mistake. Right. But even still the neurological matching, that neural entrainment that you're talking about, the literally our brains being on the same wavelength, can that happen in a text conversation? Oh, absolutely. It's right. It's harder because you don't have as much information, but think about when you get a really funny text from a friend and it makes you laugh out loud, like without even meaning to.

38:33Right. Right. You're having the same experience that friend had when they sent it to you, when they first saw it, that they're hoping you would have. It might not be happening at exactly the same moment. Right. Or if a friend sends you a text or an email talking about how sad they are, that something just happened, they just found something out, they just lost their job. You experience that same emotion that you know that person was experiencing when they wrote that. That's what empathy is. Empathy is entrainment. And that's what allows us to communicate with

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41:21Tell me about the juror who saved a man who really did not deserve prison. There's very few trials where they've let cameras and recording devices into the jury room. There's actually only about five in the history of America. And so I got my hands on one of them And I was able to read the transcript and watch the video. And this was the trial of a guy named Leroy Reed, who was an ex-con. He wasn't doing well in society. And at one point he'd signed up to become a private detective through like something in the back of a magazine. And they told him to go buy a gun. So he goes down to the store gun store and he buys a gun and he brings it home.

41:59He never actually touches the gun. He just puts the box up in his closet. And then a couple of weeks later, he's down by the courthouse hoping someone hires him to like solve a crime. which obviously didn't happen. And a cop stops him and he asks for some proof of ID. And the only thing Leroy has in his pocket is the bill of sale from getting the gun. So the cop says, bring the gun down to the station and they arrest him right away because in Milwaukee, it's against the law for an ex-convict to own a firearm. So he goes on trial and they go into the jury room after the full trial. There's a lot of disagreement, right?

42:34Some people say like, This isn't just like, I don't think that this guy deserves to go in jail, even if he did break the law. Then there's a bunch of other people who say like, look, it's not up to us to what is just and what is unjust. Like our job is to apply the law. And if this is what the law, how the law is written, if we don't apply laws, that's anarchy. And they're just at each other's throats. But luckily for them, there's this one juror, this guy named John Boley, who is a super communicator. and this was the the most unusual guy in this room he everyone in the room like works in factories or the stay-at-home parents this guy teaches literature at the local university and his specialty is derrida he's wearing a suit and tie and everyone else is dressed casually another juror told me that he just couldn't stand bully that like he he kept on talking about like kofka and the trial and all this stuff he was like who are you man but what bully could do as a super communicator is he could recognize these different kinds of conversations that were having.

43:33The people who are into justice wanted to, they were having an emotional conversation or a social conversation. They were talking about how they felt about whether Leroy Reed should go to jail and whether that seems fair. And then the people who are really focusing on what the law said on the law and order types, they were having a practical conversation because they were saying, look, if we don't apply the law, if we don't enforce the law, that's anarchy. And so Bully realized they weren't hearing each other because of that. So what he did is he subtly encouraged each conversation to happen on its own.

44:12And then he tried to connect to them. He talked to everyone about the justice issue and they all agreed that Leroy Reed should not go to jail. Then he turned to the law and order folks and he said, look, I really hear what you're saying about needing to enforce the laws. I totally agree, but there's these other laws that aren't getting enforced because people like Leroy, we are getting arrested. Like I want the cops to arrest murderers and rapists. And they're bringing us this guy who had a gun. Let's send a message that law and order is too important not to look for the real bad guys. If we let Leroy read go free, then we're going to tell them, bring us better cases.

44:55And that's all it took for the law and order folks to say, oh, no, you're right. And they said, Leroy read free. Right. And I should state for the, for the context, Leroy, his learning disability was such that he, he genuinely may not have understood. Oh, absolutely. Absolutely. He had trouble reading entirely and he posed no danger. He posed no danger. He did not belong in jail. Right. That part was clear. So it was simply an application of a law in a context that would have sent a harmless person. Yeah, that's exactly right. But I think that there's something really valuable in this example, which is John Bully is someone who had nothing in common with anyone else in that room.

45:40If they had bumped into each other at a party, I mean, they would never be at the same party. Right. Yeah. Like it never would happen. And if they, if they bumped into each other at a concert, they never would have made conversation that just, it was so obvious that they didn't have anything in common, but that doesn't matter because when we talk to someone and we match them, when they say something emotional and we say something emotional in response, when they say something practical or talk about society and we show that we're willing to go there, we're willing to engage with them. We inevitably find things that we do have in common, even if at first glance, It seems impossible to imagine.

46:17So it sounds like the root of super communication is empathy and shared humanity, is recognizing somebody's shared humanity. I think that's right. I think that's a huge part of it, right? We talked about this matching principle that you have to be having the same kind of conversation at the same time. And what we're really saying there is we're saying you have to listen to what other people are saying. And when they show something about themselves, their humanity, you have to acknowledge it and you have to be willing to show something about your humanity. That's the easiest thing on earth. Because the truth of the matter is that we are both humans on this planet.

46:54We are both people who are just trying to do right by ourselves, the people we love. And yes, there are lots of things that we disagree on. We disagree on politics or gender or Israel and Gaza, lots of things that can be real contentions. But the truth is that we can talk about our differences and still listen to each other and appreciate each other and understand each other and connect without either of us having to change our mind. That's what this whole nation is built on. And when you think about it, the constitutional convention that started America, it was a group of people who mostly most of whom heeded each other coming together and arguing about what the country should look like and having conversations until they came to a consensus and writing the Constitution.

47:44That has been the strength of America. It's been the strength of humans. And we've forgotten how to do it lately. Right. We've forgotten because the world has gotten crazier because we stopped teaching it in schools. But if we're just reminded of some basic skills, our instincts will take over and we'll do better. So how does that – I want to know how this applies. I'm going to give three examples. Example number one, you are a middle manager at some Fortune 500 company. You live in Chicago. You're 45. Right. You're middle of your career, middle management. Your boss is just giving you this like incredible workload.

48:29Yeah. And you can't handle the workload, but you're also worried that you might be replaceable. So you don't want to like push. You don't want to make too many waves. You're burning the midnight oil and this is untenable. Right. So the first thing that I would do as a super communicator, the first thing a super communicator would do is don't march into that office and say, you're working me too hard. This doesn't work. Right. Instead, ask questions. And most importantly, ask deep questions. Ask those questions that get at what your boss thinks or feels or the experiences that are making their decisions.

49:08questions like, you know, I know that I've seen an uptick in work and I'm wondering when you started your career, when you were at the same place I am in my career, how did you deal with having just too many things to do? I know that there's a lot more demands being placed on us right now. And I'm wondering, are you worried about that? Like, are you worried that, that we're not going to make it? Or is it just that, that you feel comfortable about it, but, but that we need to put our nose down when you start doing that, what they're going to tell you is they're going to tell you what's really going on.

49:41Cause the truth of the matter is they're probably not a sadist, right? They're probably going to say something like, you know, there's a new boss and I'm actually kind of concerned that I'm going to get fired if we don't step it up. And so I, that's why I keep giving you more stuff to do, or they might say, you know, I think you're a great employee. And when I was at your stage, when someone challenged me, I got so much better and it served me so well in my career. So they're going to tell you what they're thinking or feeling or the experiences that they've had. And when they do, now you're suddenly having a real conversation because what you can say back is you can say, I totally hear what you're saying.

50:18And thank you so much for pushing me to do my best work at the pace that we're going right now. I actually feel a little overwhelmed, like I can't do my best work. And, and I know you want me to learn from this experience. Here's some ways that I feel like I could learn from it better. Or I hear what you're saying that your boss is pushing you. And so you're pushing me. And I want you to know we are a united front. I will do whatever I can to help you with your boss. What we're doing right now, I feel like I can't, I can't be the best ally for you because there's too much on my plate. let's talk about how I become your ally.

50:56So rather than telling them how you, rather than telling them how you feel, you're starting by asking how they feel. And then telling them how you feel and finding that connection, right? Matching each other. Because the truth of the matter is if you march in and you say, I feel overwhelmed, I can't do this. Of course, they're not necessarily going to be able to hear you. They don't know if you're an emotional place or if this is, if this is a practical problem, like you literally don't have enough hours or if you just feel overwhelmed and it's more emotional. Oftentimes when we are in that state, it's hard for us to explain what's really going on inside our own head.

51:28Right. So if they're a super communicator, they'll ask us a deep question. They'll say, tell me what you're feeling like. Tell me about last week. What happened last week that it felt overwhelming? But we can do the same thing and we can be a super communicator to them and it's going to make everything better. Okay. Scenario number two. Okay. You have a rental property. You got a bid from a general contractor. It's a lot higher than you thought it would be. You know that there's a shortage of contractors generally. So you would ideally like to make this work out, but you want to negotiate that rate down a bit.

52:06How do you make that play? So the first thing to figure out is, do you actually want to have a conversation or do you want to just tell this guy, I'm not going to pay that much or this woman? When I see my kids, I say like, I want to have a conversation about your rooms. I don't actually want to have a conversation about their rooms. I want them to go clean up their rooms. So sometimes you're talking to that contractor and you say like, look, I'd really like to talk about this price you gave me because it's, uh, it's kind of undoable for me. And what you're saying is actually, I'd like, I want you to, I don't want to have a conversation.

52:35I want you to come back with a better price, but let's say that you do want to have a conversation. Let's say, let's say it's not a situation where you can just make orders, but you really need to negotiate. You really need to be able to work together. Then that same principle of asking deep questions is really helpful because the thing that you want to figure out is, is this person padding the bill or is it just that actually their line item costs have gone up so much that they can't charge less than this? This is actually what it costs to build whatever I want to build. And the only way you figure that out is by asking them questions.

53:10In your judgment, like if we wanted to take 20 % off of this, this amount, what would it take? The trade-offs that we would make, get them talking about how they see the situation and then listen for what's really guiding their decision-making. There's usually kind of two kinds of decision-making. One of them is when we're drawing on the criteria of experience. So we're saying, this is something that's happened to me. This is logical to me. I think that the logic dictates we ought to do X and Y and Z. And then in other conversations, we're using the logic of feelings. And we're saying, look, I don't know exactly how much this should cost, but for me to do this project, I really need to charge you this much.

53:57Like that's what feels right to me. That feels fair. Now, if you tell me that you're in the logic of emotions mindset, that you're in the logic of feelings, that this feels fair. and then I just start coming back at you with a bunch of facts and figures. Well, it's not fair because this costs this and this costs that. It's not going to be persuasive. You're not going to change your mind. If on the other hand, you say this is a logic of experiences, the logic of trade-offs, and you say, look, the reason I'm charging is because the price of wood has gone up and the price of nails has gone up and the price of gasoline has gone up.

54:32And I say, well, it just doesn't feel like I should pay you that much. You're not going to listen to what I say. Right. So you have to listen to what kind of logic the person is using and then match their logic. And then you can invite them to match your logic because once they know that you've been listening to them, once you prove that you've been listening, they'll want to listen back. So if a person says, okay, I don't feel like this is fair, it's often a reflection of, hey, I am price anchored to what this used to cost four years ago. So you might have one party that says, well, at a practical level, the price of lumber and copper and labor and gasoline, all of those prices have gone up.

55:11That is a pragmatic, factual statement. Plus the cost of capital has gone up because the cost of borrowing is higher. Right. So all of these line items separately have gone up. And so that that makes the price higher than it was. Yeah. Right. So you've got one party saying that you've got the other party. essentially conveying that they are emotionally price anchored to their impression of what something feels like it ought to cost. And so let's say you were to ask, tell me a little bit about why you think that it should be this price. Tell me a little bit about why you think this is the bid I've given you is overcharging.

55:47They're going to say something like, well, I had this friend who they did the same renovation four years ago and what they paid is 20 % less. right okay so how do you think if your friend was doing it today do you think that they would be willing to pay more because all the price because the prices have gone up like have they loved their house have they been happy with the renovation yeah they've really enjoyed the renovation because because i'm telling you we can definitely do a renovation for 20 less but it's it's not going to be like your friend's renovation we're gonna have to cut corners here and there.

56:21And if what you're telling me is that you really want something that's like what that person got, what your friend got, then I totally hear you that it it's frustrating that prices have gone up in four years, but I want to give you what you're really asking for. And let me explain to you why I can't do it for any cheaper. So now what I've done is I've acknowledged what you're really telling me. What you're really saying is not just that you want to lower price, what you're really saying is I want the deal my friend got. I don't want to feel like I was taken advantage of. I don't want to feel like you're overcharging me.

56:54And I'm telling you, I hear that you do not want to be taken advantage of. I hear that you want me to treat you with respect and dignity. Let me walk through why it's more expensive now than it was four years ago. So I'm matching you and then I'm inviting you to match me and let's have a practical conversation about where this invoice comes from. Okay. Third question. What do you think? Would that work? I think that would work. I think it would be hard to do on the fly. It would be hard to do in the moment. Absolutely. That's why asking questions is so helpful is because it gives you a second to think about, to listen and to think about what's really going on here.

57:31Yeah. It takes the spotlight off you a little bit. And the truth of the matter is you might not agree with each other. Like you might not come to an agreement. You might decide, look, I can't afford that much. And he might decide I'm not willing to do this project for any less. Mm-hmm. But it's better to walk away from something where you both understand each other. Right. Then for there to be this possibility that you could work together, that you could make this success. And you guys never found that possibility because you weren't really hearing each other. Right. And I think you're right. The key is to ask questions.

58:05Yeah. Because what makes it so hard in the moment is that in the moment it's easy to be reactive. That's exactly right. It's exactly right. And oftentimes that our instinct is to try and control the other person. Right. When we're in a fight or a disagreement or a hard conversation or negotiation, we have this fight or flight response and that triggers our need for control. Like we want to find something we can control. And the easiest thing to control is the person sitting across from us. So we say things like, if you'll just listen to me, you'll agree with me because you'll see that I'm right.

58:34Or if you just see things from my perspective, then you'll understand why I'm saying this. Or we try and control other people's emotions. We say, they say that they were bothered by something and we say, oh, you shouldn't have been bothered by that. Like, that's not such a big deal. You're making a big deal out of it. Trying to control someone else is toxic. And in marriages, it's actually one of the signs that you're on a bad path. What's much better is to find things you can control together. Like to say, if you're having this argument at two o 'clock in the morning, let's, let's wait until 10 a.m.

59:04when we're both well rested. that when you're having a fight about, you know, where you should go for Thanksgiving, instead of it becoming a fight also about your mother doesn't like me and we don't have enough money, let's just stay focused on Thanksgiving. Or when you're talking to this contractor, saying to them, look, we both have this goal of making a beautiful house. I want to be able to build what I can afford. Can we work together to figure out what are the things that matter and what are the things that don't matter in order to have this house be what we're both hoping for. When we start controlling things together instead of trying to control each other, then even if we disagree with each other, it still feels like we're cooperating.

59:46It feels like a conversation. Right. And then you're united in the goal of arriving at a solution together. That's exactly right. That's exactly right. So it's not you versus me. It's us versus the problem. Exactly. Exactly. And that's what you want, right? Right. Right. Okay. So I interrupted you with a third situation. So what's the third? Oh, so speaking of fight or flight, what happens when you're dealing with someone whose response is flight? And where I'm going with that is, and this is actually advice that I would like from you. My ex-boyfriend, my last boyfriend, wonderful guy, but he has a very instantaneous knee-jerk temper.

1:00:26And so the slightest perceived infraction, he will go from zero to 100 very quickly. And when that happens, his response is to leave. He doesn't get violent, but he immediately wants to leave and then he never wants to talk about it. and he actually he dumped me by text message oh my gosh yeah that is not cool yeah don't don't me by text and then refuses from that point forward refuses to talk about it uh yeah you guys still talk about other stuff like you're still in a little so that was like seven months ago okay and we you know every now and again he's he's also a journalist so every now and again And we'll send texts related to his area of coverage, but we've never talked about what happened.

1:01:16The most important thing. Yeah. Yeah. So we've basically transitioned into being colleagues. Right. So first of all, you know, I had mentioned before deciding whether this should be a conversation or not. You deserve so much better than that. Oh, thank you. It's totally okay to write this guy off and be like, look, I don't even want to have the conversation. But let's say you do. Let's say you want to have that conversation. One of the things that's really, really powerful is that oftentimes we avoid conversations. And my guess is that your ex-boyfriend is avoiding this conversation because we're so anxious about them that we are absolutely certain and terrified we're going to make some mistake.

1:01:51I'm going to say the wrong thing. I'm going to let my anger spill over. I'm going to do something that I regret later. And so the way that we can counter that is at the beginning of the conversation, we simply acknowledge that this is going to be awkward and people are going to make mistakes to say like, look, like I want to talk about this with you. And I know I'm going to say some of the wrong things and I want to apologize in advance. I hope you'll be understanding. And you're probably going to say some of the wrong things. And, and I know that I'm going to get angry and you're probably going to get angry.

1:02:21And I want you to know if you get angry, I'm here to hear it. Like I want to hear, I want to hear what you're feeling. You don't need to protect me from that. And I promise I will forgive you. And I want to ask you to forgive me because we're both going to make mistakes. Do you think that would help? Like if you said that to your ex, would he? I don't know if it would, because he generally avoids difficult conversations. And his response to any type of a difficult conversation is simply to shut down and say, I can't do it. Can't have this conversation. And look, some people, some people don't want to be super communicators, right?

1:03:04Some people don't want to have the most meaningful conversations. But, but maybe if you started by saying something vulnerable to him, if you said something to him, like, look, I just want you to know, I value our relationship so much. And I understand that, you know, romantically, it won't work out, but I still carry around all these feelings of affection for you. And, and I feel like it would help me understand what happened if we could talk about this, because I feel, I feel confused and, and I've been thinking about it a lot. Can we have this conversation? And I, and I want to promise you that like, I know that this is going to be weird and it's going to be hard, but I want you to know that like, I, I so appreciate this and I forgive anything you say to me and I hope that you feel the same way.

1:03:58Mm-hmm. That's good. That's better. Yeah. Yeah. Because I think once you expose that vulnerability, this reciprocal vulnerability kicks in. When someone is vulnerable with us, it's the loudest form of communication. Again, this is a product of evolution because on the planes, when, or a state of nature, when something is vulnerable, you have to pay attention to it because that means either that, you know, you might want to attack it or that it might attack you or that you need to protect that member. of your tribe. So our brains are designed to listen to vulnerability louder than anything else.

1:04:35And when you expose your vulnerability, it's very natural for him to feel an instinct to expose something about himself and say, I'm, I had no idea that you felt that way. And I've actually been feeling really bad about it myself. Like I probably should not have done this by text, but it's it's saying something vulnerable yourself first that sometimes opens the door would it work i'll give it a try and i'll let you know yes let me know let me know and i'm i i hope you find a better boyfriend oh thank you free to you as you deserve to be treated thank you and you might find after talking to this guy actually i never want to have another conversation with me.

1:05:19I'm so glad that it would turn out this way.

1:05:26Yeah. Yeah. I've never seen so much avoidance basically, you know, just deep, deep avoidance. And the challenge of how do you have a conversation with somebody who is conversationally avoidant? Let me ask you this. When you've seen him avoid things, What do you think he's feeling at that moment? Overwhelm, anxiety. The anecdote that I told earlier about how his anger can go from zero to 100 is symptomatic of poor emotional regulation. Yeah. And generally, I think poor emotional regulation means he probably gets flooded with a lot of very intense emotions. Yeah. And doesn't know how to process that or handle that.

1:06:08And so the easiest thing to do is, you know, build walls, shut all of that out, avoid it altogether. And when you have seen him be anxious and then calm himself or you've helped calm him, what was that like? Like what happened? He calms himself by going to work. Okay. And so that's his – work is his happy place. Right. And so that's his method of avoidance is he just goes to work. So do you think it would help things? Let's say you had that conversation. You said to them, look, I want to talk about this thing. This is something that I feel really bad about. And I'm not going to judge you. I just want to have a conversation about it.

1:06:48But not right now. Because I know that you're going to work and that that's important to you. Could we talk about it tonight when you get back from work? Oh, he's been avoiding this for seven months. Okay. Yeah, yeah. Do you think that would help though if you? Not the tonight part because, again, it's been literally months and months and months. Yes. Certainly, I think in a case in which two people are in a relationship, like for somebody who's listening, who's maybe in a similar situation with someone that they're currently in a relationship with, and that person is deeply avoidant and also a workaholic, then yes, a 24-hour delay is probably useful.

1:07:28But in a case like mine where there's already been a seven-month delay, you know? And again, it might be that he just doesn't have the capacity to have this conversation. But I do wonder if you sent him an email and you said, look, how long did you guys date? Off and on for about a year. Okay. If you say, look, we dated for a while and this was like, there was so much I loved about our relationship. It was a really positive experience for me. And I don't want to pick it back up, but I want to remember it the way it deserves to be remembered. But whenever I think about it, I think about this lingering, nagging anxiety I have about how we broke up.

1:08:11And so I just want to ask you questions about that, if that's okay. You don't have to answer anything you don't want to answer, but you would be giving me such a gift to let me ask you these questions because I feel bad about this. And I feel like talking to you and asking you questions, it would help me feel better. It helped me remember the really great parts of our relationship. Do you think that would work? I think that's good too. That and then the other part that you said earlier. I'm going to transcribe both of those. Well, and it might be that like, I mean, we've talked about how different forms of communication have different rules.

1:08:47Right. It might be that a face-to-face conversation makes him really uncomfortable because he can't, he feels like he does feel overwhelmed. He's out of control. so maybe this is something that's better discussed by email right to send him a note and say like we don't even have to talk about it face to face like can i send you some questions and will you just tell me what you're thinking or feeling because it might be that in that situation he feels a lot more comfortable he gets to he gets to think about what he wants to say before he has to respond he gets to edit himself figuring out figuring out what's the source of this avoidance and then figuring out how do we sidestep it just a little bit.

1:09:27That can make all the difference. Right. Right. I hope it works. Tell me if it does. Thank you. Thank you. And have you met anyone else since then? No. No. Really? Yeah. How's the dating world? You know, New York is, well, it's better than Las Vegas. I will say that. Okay. Okay. Dating in New York is interesting because on one hand, I think that the selection is better. Yeah. Right? There are a lot of people here who are really intelligent, very ambitious, very well-educated. Yeah. They read books. I know that sounds very simple, but it's - It's a big deal. It's a big deal. Yeah. It's a really big deal to find somebody who reads books.

1:10:16Yeah. Recreationally. Absolutely. You know, and so I feel like you find that here in New York in a way that I never found that in Vegas. Yeah. So that part is really nice. But there's also, I think because there's such an abundance of people here, there's, I think, people kind of treat you like you're disposable. Yeah. Because, you know, it's just on to the next, on to the next, on to the next. There was this interesting study that was done by these folks at Harvard Business School. It's described in the book where they looked at transcripts from people who were speed dating and they tried to figure out who has the most success at speed dating.

1:10:53And they've actually repeated the same experiment by going into bars. And what they found is that the single most important thing you could do is ask a follow up question. Because when we ask a follow up question, it shows that we're listening. It proves that we're listening, but also it tells the other person that we're interested in them. Right. And I found that, you know, my wife and I have been together for like 20 years now. So I haven't dated in a really long time. But when I go out and I meet people, I find that one of the ways that I distinguish whether I want to hang out with this person is, are they good at asking me questions?

1:11:26Or do they just wait for me to ask them questions? Or do they ask questions where they actually want to just tell me what the answer is for themselves? They ask me, where did you go on vacation? So that they can tell me, oh, last summer I went to St. Croix. You know, like being able to ask these follow up questions, particularly if they're deep questions, it's a good signal and it helps convince other people that they want to spend time with us. Right. You know, one of the major ways that I eliminate people in dating, whether it's a speed dating event or it's a first date, one of the immediate red flags that makes me automatically just eliminate somebody and not want to talk to them anymore is when rather than ask me about who I am, they start to tell me who I am.

1:12:10Which it's a worst instinct, right? Like, yeah. And why would you do? And so, and it, so like an example of this might be like, all right. So a common question that people ask when they see me is they'll, they'll ask about my ethnicity because it's clear that I'm from somewhere. But my name, Paula Pant doesn't really give any clues. And so there's, there's immediate cognitive dissonance. People are like, but are, are you Paula? That's maybe a Latin American name, but I don't get Latin American vibes from you. I get more Middle Eastern vibes. People really want to place me. And I remember being at a speed dating event.

1:12:52Someone said, where are you from? And I said, oh, I'm from Nepal. He was a little confused, which is common. A lot of people haven't heard of Nepal. And I was like, oh, it's located in South Asia. It's where the Himalayas are. I kind of placed it geographically. and he was like oh wasn't that just that's the same thing as india um

1:13:17and that's when i started to get annoyed and i was like well are you you're familiar with the social construct of a nation right kind of like the u.s is just part of canada yeah exactly you know it's greater canada and i mean if he had like ended it there and backtracked and laughed it himself would have been fine. Right. But he just kept digging in, you know? And so, and, you know, he was like, yeah, but you guys, I mean, you look the same, you know? And I was like, all right, would you say the same thing about Pakistan? Would you say the same thing about Nepal and Pakistan? And he was like, no.

1:13:53And I was like, well, do you know, Pakistan was formed 75 years ago? And, and he was like, well, are you a history teacher? And I'm like, this does not sound like he's worth the second day. Yeah. Yeah. And that conversation was over right then and then. As if he had just said like, oh, Nepal, I don't know much about Nepal. Tell me about like, what's, what's Nepal like? Right. Then you would have been like, oh, you know, this is what it's like. Like you would have told him the parts of Nepal. Have you been to Nepal? Yeah. Many times. Yeah. So you would have told him the parts of Nepal that were important to you.

1:14:26Yeah. Or you could have said, actually, my grandparents immigrated from Nepal and I grew up in Cincinnati, I'm basically as American as anyone gets. Right. At which point you're telling him something meaningful and valuable about yourself instead of him asserting, oh, you must be X. Right. Exactly. Yeah. Exactly. Those questions, they make a big difference. Well, is there anything that I haven't asked about? Isn't that the most important question a journalist asks? What haven't I asked? It really is. You know, the only thing that I would add is, so there was this experiment that was done almost 100 years ago now by Harvard.

1:15:02And it's actually one of the largest and longitudinal studies that we have. It's called the Harvard Study of Adult Development. It's had different names over the years. And what they did is they found thousands of people and they followed them for their entire lives. And they were trying to figure out what made people successful, what made people live longer, healthier, and most importantly, what made people happy when they got older. And they thought that maybe having a stable job was an important part of it or having a lot of education or coming from a good family because this was back in the 1940s when coming from a good family was a big deal.

1:15:33And what they found consistently is there is only one thing that determines if you're going to be happy and healthy at age 65, and that's having at least a few close connections to other people when you're 45. And of course, if you have them when you're 45, they didn't start when you're 45, right? They started sometime earlier than that. Right. Right. And what they've carried away from this, and there's study after study that shows this is true, connections with other people are the most important thing in life. They are the thing that make life meaningful. You know, the Surgeon General just said that being lonely is the equivalent of smoking 15 cigarettes a day.

1:16:12And so the question becomes, how do we form those connections? Because we don't have to have a million of them or even a dozen. Two or three is enough if that's all that we want. and the way we form those connections is through conversations right when you call up mo even if you only talk to her every three months you guys just reconnect immediately you know that she is there for you and you are there for her you know that she is one of your best friends even if you haven't seen each other in years that is what makes us not only happier as we as we get older it makes us healthier. It makes us more successful because we talk to people who tell us about opportunities we wouldn't have discovered on our own.

1:16:55And the, the really important lesson is that there aren't just some people who can do this. What the Harvard study has found is that once people understand the importance of making those connections, everyone can become a super communicator. Everyone can develop some skills to ask more questions and to share more about themselves, to loop for understanding, to prove that you're listening, to recognize what kind of conversation is happening and match each other. Anyone can learn to do this. And if you do, it is literally the best investment you can make in yourself because the more that we can connect other people, the happier and healthier and more successful it will be.

1:17:40the best investment you can make in yourself yeah is is the investment of communication absolutely which is the the foundation of building relationships that's exactly relationships that's exactly right becoming a super communicator that's the only thing that other thing that occurred to me well thank you charles thank you thank you so much for having me on this was so much fun this is great if i ever go to nepal i'll think about you oh i'll ask your advice. Oh, fantastic. Or if I bump into like some nice young man who would not break up via text. Seriously. I was like, I have this wonderful, amazing woman.

1:18:24Thank you, Charles. What are three key takeaways that we got from this conversation? Number one, relationships are the backbone of a successful life, both in business, in your career, in your family life, in every facet of your life. Strong relationships are the backbone of health, wealth, and happiness. And good communication is the key to successful relationships. And so what constitutes good communication? Well, in the first of the three key takeaways, Charles Duhigg elaborates on traits exhibited by successful communicators. And there are these people who are consistent super communicators who can connect with all of us anymore.

1:19:09And what we know about them is that they do a couple of things differently from everyone else. First of all, they ask a lot more questions, like 10 to 20 times as many questions as the average person. They tend to reciprocate vulnerabilities and authenticity, as you mentioned before, but also reciprocate laughter or reciprocate sadness. If I see someone who says, mentioned something kind of sad, I don't, I don't try and cheer them up. I try and say, I'm really sorry. That sounds really hard. Like, tell me more about that. But the most important thing that they do is that they show you they want to connect.

1:19:40Because conversation is so overwhelming and potentially scary, right? Particularly a hard conversation, something you've been dreading talking about. That when someone shows you that they want to connect with you, when they notice that you've said something emotional and they meet you emotionally, when you say something practical, like, look, we got to figure out where we're going to on vacation next year. and I say, okay, let's talk about airfares, right? That's how we show that we want to connect with that person. And it's that showing of desire of connection that can make all the difference.

1:20:13That is the first key takeaway. Key takeaway number two, there are three types of conversations that people can have. There are practical conversations, emotional conversations, and social conversations. people want to be helped, heard, or hugged. In this key takeaway, Charles Duhigg shares why it's important to understand which type of conversation you're having in order for the conversation to be successful. We think of discussions as being about one thing, but actually there's many kinds of conversations. And they all fall into these three buckets, the practical, the social, and the emotional.

1:20:55And what they said is you were having an emotional conversation with your wife and she was having a practical conversation back with you. And so you guys could not hear each other. We're literally using different parts of our brains. And, and it's all about matching the matching principles known to have the same kind of conversation at the same time, which as you pointed out is so powerful because that's how we get other people to trust us, to listen to us. And that's how we learn who they are. And actually when I get home from work now and I'm starting to complaining about my day, Liz, my wife will say to me, do you want me to help you come up with solutions or do you just need to bet and you want me to listen to you?

1:21:31And so understanding what type of conversation you're having, is it practical? Is it emotional? Or is it social? That is the second of the three key takeaways. Finally, key takeaway number three. We've all been at those cocktail parties where we're making small talk and it feels kind of boring, right? Small talk in which people ask for the facts of our lives. So what do you do? Where'd you grow up? When we're relaying a litany of facts, we don't deeply connect with people. So how do we ask deep questions of others, the kinds of questions that help us connect with one another? How do we ask those questions in a way that feels unintrusive.

1:22:17Well, in this third and final key takeaway, Charles Duhigg shares a tactic that we can use in order to ask people not about the facts, but rather about their feelings and their experiences. And it's a tactic that works even in, and especially in, professional contexts or in environments where we're just getting to know somebody for the first time, perhaps a future business partner or a client. Don't ask someone about the facts of their life. Ask them how they feel about their life. If instead of asking you, where did you grow up? I said, you know, I'm just wondering, what was the best part about growing up where you did?

1:23:03Did you grow up in a place that's good for childhood? Then you're going to mention to me that you're from Cincinnati, right? Right. But then you're also going to tell me so much more about what your experiences were like there. And the best part is, once you do that, it's totally natural for me to answer the same question I just asked without you having to ask it. Oh, you grew up in Cincinnati and you had like a great experience? It's funny. I grew up in Albuquerque, New Mexico. And like it was the same thing. Like I was a big fish in a small pond and it felt wonderful. That's how we start having a dialogue back and forth is when you ask about feelings rather than facts.

1:23:38And so that is the third and final key takeaway from this conversation with Charles Duhigg. Thank you so much for tuning in. If you enjoyed today's episode, please do three things. Number one, share it with a friend or a family member. That's the most important thing that you can do to spread the message of great financial health. Number two, sign up for our show notes at affordanything.com slash show notes, where you'll get a synopsis of every episode delivered directly to you, hot and fresh to your inbox. And number three, connect with other people, have great conversations with people in the Afford Anything community.

1:24:11It's completely free and you can join at affordanything.com slash community. Thank you so much for tuning in. My name is Paula Pant. This is the Afford Anything podcast and I'll catch you in the next episode.