How to shift a vibe with M. Night Shyamalan

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1:14Start to finish. Cases closed. Requests handled. No extra work for you. To learn how to put AI to work for people, visit servicenow.com. Dude, let's not fake this vibe. You know, what are we? You and me? Yeah, what are we? What are we? That's a great question. I've asked him to go to the Sixers games, which he said no to twice. Did you hear that gasp? Gasp, gasp. Hey everyone, it's Adam Grant. Welcome back to Rethinking, my podcast with Ted on the science of what makes us tick. I'm an organizational psychologist, and I'm taking you inside the minds of fascinating people to explore new thoughts and new ways of thinking.

2:02I'm on tour for the launch of my new book, Vibe, The Secrets of Strong Connections in a Lonely World, which means I get to talk about it live on stage with some of the most interesting people I know. This week, I'm sharing a conversation with one of my favorite filmmakers, M. Night Shyamalan, in the Authors at Wharton series. Knight and I had a blast exploring how many close friends it's possible to have, why instant chemistry can become a horror story, how to shift a vibe on screen and in real life, and much more.

2:41Hi guys. Hey Knight, welcome to Authors at Wharton. I know this is so wild because he's interviewed me so many times. Too many times? So many times, so many times. Well I did come prepared. No, no, no, I'm interviewing you. I think this could be a conversation. Sure. I have questions for you too. Well, we'll see. We'll see. We'll see how that goes. But I did want to know why you... Wait, before you dive in, can we just say how amazing is it that M. Night Shyamalan is here?

3:09Thank you. Thank you for coming to the series that I host and hosting me. It's really generous of you. Well, thank you for asking me, seriously. Adam has, he's like the, he's like the Jordan of connectors and so we go to dinners and he brings incredibly interesting people you know if I come with a preconception of who I am or how I interact with people you you reset me and allow me to redefine myself that's coming from you your energy you're you're exceptional at being with people really you are well thank you that's that's very kind of you I love the way you think and it's always, I'm always a student myself.

3:50So I'm with you guys. Well, thank you for reading the book. Not every interviewer does. Really? Yeah. That's wacky. So what I did was like, I read the book and then I just get super nerdy. There was 24 things that I marked down that I want to talk to you about. Then I put those 24 things into six categories. So that's what we're going to talk about today. Is this how you make your movies? Yeah, I do. I try to break it down so I can get two years of work into like, you know, doable parts. I can't wait. So this is a really beautiful thing, which I was really touching to me. So I'm paraphrasing some of the stuff on this page.

4:26A vibe is the quality of connection between people. And then it says the product is more than mutual attraction. It's mutual transformation, which really struck me. And there was two quotes that you put in the book from others. One was, each friend represents a world in us, a world possibly not born until they arrive. That's a really beautiful quote. And then another one in that vein, certain people draw out a version of you that didn't exist before. They witness you and thus rearrange you. We all carry endless hidden selves and latent worlds waiting for the right grays to bring them to the surface.

5:06Sounds like Maya Wilbrink and Anais Nin. That's correct. I passed the test so far. Good. I love those quotes. Yeah. Just immediately you had me. Can you talk a little bit about that connection? So Trevor Noah gave me a really interesting metaphor for this that I wish he'd given me while I was writing the book because it's so perfect. You know, in Harry Potter, how many people are familiar with the Horcrux in Harry Potter? Okay. A lot of you. Okay, good. You've read, seen Harry Potter? Yeah. They asked me to make the first movie. Seriously? And you turned it down? I was making Unbreakable. We'd have to move the family to England.

5:43They would have had British accents. We wouldn't have been Philly. You turned down Harry Potter? Although my kids want an English accent, so. We're going to have a whole conversation about this. I'm so curious. But I love Unbreakable. Thank you. It's how a superhero movie should be made. So, anyway, so Horcruxes. So it looks like almost everybody here is familiar with them. But the way Trevor put it is he said, every person you interact with has a little horcrux of your personality. They have a little slice of you. And some of that is they know different things about you than anyone else does.

6:18But some of that is because of who they are. They elicit aspects of you that were invisible before. And I've had that experience my whole life. And it sounds like you have, too, of you meet somebody and all of a sudden you say, wow, I really like who I am with that person. And I've never been that me before. I think that's actually a big part of what psychologists find is at the heart of falling in love, is you like the version of yourself that shows up with your new partner. And I just think it's a really beautiful way to look at human connection, is to say, wow, everyone I interact with can activate a piece of me that might have been missing from my life or that might give me a chance to be different than who I've been before.

6:56It reminds me too, like sometimes I think about how does that like how did a kid in Ireland put up a little sign in his high school and said I'm starting a band and then the members of U2 answer that ad. How does that how does that happen? That four kids in Dublin become U2. I think it's a little bit of this each of them transforming each other into this. Yeah, I think it feels magical when it happens. And I think so often people are missing opportunities to just send that signal that, hey, I'm open to connection. I'm looking for it. I barely, I think this got a sentence in the book, but one of the more interesting experiences I've had in the last few years was I went to an event and there was a very prominent, very shy person there.

7:42And nobody knew what to say to him. And the next day he showed up in the morning carrying a chessboard, just walking around the event. And it was like this little, it was like a homing signal for anybody who loves chess or anybody who's a little bit nerdy or is a fan of games to approach him and to interact in a fun way. And I just looked at that and thought, how many times in our lives do we miss the opportunity to carry the chessboard and signal to somebody, hey, there is a side of you that I would love to bring out. You know, when I get interviewed and the person is just asking a rote question, you know, when you do junkets for movies, it's just hundreds and hundreds.

8:21I'll do 500 interviews for a movie and they're just rote. They just say something without any emotion, without any connection, without any vibe. It kills me. And for me to answer would be to be complicit in the killing of myself. and I you know I've learned to be able to diffuse it right away I'll be like dude those are those suede um and and do it genuinely about that and then he and then the guy's like uh yeah yeah and I say yeah so you were asking about you know what was it you wanted to know I love how you're taking over the interview and and but it's to get some kind of connection because dude let's not fake this vibe.

9:03Just let's connect for seven minutes. It's like, so this is all, I find it my lifeblood, this thing you're talking about. When I was reading it, I was texting him and I was like, bro, this is really affecting me because this is how I think about, I don't like it when we're not being honest and connecting. It's, I think this is something a lot of people don't know about you if they only see you doing cameos in your movies, because I think that so many of your peers are task-oriented. And they sit down and they say, okay, we've got to make the most of every second. We have a goal to achieve. We have a job to do.

9:35Let's just get right down to business. And I think you're as passionate as anyone I've ever met about telling stories and bringing your creative vision to life. And yet you always pause to make time to say, wait a minute, tell me who you are. Where'd you come from? What's your background? And I feel like you spend a lot of time soaking up people's life stories before you start working with them. And I can only imagine that leads to a better vibe on set, not just in an interview. It does. I mean, I use it, the connection to be vulnerable and to do, to ask extreme things of the artists. Again, why go through this, all of this, unless we're affecting each other and connection is the only way we know we exist.

10:15You know, so it's important to me, this book. Me too. So this is on page 20. I'm going to be quizzing you. When we approach the people we meet as possible associates, allies, pals, or companions. We have more opportunities to vibe. Can you tell me what those categories are? What is that? He breaks down relationships. Just like, give me a sense of that. This is, I mean, this framework has changed the way I think about all my interactions and a lot of my meaningful friendships and all kinds of relationships. So I think there are three meaningful ways that we bond with other people. Ally, pal, and companion.

10:54So an ally is somebody who shares your goals. You are on a mission together. They might be somebody you'd love to do a group project with or start a company with or volunteer with because they're reliable and they have skills that are different than yours, but they can ultimately help you accomplish what you want to accomplish. A pal is somebody who shares your interests. This is somebody you have fun with. You love hanging out. You would be excited to invite them to pickleball or karaoke or whatever your idea of an enjoyable afternoon is. And then a companion is somebody who shares your values.

11:24You have deep affection for each other. This is somebody you would confide in, somebody who would console you, somebody who provides compassion and emotional support. And then people that are in your life and still play a role but aren't allies, pals, or companions, I've come to call associates, they just fulfill a need for you. So it might be your carpenter or your neighbor who carpools with you, maybe not an emotionally meaningful connection. I think the ally-pal and companion bonds are, to me, the most useful ones to think about because we all have colleagues and friends and relatives who we vibe with in different ways.

12:02But we're not always on the same page about which kind of relationship we want or what we have. And so, Knight, if I approach you and I really want to be your pal and I ask you to play basketball with me all the time and you think we're only allies, then we are going to be like ships passing in the night. And when we spoke about this before, the idea that you're supposed to go up the ladder, and if you don't, you're getting demoted or you're being like, that's the problem, right? I think that's a broken mental model. I think most people would say, okay, we should be associates first, and then we'll become pals or allies.

12:35And then eventually we get to companionship. But that's not what I see in the data over and over again. What I see in the data, and I've lived this too, is you can be close on any one of these wavelengths. You can have allies you're really close with that you would trust with anything important to you. But your conversations are mostly about work. And you're trying to collaborate and you don't have necessarily, you don't hang out outside of work. You don't have conversations about your families. But they're basically your go-to partner for anything you want to get done. You can be really close with pals.

13:08A lot of us, I think, have high school pals and college pals, for example, that know us extremely well, that met us at a formative time in our lives. And you don't necessarily have deep conversations about love or loss, but you feel a real bond with them. You can also have distant companions. I think of in Fight Club, the single-serving friend idea. You're sitting on an airplane with somebody and you're both nervous and you start to reassure each other. That person could be a companion and you might never see them again. Right, right. What are we? You and me? Yeah, what are we? We're going to just talk about it in front of a whole crowd of people.

13:48Yeah, we should. Is it inappropriate? No, I actually think people should have this conversation. Yeah, so we're allies, right? We're doing things for the public and connecting with them, and we're together on that. But then we're companions, too. Are we? Although I thought so. It might be asymmetric. Tell me more. Well, we have the potential to be companions. How about that? Definitely companion potential. I see it. But I've asked him to go to the Sixers games, which he said no to twice. Did you hear that gasp? Gasp, gasp. I've failed to go to the Sixers games with you multiple times. It's true.

14:23That is true. But it's not for lack of interest. It's usually a last minute ask. That's true. I feel like I'm maybe. That's true, by the way. I'm number. Wait, wait, don't go there. Don't go there. Don't go there. Number 19. Anyway, the next page. Like hierarchy. and I'm like, okay, Knight has already, he's already asked his neighbor. We don't have time for this. We don't have time. No, no, wait, but this is interesting because I think you're right. Most of our interactions have been as allies. Yes. I think we, I think we both love sharing ideas and stories. And so we probably, we hit it off on that right away.

14:57Yeah. But our interactions feel very pal and companion-like. Yeah, they do. We love to joke around. Yeah. We also, you go deep very fast. Yeah. First time we ever met. Yeah. You poured your heart out to me and then regretted it the next day. I'm like broken in companion mode. Yeah, but I love that. It's a helpful paradigm because it isn't on a continuum of lesser to greater. There are different needs. I found that really, really helpful. I'm glad that resonates. So I aspire to be pals and companions tonight, not just allies. Thank you. If you reciprocate. Well, let me think about it. See, this is why I don't go to the Sixers.

15:33Being friendly says I like you. being personal says I see you on that same page, which is page eight. It is bonding to share a pebble you both love. Tell them what a pebble is. I've become such a fan of this language. So originally pebbling, the term comes from a mating ritual that some penguins use, where they go and collect these little pebbles. They're usually smooth, shiny stones. And then they present them to potential mates. And I'm not a penguin psychologist, but it seems that they're basically signaling, look, we could build a nest together. It's a bid for connection. I think the modern digital equivalent of pebbling, what penguins do, is when we send each other articles, links, reels, and memes.

16:18And it sounds trivial, but it's not. And I want to be clear, some of you are very active pebblers and are talking about it right now. Let's be clear, I'm not talking about spamming people with random junk that you found on the internet and sending it to every person you've ever met. What I'm talking about is, hey, I just read this article that actually reminded me of something that was in The Village. And I don't know if you ever want to make a sequel to it, but I think there's a seed here. This would be really interesting. And I've taken the time to remember a past conversation we had about the arc of The Village.

16:55and hopefully you see that as a gesture of care, right? That I cared enough to pay attention to what you were thinking about and I took the time to share something that I thought would be meaningful to you or even would be meaningful for us. That's so beautiful, that whole concept. I screwed up. There was one thing on the previous section, you know, I have six sections in the four things. So with the connection of like the allies, companions and all that stuff, in your footnote. Oh, wow, you read carefully. Yeah. In your footnote on page 32, you wrote this. Whereas integrators enjoy blurring the lines between work and home, segmenters like to maintain strict boundaries.

17:40Segmenting personal and professional relationships isn't just an individual preference. It's a cultural norm. Americans tend to be task focused on the job. We have associates and allies in the office and save our emotional bonds for home. In many parts of Europe, Asia, Latin America, people are more inclined to treat their colleagues like pals or companions. In one survey across continents, a quarter of the people in Poland and nearly half in India had gone on vacation with their co-workers compared with just 6 % in the United States. I thought that was really because people find me freakish. that the work people are, there's no difference.

18:22You're an integrator. Yeah, there's no difference for me. And yet everything in this society said, stop doing that, stop doing that, that's bad. Bad problems will come from it. Problems, problems, problems. So I just was interested in what your studies or your research has said about that. Because I am in this culture, but I come from another culture. Yeah, yeah. So my colleague, Nancy Rothbard here at Wharton has, I think, done the most interesting research on integrators and segmenters. and there are individual differences. There are also cultural differences. And I think one of the things that I've become increasingly aware of is it can actually go in both directions.

18:59So some people are one-way segmenters. They don't bring work home. Others are the other way. They don't talk about their family at work. But we know that integrators and segmenters often have a hard time dealing with each other, right? Because you're making all these bids It's for, I want to be your pal. I want to be your companion. And there are a bunch of Americans who are saying, nope, I don't want that. What are you doing? We're supposed to be professional and task focused and efficient. How have you overcome that barrier? Me? Yes, you. It's been tricky to be transparent. It's been tricky because I do live in the United States.

19:39I do work in the United States because my instinct is for everyone to be family. And it's tricky. We both know another person named Danny Meyer who in his book, he references a thing that he and I are very similar, Danny and I. And he used to think that, well, let's make everyone in our companies be family. But he realized that that's not actually working. And it's more, you know, you have a purpose together and you're all working together towards something. And I wonder if that's the answer for the United States. I think it might be. I think it's a huge problem to call a company a family because it creates unrealistic expectations of unconditional love.

20:25People hear, wow, we're a family. And then they can't imagine that they could ever get a bad performance review or they could be fired or furloughed because you wouldn't do that to your siblings or to your children. And yet we do do that in workplaces because we have performance standards. I think what people mean when they say our company is a family is we want to have a real sense of community. We want people to have belonging. We don't just want to be associates or allies. We want to interact as companions too. And we want to show care and respect for each other. And I think that's reasonable, right?

20:58You can say, look, I've seen you do this with people you work with, right? You show real affection for them. I've even heard you say you love some of them. And I think that's what companionship looks like. But you still have to be clear if they don't meet your collective performance expectations. That's going to be a real conversation that you have. So if you came into my company, would you say that I would need to adjust this the way I am with them? This is what makes me sad because there is the possibility that one day I will let you go and then it feels devastating or everything was a lie. No, I wouldn't say you have to fundamentally change, what I would say is you have to be extra clear.

21:39You have to be clear in saying, here's what it means to be good allies here. And so I think first and foremost, if people are going to work together, they need to be aligned about what allyship means. It means we agree to put the mission first. It means we agree to live by a shared code of values. And we accept those as our guiding principles. And part of those guiding principles for you might be, we treat each other like people who care deeply about each other. We're going to interact as companions. We're going to show each other emotional support. We're going to know what's going on in each other's lives.

22:12But I never want somebody to be companions at the expense of being good allies. Is that a conversation you could have? Have you had it? I may have said words that reflect that. But I think the emotions overtake it. the intensity of the relationships is overtaking logic. And so when you go, hey, this isn't working out, it's just all emotional to the point. And it's naturally emotional, even if you didn't run a company the way I run it. It's complicated. Definitely. And I think this is one reason why a lot of people who are creative the way that you are creative will bring in a CEO to do a lot of the management work.

22:58I see.

23:03If I brought him in. That's not advice. I like this line that I want you to tell me about this. This is a little bit of like how to strengthen our relationships and our things. You said compatibility grows with familiarity, which I thought was really cool, which says it can be nurtured or grown. Compatibility. Yeah, I think most people hear the term compatibility and they think we've got a match on it. Right. So are you compatible with someone on a first date? Are you compatible with someone in a job interview? If you pick the wrong person, you're screwed. But the overwhelming evidence on this suggests that it's very hard to know if you're going to click before you've actually built up some history interacting together.

23:47and we're both basketball fans so I think basketball is the easiest place to see this there's a study of NBA teams where it turns out that they don't maximize their chances of performing well until they play together the core team for about three years maybe four years and I think we see a lot of super teams fail in the first year and we say oh bad chemistry we should not have put them together but I am willing to give LeBron and Jalen Brown a second year right we we know what they can do individually we don't know what their game is going to look like together we don't know whether Jalen is going to naturally anticipate LeBron's no look passes or whether they're going to hit him in the face and we don't know how much time it's going to take to build up those shared routines so that they're complementing each other so that they're maybe compensating for each other's weaknesses and harnessing each other's strengths and that is not something you can assess on day one.

24:44Well I found it very encouraging that compatibility is something that is almost a skill a little bit. Would you say that or no? I think building it is definitely a skill. I think yeah I mean to continue with the basketball analogy I think the the first thing that the Sixers really talked about this summer right was okay how are we going to fit our pieces together? Everybody has a role that they're used to playing and is that role what the team needs right now? Let's try to figure that out and let's run a bunch of experiments to see what happens if Joel Embiid actually stands under the basket occasionally instead of hanging around the perimeter.

25:19If he were to play center, that might open things up. There's some sarcasm there. I don't know, it's just a hunch. I don't want to get off on a tangent, but I remember some study about how much the NBA teams, if they actually touch each other, like, you know, you did a good job like that, that the correlation between the success of the team and the amount of times they, is that true? Am I remembering that right? You are remembering it. This is a Michael Krause study, which is not, I don't want to claim that this is causal, but they do show that if they count the number of celebratory touches, so a fist bump, a high five, a bear hug, during games after great plays in October or November, you can actually use how often teams touch each other enthusiastically to predict successfully how many games they're going to win by the end of the season six months later.

26:07And let's just be really clear. I don't think that if I tap you a few more times, you're suddenly going to play better. I don't think that is creating team chemistry. I think it's a signal of team chemistry. I think the teams that have gelled are more likely to cheer for each other and to have each other's backs. And so you see that. That's basically a leading indicator that this is a team that's going to get better together. Because I was going to use that as evidence from my way of leading, but then he just... Yeah, you're like, okay, wait, so I should hug all my employees now. I hug everybody.

26:37It's true. Okay, so... Oh, yeah, this is cool. All human interaction is just basically taking turns showing each other our snow globes. A strong vibe develops when you're as interested in seeing their snow globe as you are in displaying yours. I like that analogy. Credit to the comedian Mae Martin. And if you haven't seen May's Netflix special, there's this one scene that I will not do justice where basically May says our lives are these snow globes. We have these precious experiences we've had and we're supposed to be showing each other our snow globes. But what most people just end up doing is saying, here's my snow globe.

27:15And let me tell you more about me and my snow globe. And they forget to show an interest in the other person. And I think sociologists call that conversational narcissism. Wow, silence. Let's just take that in. And you don't have to be a narcissist to engage in conversational narcissism. There are people who are perfectly decent, who sometimes slip into the pattern of just talking about themselves.

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30:24This is somewhere, I don't even know if I, it might be something I'm remembering from you. It just popped into my head. You form a stronger bond when you talk about your scars, not your wounds. I think there is something to that. I think sometimes when people talk about their current pain, it ends up feeling like a trauma dump. And people say, whoa, too much information, TMI. Whereas if you talk about your past struggles, you're not putting a burden on the other person. You're showing vulnerability, but it's bounded vulnerability. The other person doesn't have to hold your hand. They don't have to take care of you.

31:02They can just listen to you and understand you. And I think we all need companions that we can talk about our wounds with. But I think if you're trying to build a bond, it's probably better to start with a scar. Yeah. And because there's distance. And I think you went into by showing the vulnerability if I said, hey, Adam, you know, there was this thing. And this time I did this and it didn't go well. And I screwed up. Well, tell me, Knight, what didn't go well? I want to know. What is it? But it's like, you know, if I chose, let's say I didn't do a movie for the wrong reason. Harry Potter. OK, go on.

31:33No, not Harry Potter. That one I'm still standing by, although I wish I did it. But there was, you know, another movie that I didn't do. Are you going to tell us which one? Life of Pi. Oh. Yeah. Oh. Yeah. Oh, I would have loved to see what you could do with Jan Martel's story. Yeah. I just talked myself out of it. No one's going to want to see this, blah, blah, blah. Indian kid. That kid, in the story, the kid was born in my town that I was born in. And it was as if I wrote that piece. I felt like I wrote that book and I was going to build a boat in the backyard and just do the whole thing. And I just stopped.

32:09And that came from insecurity or wanting their love in a way that I wasn't going to risk it. And so, like, that's a scar because I don't really feel it as a wound anymore. And I learned that lesson, you know. Well, first of all, thank you for sharing that with me, companion. We're getting there. Maybe more importantly. I'll post a picture of me and him at the Sixers game. If you agree to cry, I'll go. We'll formalize the companionship at the Sixers game. I have to say, I'm glad you didn't make the movie. Because you took a different kind of risk. And you've defined your career making original films.

32:52And that's one of the things I admire most about your work. So, Scarby gone. Very sweet. And then some of the things that I was reading that helped us with challenging stuff about bonds and relationships, which was affecting to me. Bad relationships confine us to situations that activate our worst selves. Good relationships put us in situations that bring out our best selves. Great relationships introduce rituals that elevate us into better versions of ourselves. I thought that was really, really powerful. And I do think that you do that for me, you know, that like I want to have people over for dinner and connect and all that stuff, but that you do it.

33:34And you're pushing me out of my comfort zone and I know Bobna's comfort zone. But these are the things we want, but we don't actually do it. You're doing it and you're elevating us in this kind of aspirational way. Aw, thank you. Vibes are complex and evolving. We can gain chemistry, page 77. We can gain chemistry as we change the situation and get closer as we change each other. We grow closest as we allow each other to change. I thought that was really profound. But hard. Yeah. It's really hard because I think one of the most distressing things that happens to people in close relationships, this is true in romantic relationships, it's true in longstanding friendships, it's true in great collaborations too, is you feel like you've put the work in to build, you've built a great bond.

34:22And then all of a sudden, the person shows up different from how they've been in the past. And you just, you want to hold on to who they've been because you like what it brings out in you. And you are doing both the other person and the relationship a disservice by asking them to stagnate, I think. I have a saying that you can't grow up in the house you grew up in. Because like when I go visit my mom, I'm 16 again. It's just the way it goes, you know? We're having similar conversations is what is, And it's partly why I use different collaborators for a lot of my movies, new DPs and new, you know, anything that I just.

34:58What's a DP? Oh, sorry. Director of photography, the cinematographer. So, like, you know, I'd never even met this cinematographer who did Remain. I want to be a new version of myself. And then when we started working out the shots, he would be like, don't do that. Don't do that. And, you know, we can do it in one shot. I'm like, you know what? We can do it in one shot. You know, I started to think in a different way. And I was telling Bob and I had so many bad habits that he kept calling me on and he was awakening this thing in me. That's so interesting because I think a lot of people will say, look, knowing how much energy and effort it takes to build a great collaboration, the last thing I want to do is let that go.

35:34I want to keep those people with me. I think about the, I guess you see this a lot in comedy, like the Mel Brooks movies or the Adam Sandler movies, right? There's a consistent cast of characters both in front of the camera and behind it. And I love you saying, okay, I have some go-to people, but I also want to mix it up so I keep growing. This subject is very tricky, how to start a new version of yourself. Because as an artist, I need to be a new version of myself. So by definition, if I had everyone the same, I'm going to say it in the same language. A different story, but in this very similar accent, or that part of me, the crystal that is me, that part that's reflecting would be the same thing over and over.

36:16So I can feel it in me. Because if you were one of my collaborators, if you were the production designer, I would be like, I know what Adam's going to say. That's not a great thing when I go, I know what Adam's going to say. I don't want to know. Because if you can anticipate what I'll say, you've already internalized what I was contributing. You don't need me in the room. This evolving and changing so we can get closer. I mean, ideally, we could have both. The team that's been together for years, but they're still changing. Well, if you go back to the NBA study, after three or four years together, you start to see diminishing returns of shared experience.

36:52And I think part of it is their routines get stale and they become more predictable. Their competitors have an easier time anticipating what they're going to do. And that ultimately, the very thing that made them great, sinks them. And I think you're right. There is a sweet spot, not just with time, but also the mix of people. Christine Beckman and her colleagues have done some great studies where they show if you want to start a company, If you have a mix of people who have worked together before or come from the same place and people who are new to each other That's actually more likely to lead to a successful startup than people who either all have shared experience or none That's pretty much what I do And I consider my movies startups every time because they're original startups a group that I've been with and a group that I don't And they're all in significant positions So there is a little bit of we did it this way and we did a pretty good job And then the other one's like I want to do it completely different but I think this applies to all things, you know.

37:42We're not the same. There was some line you said in the book about predictability in lieu of something. Do you know what it is? Oh, yeah. I think I was writing about how much I hate small talk. Yes. I think you were saying it was in lieu of, like, a piece of humanity. Yeah, I think that... Which is so beautiful, like, that we have something beautiful and human that we're about to exchange and transform each other, and instead we say, you know, it's chilly today, isn't it? yes we're going to be british but yeah i think i think that happens all the time i think we go to familiar scripts to avoid awkwardness and that leads to a predictable interaction that won't make us feel weird but we do it at the expense of having a meaningful connection and this is what we all hate about small talk this that we're cutting off the humanity part to try to i don't know to get through it it's interesting because i i had a i had a great debate with somebody last week who said, you know, I complimented somebody's scarf in an airport and we hit it off.

38:44Yeah. So you're wrong about small talk. Yeah. And I said, no, a compliment is the opposite of small talk. The leap of faith you have to take to praise someone in something else. That is a huge display of vulnerability. Right. I don't know if you're going to respond well to it or not. I'm putting myself out there. And the fact that then the other person received it with gratitude and said, thank you. I actually am really proud of this scarf. I had to, it was a whole experience to find it and to get it. I think that compliments may feel small, but I think there's some of the deepest modes of connection we have.

39:20Yeah. I don't even think the word small talk is correct because it could be minute, but it's said with real genuine wanting to get to your humanity. Then it's there. That's why when I was referencing the interviewers who don't offer me their humanity, I'm out. Even for those few minutes, it's not worth us doing pretend. And I know he needs to get or she needs to get that answer for their editor or whatever it is, but it's not worth us giving up this moment together. No. And so this is actually a great way to make a public service announcement for anyone who interviews night in the future. Be sure to compliment his shoes.

39:54There you go. I thought this was really interesting and difficult, this stuff coming up, which is page 112, we're getting deep. Acceptance is not about justifying or excusing abuse. It's about granting others leeway to engage in behaviors that fall within our zone of appropriate action. Neuroscientists find that feeling understood is enough to light up the reward center in our brains. So I got interested in this because every relationship we have has moments of ambivalence, mixed feelings, right? We're usually allies or pals or companions with someone because we see a lot of virtues in them and we think they bring out virtues in us, but everyone has vices and flaws.

40:38And sometimes those end up being sort of unpleasant for us. So, you know, this night I run late a lot, a lot. Like tardiness is a, is a consistent challenge for me. And you also know my wife, Alison considers being late a mortal sin. so you can imagine how this goes in a marriage right allison is ready to leave for a dinner party and it's 37 minutes before we're supposed to leave and she already feels like i'm late and then we leave maybe 10 or 12 minutes late and she's not okay with that and i know that i'm supposed to do better but i just i try to pack too much into my day and i think flow states are precious.

41:20When I get absorbed in a task or a project, I just, I have a really hard time disengaging. I'm with Allison on this one. Thanks. I'm just emoting you to associate right here. Companion potential has been extinguished right in this very moment. I thought you would have my back, Knight, but this is my bugaboo, by the way. You're right. You're right. So here's the thing. Instead of trying to change my values or my philosophy of being on time, she accepts the fact that I am not good at showing up for things on time. And she says, I know that you run late. I know this is a habit of yours. I don't like it, but I can't change it.

41:58And then she says, here are the times when it's not okay. And she will tell me today we cannot be late because somebody has made dinner and it's going to end up getting burned if they're waiting for us. And I love, this is to me a great skillset that we could all apply. Whenever somebody does something that's unpleasant for me. I'll say, look, I accept that this is a preference of yours or a part of your personality. And I just want to be clear with you about here's where that's fine and tolerable. And here's where that could be problematic. And that way they know when they need to shape up, basically.

42:31I thought that was really beautiful. The idea of like having acceptance for this window of things in each other. Tell her. It was her brilliant idea. It's wonderful. And then the corollary to that is surprisingly, people who saw more severe flaws in their partners weren't less likely to stick with them. It came down to something else, whether they managed to maintain high opinions of their partners despite their flaws, which I thought was really amazing. You go through this honeymoon period and then you discover that the person that you love is only human. and that could be disappointing or it could be wow this person's flaws they actually sometimes are strengths in disguise so your partner who's sometimes lacking a filter and says inappropriate things is also the partner you can always count on to be honest because they just can't bring themselves to lie and if you look at it that way you can say wow this is this is something i really value This episode is sponsored by Scribd, the knowledge platform home to more than 350 million documents shared by real people.

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44:14Head to Scribd.com to claim yours. That's S-C-R-I-B-D dot com. Must be 18 or over. This episode is brought to you by Capital One. Capital One's tech team isn't just talking about multi-agentic AI. They already deployed one. It's called Chat Concierge and it's simplifying car shopping. Using self-reflection and layered reasoning with live API checks, it doesn't just help buyers find a car they love. It helps schedule a test drive, get pre-approved for financing, and estimate trade-in value. Advanced, intuitive, and deployed. That's how they stack. That's technology at Capital One. I've got big news.

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45:27the strength of a vibe is not determined by whether we fight over time fights expand our capacity for harmony the purpose of friction is not to ruin relationships it's to reset rebuild and reinforce relationships so good dude thank you i believe all those words that i wrote I you know look I think a lot of people avoid conflict because they're trying to keep the peace and they're afraid that it's going to hurt their bond but I think a relationship in which you can't disagree you can't give constructive criticism you can't tell the hard truths that the other person may not want to hear but needs to hear that's not a relationship it's a charade and I think that what happens in a relationship where you can be candid with each other is you actually grow your caring capacity to have conversations that might be uncomfortable or unpleasant and know you're doing them because you care.

46:22And you either want to help the other person or you want to build toward a better understanding of each other and improve your relationship. And that is what we see over and over again in the research. Even just when you randomly assign someone to say, pick a friend, relative, or colleague that you've been hesitating to tell something and level with them. a week or two later when you follow up with that person they feel closer and so does the receiver of that hard message and what that suggests to me is we're actually more skilled at this than we realize like the conversation you're hesitating to have is more likely to enhance your bond than it is to undermine it are you that way i've been a beneficiary of having people in my life who who dish out that tough love freely and i've come to realize that not paying that forward does a disservice to the people that I care about.

47:12Yeah, I mean, related to things that don't quite work for me is this. I don't want to make anybody feel bad. And so then I avoid that. And that's obviously not the right way to be. And there shouldn't be anything wrong with saying, hey, I prefer when you don't do that. I think that the biggest thing that I've learned about this is it's rarely the message that becomes a landmine. It's a misunderstanding of the motives and intentions of the messenger. And so if you can be clear up front about why you're saying what you're about to say, then it's surprisingly easy for people to hear a hard truth.

47:48So I found it's enormously helpful to start a difficult conversation by saying, hey, you know, if this relationship weren't important to me, I wouldn't even bother. Or I noticed a couple things that if I were in your shoes, I would want to hear your call. Do you want to hear them or not? I have a couple notes, but, or, you know, I've noticed that in my best relationships, we don't hesitate to just give each other advice on how we can be more effective. Yes. I would love to know what you think I could do better. And I'm happy to share that with you if that's of interest to you. I like all those.

48:22I'm stealing all of those. Try them at your own risk. I'm stealing all those. Okay. My last thing here, when researchers analyzed the success of more than 12 ,000 sports and work teams, social cohesion was less important than commitment to the purpose and pride in the team. Focusing on relationships between members was less effective than clarifying the group objectives. I thought that was amazing. It's all the things we're talking about. And again, my issue, which is, you know, I'm putting connection over all things. And when there is allies, pals, and companions, and I'm turning everything into a companion.

49:02Allies first and foremost. And this is, I mean, this is what you said your, your films are like startups. This happens in so many startups. People like each other and they don't realize that doesn't necessarily mean they're going to like working with each other. So friends get together, they launch something and then they walk on eggshells because they don't want to damage the friendship, that causes the project or the business to fail. And then in turn also does damage to the friendship. And so I think the beginning of any healthy collaboration is to walk through what does it mean to be good allies?

49:34What are the commitments we're going to honor for each other? And I think that that is a conversation I would not discourage you from having. Okay. So let's just, should we do some of the questions from the... Yeah. We got some great audience questions.

50:15Here we go. Okay, so here's the thing. I think in the moment when you experience chemistry with somebody else, it's not just a feeling. The vibe is not just in your head. It's actually traceable in your body. Your brainwaves and your heartbeats are synchronizing. And the danger of that is that can happen because of attraction. It can happen because of romantic attraction. It can happen because of interpersonal attraction. You're really drawn to the energy that's crackling in the interaction. What you don't know is whether you're longer term aligned. And I think the question I would ask, this goes right back to, are we potential allies, pals, or companions?

50:55So if you want to go beyond, you have the dopamine rush to, is this a meaningful connection? I think you have to know, are there goals that are important to you that they either share or are willing to support you in trying to achieve? if you want to be pals, you have to find some common interests and discover things or develop things that you really enjoy doing together. And, you know, that's really different, right? I want to spend free time with you. It's very different from, I think I can count on you and I can trust you, right? Which is what you're looking for in an ally. I think with a companion, what you're trying to figure out is, is this somebody who you could see yourself dropping everything to pick up from the airport or to rush to a hospital?

51:38And could you count on them to do the same thing, which is, again, really different from would they be a good pal or a good ally? And all of these questions are about trying to assess is there alignment in interest, goals, and values as opposed to just energy? Built into this question was a sense that that initial period was a lie. It's not necessarily a lie, right? Your energy can be synchronizing. Yeah, it could have been beautiful. And it could have been, like you said, a momentary companion. Yeah. And then when you tried to make it a permanent companion, all these other things came. Yeah, I think the lesson from that is don't mistake a great interaction for a great relationship.

52:18Those are two different things. That's a beautiful way because there's something dark, obviously, about this. And I prefer to see it that way. So that's really lovely. Let's see. I mean, some of these are for me. We have to, give me that. I want to know it's for you. No, no, no, no, no, no. You'll go off on a tangent. We're here for the tangents. Mr. Shyamalan, in a film, you often build a perfect comforting setup only to pull the rug out with a dark twist. I try to treat all the characters, we always talk about screenwriting, with love. Even the ones that don't do great things. So like the extreme would be the killers chopping up a body.

52:59Why? How do they get there if they don't? have love for that character, that character. Why are they doing it? I'm trying to say that people are complex. So you get to the family and the family is all loving, the neighbors loving, and I would write them with complexity. We sense things in writing and movies where it's two dimensional. If you have the cheesy end of a movie where the kid scores a touchdown and they win the big game and I would, and the mom's clapping, you know, and excited, I would whisper to the actress playing the mom and said, and this is the moment you lost your son. Now clap.

53:35And something in her nose that she's no longer, this is no longer her child. And yet it's super wonderful for him. That dark and light, then you'll never know that she was thinking that, but that would be a direction I might whisper. Wow. And you'll see, and you'll feel emotional and you don't know why, but she's representing loss and light in that way. Stop, we only have a couple minutes left. It's worth it. Ready? Well, I'm looking at your next question. You go ahead. If M. Night Shyamalan were to make a movie about intentional networking, which is just a hilarious, that would be a comedy. What do you think the unexpected twist would be?

54:08And what lesson do you hope the audience would take away? Oh, I don't know, bro. That's such a specific question. All right, I'll ask a more general one. Yeah. So one of the things I think probably everyone in the world loves about your movies, but one of the first things that I fell in love with in watching your movies was how you bend and blend genres and how you think you're watching like a thriller and then it becomes horror. Yeah. The question here is, how do people and societies benefit from horror movies as a genre? Well, first, I don't make horror movies. So that even that, like the idea of saying, if you have any touch of something frightening in the movie, you're a horror movie.

54:50So I don't feel that way about my movies. I do think going through darkness or hell, a fire to come out on the other side with a strength and a better sense of yourself and your place in the world to help it, which is most of my movies, which is the hero's journey, all of that stuff, is how I feel about the world. And so I'm able to take you to very dark places to show you something bright and light. You can tell no matter what I'm doing that the author is, believes the world, that universe is a benevolent place, which I do. I hope mine are you come away with light, you know. Well, I think that makes the light more rewarding, though, when you have those moments of horror.

55:34When I think about what I first felt like watching The Sixth Sense or The Village, that made the reveal at the end, the payoff, that much more emotionally resonant. So in that movie, Sixth Sense, you know, those are horror because we're saying we're scared. But really, the person that he's seeing is in pain and telling you something that, you know, there is a human being with tragedy. And then when he can talk to them, he's scared by them and then says, what did you want? What's wrong? and then they stop being scary. And then he actually, that's his goal. It's almost a little bit like that. What was the purpose of that is to understand pain or fears that confine us.

56:13Done brilliantly, of course. But it also, it gave me an answer to the question about your networking movie. So yeah, hit me. There's, you ready for this? This is my pitch. Pitch me, pitch me. Okay. So you've got a Wharton MBA student. Okay, I'm liking it. I'm liking it. Okay. And he's really shy. and he realizes he needs to get good at networking. And so he starts dropping business cards and introducing himself to people. And he doesn't know that everyone thinks he's a narcissist.

56:45He had me, he had me. It needs a little developing, but you had me. And you were going somewhere good. I mean, you had good inflection. I was with you. They were all with you. See, we're seeing right now how you struggle with conflict. In this fake pitch, But you couldn't even tell me that sucked. No, it started out great. It started out great. You're burying the rejection. You're seeing in real life this. Let's see, one last one here. How many close relationships do you think it is possible to have? Ooh. 14. No, I just, you know, I would love it. It would make my day as a social scientist if there were a precise answer to that question.

57:29But there isn't. Here's what I'll say. If you ask anthropologists like Robin Dunbar, what you will see are these concentric circles of relationships where most people can handle five really close bonds. Oh yeah, yeah, that's right. And then you go outside and then there's kind of another circle of maybe 15 and then 50 and 150 to 200. I think we should take a more nuanced look at that because I think how many close relationships you can have depends on whether we're talking about allies, pals or companions. I don't think you can have 50 or 100 close companions because the emotional investment and the time in order to keep up those relationships is greater but you might have dozens or even hundreds of pals if you think about all the people throughout your life that you've had fun hanging out with and those those people you could go years without seeing and if you ran into them at a reunion you could pick up right where you left off and you could accumulate dozens and maybe hundreds of allies too, and you have over your career.

58:28You have people you have built incredible collaborations with that maybe never came back for another movie, but you could. And those are potential allies waiting to be reactivated. Well, I love this in this time when everybody's so polarized and it's so difficult. This is really heartening. It's a lovely thing to see that there's so many ways we can be good to each other in different definitions. It's just beautiful. So I think you did a really good thing for all of us, dude. You're a wonderful author, wonderful thinker. Oh, thank you. Knight, you are as gifted at friendship as you are at filmmaking.

59:06And I don't say that lightly. I am in awe of how much effort and energy you put into your relationships. I see that when you're with your family. I see that when you're with random people that I introduced you to that you're excited to bond with. And I see that when we interact. And it's really, it's had a profound impact. me. Watching how much effort you put into your connections has inspired me to make more time for people in my life. And I want to thank you for that. And you coming to do this tonight is an example of that. Thank you. Thank you, brother. Thank you. Thank you, guys. Come here, brother.

59:37Awesome. So cute.

59:43Rethinking is hosted by me, Adam Grant. The show is produced by TED with Cosmic Standard. Our producer is Jessica Glazer. Our editor is Alejandra Salazar. Our engineer is Asia Pilar Simpson. Our technical director is Jacob Winnick. And our fact checker is Paul Durbin. Our team includes Eliza Smith, Roxanne Hailash, Banban Chang, Julia Dickerson, Tansika Sung Manivong, and Whitney Pennington Rogers. Original music by Hans Dale Su and Alison Leighton Brown.

1:00:13So you have a movie coming out in February, Remain. It's about a romantic relationship that, if I've read the look on Jake Gyllenhaal's face correctly. Well, I'm not going to tell you anything. Does not go as planned. Can you tell us anything about what's going to be in the movie? That was a weak segue. I'm inviting you to share a pebble with us. Oh, that was manipulative.

1:00:45This episode is brought to you by Capital One. Capital One's tech team isn't just talking about multi-agentic AI. They already deployed one. It's called Chat Concierge and it's simplifying car shopping. Using self-reflection and layered reasoning with live API checks, it doesn't just help buyers find a car they love. It helps schedule a test drive, get pre-approved for financing, and estimate trade in value. Advanced, intuitive, and deployed. That's how they stack. That's technology at Capital One. State fair food is getting smaller. and pricier. We'll have room for fried cookies. Okay, you never overspend on food.

1:01:21What's your deal? What's his deal? He went to Metro and got $450 in value on the new Samsung Galaxy A37 5G for free and no activation fees. Free phone? Oh, sign me up. Get that more for your money feeling only on Metro by T-Mobile. Bring your number and activate$40 period plan. $450 based on device discount waived activation fee. Not available if with Metro or T-Mobile in the past 180 days. Hi, I'm Debbie Millman. and I host a podcast called Design Matters from the TED Audio Collective. Every episode, I have conversations with designers, writers, artists, and other luminaries of contemporary thought.

1:01:59People like Roman Mars, Ai Weiwei, Ethan Hawke, and Ashley Ford. We not only talk about their crafts, but how they design the arc of their lives, what they've learned, what obstacles they've overcome and how they've done it and how they see the world. Join us for an inquiry into the broader world of creative culture. Find and follow Design Matters with Debbie Millman wherever you're listening to this.