Willpower is the wrong tool for changing habits. Do this instead. | Charles Duhigg: Full Interview

I'm Charles Duhigg, a writer at the New Yorker magazine

and the author of The Power of Habit,

Supercommunicators and Smarter, Faster, Better.

Today on Big Think,

we're going to be talking about how to change your habits

and create new habits,

how to create the behaviors that you most want.

And we're going to be talking about how to become a super communicator,

how to use language

and conversation so that you can connect with anyone

and help create the world

that you most want to see.

Before we start talking about communication, let's talk about habits,

about how to build the right habits in our life.

Because much of how we connect with other people,

much of how we communicate is built on the habits that we live by.

And so when we understand how those habits work,

we gain power over changing them and making them better.

Part one, how your brain is running on habits.

Chapter one, the habit loop.

I've been a reporter for about 25 years now

and had these experiences where I got really interested in trying to understand the

psychology of why we make the decisions

that we make.

In particular, when I was in Iraq as a reporter,

this is during the war,

I met an army major who taught me

that the way that the army functions is by changing people's habits.

That your instinct when someone's shooting at you is to run away.

but they want to teach you to shoot back.

And so what they do is they try

and figure out how to teach you the right habits.

Or when you're overseas in the military,

you can call home and talk to your spouse every night.

And if you don't have good communication habits,

then you end up getting into fights and as a result,

you're distracted when you're on patrol.

And so one of the things

that I've learned is

that there's a huge amount of knowledge that's been generated in really the last

couple of decades about why we do the things we do

and more importantly how to do them better.

Whether it's creating habits for myself around exercise

or whether it's communicating with the people

that I care care about the most.

We now know due to advances in neural imaging

and data collection why some people do this better than others

and how we can learn from them. about 40 to 45% of what you

do every day according to studies is a habit.

Now you might think of it as a choice that you're making.

But actually if we can observe your life,

what we'll see is that you're just acting almost unconsciously.

You're doing the same thing that you've done before.

And these habits, they shape everything from what we eat to what we spend

to how we treat other people to what we do at work.

Almost half of what we do every day is a habit.

And the reason why is

because our brains are designed to create habits wherever they can.

There's a part of our brain known

as the basil ganglia

that exists just to create habits.

Every animal on Earth has a basil ganglia.

And the reason why it's there is

because if you had to make a decision every single time you were walking

down the trail whether to pick up the apple

or pick up the rock

and put it into your mouth,

you would be so overwhelmed that you would never you would never accomplish anything,

right?

You'd never make it past the apple and the rock.

So what our brain has done is it's evolved in order to create habits.

And every single habit that exists within our cranium,

almost half of what we do every day operates the same way.

It's what's known as the habit loop.

A habit actually has three components.

There's a cue, which is like a trigger for an automatic behavior to unfold,

and then a routine, the behavior itself, what we think of as the habit.

And then finally, a reward.

And your brain, the basil ganglia,

what it does is it looks for that pattern of the cue, the routine,

and the reward.

And when it sees it frequently enough, it says,

"I'm going to make this automatic."

Instead of you having to make a decision to get up

and go running in the morning,

instead of you having to make a decision to pick up

that doughnut and put it into your mouth,

I know what the cue and the reward are.

And so, I'm going to make it happen effortlessly.

What's important about this is

that it means that we can take control of our habits.

If we can recognize the cues and rewards that inform those behaviors, those routines,

if we can start fiddling with the gears inside our head,

then we can build the habits

that we want and we can change the habits

that we dislike until we become the people

that we want to be.

So when people think about habits,

sometimes they think that it's a matter of discipline, right?

If I have enough willpower,

then I'm going to have the right habits

or they think it's a sign of character. good people have good habits

and bad people have bad habits.

But that's actually not right.

In fact, the science says that that's completely wrong.

Your brain does not distinguish between good habits and bad habits.

Your brain just creates habits.

Anytime that there's a cue, routine, and reward,

your brain will create

that connection and they'll make

that behavior easier and easier

and easier until it becomes automatic.

It's up to you to decide whether it's good or bad.

It's up to you to decide whether it's something you want to encourage

or something you want to discourage.

And it's not a matter of discipline, right?

We can use willpower to to push ourselves to do amazing things.

But when we become really amazing,

when we don't have to use

that willpower anymore is

when a behavior becomes a habit.

When it happens almost without willpower.

Anyone who's who was not an athlete at one point who took up running

knows that the first couple of times you go for a run,

it's miserable, right?

You're like pushing yourself

and then something happens

that like two or three weeks later,

you wake up and you put on your running shoes

and you're out on the path

and you realize,

you know what, I didn't I didn't even have to push myself to do

this.

I just kind of did it almost unthinkingly.

That's because the habit has taken hold.

Habits are not a reflection of our internal character

or our capacity for discipline

or willpower.

Habits are a mechanical function that happens inside our brains.

There's two basic mistakes

that we make when we try

and get rid of a bad habit.

The first is that we try to extinguish it, right?

We try to say like, okay,

I used to smoke and now I'm not going to smoke anymore.

I'm just going to throw all the cigarettes out.

And that can work for a little while, right?

You can use your willpower to resist the temptation to smoke.

But the problem is that old Q routine and reward,

it still lives inside your brain.

And at some point, you're going to have a moment of weakness.

Your mother-in-law is going to come into town.

You're going to have a really tough day at work.

And you're going to see that old cue.

Oh, that's the corner that I always smoke on.

And almost thoughtlessly, you're going to revert to the old habit.

And so the number one most important thing is to recognize we can't extinguish

a habit.

What we need to do is we need to change that habit.

We need to take advantage of the old cue

and the old reward

and insert a new behavior into the habit loop.

And this is the second mistake

that most people make is

that they focus on the behavior instead of focusing on the Q

and the reward.

So, there's this question,

how do we diagnose the cues and rewards that shape our habits?

Let's talk about Q's first.

Almost all Q's fall into one of five categories.

It's usually a time of day, a particular place,

the presence of certain other people, uh an emotion,

or a preceding behavior that's become ritualized.

And so, if you're trying to change a habit,

one of the things you can do to figure out the cue is just

write down those five things whenever the craving hits you.

When you have a craving for a cigarette,

when you have a craving for a donut,

when you normally go running in the morning,

just write down what time of day is it?

What am I feeling right now?

Who else is around me?

And what you're going to notice in a couple of days is a pattern.

You're going to be able to identify the cue by noticing what remains consistent

daytoday.

We also have to figure out what the reward is.

And rewards are really tricky.

The rewards are like little packages that it's hard to unpack sometimes.

So when you're smoking a cigarette,

is the reward there

that you get a burst of energy

or is it that actually

when you smoke,

you get to go outside

and talk to your friends

and take a take a little break from work

when you have a donut in the morning.

Is the the reward the taste

that you get from it

or is the reward the sense of indulgence

that you give yourself?

I got something done this morning.

I get to reward myself.

I deserve this donut.

The way that we actually figure out what the reward is is we experiment.

And to give you an example of this,

I want to tell you about a bad habit

that I once had

when I was working in the New York Times.

I fell into this bad habit where every afternoon I would get up

and I would go up to the cafeteria

and I would get a cookie

and I would eat

that cookie.

And I started gaining a little bit of weight as a result.

And it got to a point where like I would actually write on these

post-it notes,

"Do not eat any cookies."

And I'd put them at the bottom of my computer screen.

And somehow every day I managed to ignore

that note and go up to the cafeteria

and get a cookie.

So when I was talking to habit experts, I asked them,

"What's going on here?

How do I change this?"

And they said, "Well, look,

what you need to do is you need to figure out what the cue

and the reward for this cookie habit is."

Each day when I felt a cookie urge,

I would write down these five things. the time of day,

who's standing around me, where am I, am I feeling any particular emotions,

is there a preceding behavior that's become ritualized?

And within like 3 days, it was very clear that the habit always struck,

the craving always struck at about 3:30 in the afternoon, right?

So, it was clearly a time of day was the cue.

And then I had to figure out what the reward was.

And when I talked to these researchers, I was like, well,

I don't know what the reward is.

The reward are cookies.

They're delicious.

And they were like, no, no, no, no.

My friend, you have to understand a cookie is like a bundle of rewards

all tied together.

Is it that you're craving that cookie because it tastes good?

Or is it that it gives you a burst of energy

because there's sugar in it?

Or is it that this is just a nice way to take a break

from work because you ride the the elevator up

and you get the cookie

and you ride the elevator back down?

You need to experiment with different rewards to figure out

which one is driving this habit. 3:30 in the afternoon,

one of the things I would do is I would test the hypothesis.

Is this about getting energy from the sugar in the cookie?

And instead of getting a cookie,

I'd get a cup of coffee

and I'd shoot that coffee down

and I'd notice,

is the cookie urge gone?

No, it is not gone.

Then I thought maybe maybe it's because of the sugar.

Maybe it's cuz I really enjoy the reward of eating the sugar.

So the next day,

what I did is I went up to the cafeteria

and instead of getting a cookie,

I took some Splenda

and I spread the Splenda on my tongue

because that's going to give me the reward sensation of sugar.

Did that make the cookie craving go away?

It did not.

I still craved the cookie.

And after a while when I did these little experiments,

what I noticed is that when I'd go up to the cafeteria,

oftentimes there were friends there

and I would buy my cookie

or I'd get my coffee

or I'd spread the splend on my tongue

and sometimes I'd go over

and I'd chitchat with my friends

and we'd spend 10

or 15 minutes gossiping about other people inside at work.

And when I'd go down to my desk after doing that gossip,

suddenly I wasn't craving a cookie anymore.

I felt satisfied and that's what helped me figure out the reward

that I was seeking was social interaction.

So now I know the Q and the reward.

The Q is a certain time of day, 3:30 in the afternoon.

The reward is social interaction.

And so what I did is I came up with a new habit loop

for myself.

What are known as implementation intentions.

At 3:30 in the afternoon, I would stand up from my desk.

I would look around the newsroom.

I'd go find someone to gossip with.

I'd gossip with them for 10

or 15 minutes and

then I'd go back to my desk

and the craving was completely gone.

I didn't crave the cookies.

I didn't have any problem ignoring the cookies,

not going up to the cafeteria and just avoiding a cookie.

What I've done is instead of trying to extinguish a bad habit,

I've changed that habit.

And in doing so,

the reason it's been successful is

because I paid attention to the cues

and the rewards instead of focusing exclusively on the behavior itself.

This is actually known as the golden rule of habit change.

That it is difficult

if not impossible to extinguish a habit

because the neural connections of

that Q routine reward will continue existing in my brain for years.

So the golden rule is

if I change that habit rather than trying to extinguish it by paying attention

to the cues and rewards

and finding a new behavior

that corresponds to the old Q

and delivers something similar to the old reward,

then that change is going to be much easier

and it's going to be much longerlasting.

Chapter two, identifying cravings.

A craving is a neurological signature

that emerges inside your brain

when you see a certain cue

and you expect a specific reward.

It often times happens almost outside of our consciousness.

Right?

When you walk past the break room containing the box of donuts,

before you walk past that room, you are not craving a donut.

In fact, you probably feel fine without having anything to eat.

But then you walk past the break room and your brain notices that cue,

the pink box filled with donuts.

And suddenly it starts anticipating the reward.

And when we start anticipating a reward, if we don't satisfy that anticipation,

that expectation, we feel a lack.

We actually feel what looks like in neurological scans a small sense of depression.

Because when our brain says, "Oh man,

this is when I usually get the doughnut,

and now you've reminded me that donuts are out there.

I can't wait to eat that sugar."

If suddenly I tell my brain, "Nope, we're not going to have the sugar.

We're just going to willpower past the break room, not get any donuts."

There's a part of my brain that's saying, "What?

That's not fair."

Like, I I was super excited for the donut.

Give me the donut.

The habit loop is driven by cravings.

When you back your car out into out of the driveway without even having

to think about it,

you get a small dopamine reaction inside your brain

when you make it safely into the street.

That's the reward.

And when you get into the car, your brain expects that small reward sensation.

It expects that dopamine.

And so if you screw up

and you hit the trash can on the way out,

not only do you feel frustrated, you feel disappointed.

The negative aspect of not fulfilling

that expectation of a reward makes the behavior even worse.

It makes it disappointing.

And so in general,

when we're thinking about the habits that we want to cultivate,

we have to think about what are the cravings

that I want to grow inside my own head.

That's why, for instance, when it comes to exercise,

one of the best pieces of of advice is to choose an obvious cue,

right?

Put your running shoes next to your bed

or lay out your running clothes the night before

or plan on meeting your friend at the gym every Wednesday night.

That's a social cue.

And then after you exercise, give yourself a reward right away.

Give yourself a small piece of chocolate

or a nice smoothie

or a nice long shower.

Now, most of us,

we go and we work out

and then we wait like 45 minutes before we eat a piece of chocolate

because we like to pretend they're not related to each other,

right?

We don't want to reward ourselves with chocolate for for exercising.

But actually what research shows is

that if you reward yourself right away with something

that you actually enjoy,

your brain will start saying, "Oh my gosh, I like this exercise thing.

Every time I exercise, I get a piece of chocolate.

I get a smoothie.

I get a nice long shower."

And so our brain will make that behavior easier and easier and easier.

Now, compare that to how most people start exercising, right?

They wake up in the morning and they say,

"I'm going to go for a run."

And it takes them 10 minutes to find their running shoes.

and they don't know where they're going to go

and so they're kind of uncertain

and they get out the door.

Then they come home and now they're running late, right?

They got to get the kids ready for school.

So they rush through their shower, they don't eat very much breakfast,

they throw their kids in the car, they take their kids to school.

Now they rush to their desk

and they sit down at their desk

and they're 15 minutes late

and they say,

"Ah, finally I made it to my desk."

In other words, they are punishing themselves for exercise.

And your brain will pay attention to that punishment.

Your brain will say, "This exercise thing stinks because every time I do it,

I end up running late

and I get really stressed out

and I don't have time to take a nice shower."

We have to think about cultivating the right cravings, the right rewards,

the right cues in order to make a behavior stick.

One thing that often happens is

that we think that a craving is a representative of who we are,

right?

We think that cravings are things that we have no power over.

And we do know

that there are for instance some genetic predispositions to things like alcoholism

or to drug use.

But what's interesting is those genetic predispositions they are not particularly significant.

Right?

There are lots of people who genetically are predisposed to alcoholism who never become

alcoholics or that they were drinking too much

and they give it up

and they don't have a problem with it.

A craving is not a representation of who we are.

A craving is a representation of the cues

and rewards that we surround ourselves with.

And so if there is a craving that you feel really powerless against,

then start thinking about what is the cue that triggers that craving.

Is it possible to to exclude those cues from my life to not hang

out with those people

that I normally drink with?

What is the reward that the craving is seeking?

Is it that I really like alcohol

or is it that actually

When I drink,

I can feel really relaxed because there's other ways to feel relaxed.

The craving does not condemn you to a certain lifestyle, to a certain behavior,

to a certain identity.

And you have all the power in the world, to build new habits,

to change your environment,

to find other behaviors that deliver that reward in a healthier way,

and make that craving much less powerful in your life.

Chapter 3, Keystone Habits.

So, one of the things

that we've discovered that's really interesting is

that some habits are more powerful than others.

Some habits when they start to change,

they seem to set off this chain reaction

that change other patterns in our lives.

We've all experienced this before, right?

Sometimes when you go running in the morning,

it's easier to eat a healthy lunch that day.

And that doesn't really make any sense.

It's like why would running in the morning make it change your eating habits

at lunch?

But what researchers have found is

that some habits are known

as keystone habits and

when they change they set off this chain reaction.

Now what's interesting is that keystone habits are different for different people.

Right?

If you were a an athlete in high school

and then you stopped running for a few years,

but you start running again,

then it's unlikely that running is going to be a keystone habit for you

because you already think of yourself

as a runner.

It's already part of your identity.

But if you're someone like me who was not an athlete in high school

at all,

who didn't start exercising until he was in his late 20s and early 30s,

then what happens is

when I get up

and I go for a run in the morning,

there's a part of my brain that says, you know what, I'm a runner.

Like, I'm the kind of person who can wake up in the morning

and go for a jog.

And that person when they walk into the cafeteria for lunch,

they don't pick up the unhealthy hamburger, they pick up a salad.

You're that kind of person.

Keystone habits are powerful because they change our self-image.

They change how we see ourselves.

Particularly in part in

that part of our brain

that doesn't listen to our logic

and doesn't listen to our arguments,

but just looks at our behavior

and determines who we are based on what we actually do rather than what

we say.

There's two researchers named Otton

and Chang in Australia who have looked at exercise habits.

And what they found is that for people who previously didn't exercise,

when they start exercising, it sets off all kinds of chain reactions.

Not only do they eat healthier on the day that they exercise,

they use their credit cards less.

They procrastinate less at work.

They end up doing chores at home,

like washing the dishes earlier in the day.

They get to bed on time more frequently, and they sleep better.

Now, there's nothing about going for a run in the morning

that makes me think like,

"Oh, I should keep my AMX in my pocket today."

But one of the things

that happens is that there's part of my brain paying attention to how I

behave.

And when that part of my brain sees me go

and exercise in the morning,

it says to itself, you know what?

You're a disciplined guy.

You're the kind of guy who doesn't have to spend needlessly for something you

don't really need.

Just keep the credit card in your pocket.

If we identify these habits that change how we see ourselves,

then all we have to do is change

that one habit and it'll cause changes throughout the rest of our life.

So, when you're feeling stuck

and you're trying to figure out what's the keystone habit that's going to help

get me unstuck,

the most important question you can ask yourself is what kind of change seems

irrationally scary to you?

Anyone who hasn't exercised before,

they know that if they say that they want to start exercising,

it's kind of terrifying.

And it shouldn't be terrifying, right?

There's lots of guidance online how to go out and get running shoes.

There's gyms you can join.

And yet, for someone who hasn't exercised, if you say like,

"Tomorrow morning we're going to go work out."

All of a sudden, they're going to get a little bit anxious.

They're going to say,

"I don't know if I'm going to be able to do this."

That irrational anxiety, that unexplained overreaction emotionally,

that is a sign that for you exercise will be a keystone habit.

Because what that's really saying to you is you're saying you don't see yourself

as someone who exercises. you're having trouble reconciling your image of yourself with this

new behavior.

Which means that if you go out and you do that new behavior,

suddenly your image of yourself is going to update.

Suddenly your image of yourself is going to start saying, "You know what?

I never thought of myself as an exerciser,

but I've run three times this week."

And that's kind of exerciser behavior.

So look for the habits that seem irrationally scary to you.

And those are the keystone habits.

And they could be things like exercise.

It could also be I always avoid having this conversation with my mom, right?

It it it doesn't make any sense.

Like it's an easy conversation to have

and yet I keep on shying away from it.

That means that that kind of conversation is a keystone habit for you.

Look for the kind of change

that seems irrationally scary to you

and lean into that.

And what you'll find is that it's hard at first.

It takes some willpower.

It takes some effort.

But pretty quickly, your brain starts telling you, "Oh, you know what?

You're the kind of person who can do this.

You're the kind of person who exercises.

You're the kind of person who can have tough conversations with your mom.

You're the kind of person who doesn't procrastinate."

And suddenly, you'll find all these different parts of your life have become easier

and better as a result.

So, the biggest idea I would leave you with

when it comes to keystone habits is you don't have to change everything at

once,

right?

In fact, you only have to change one thing

as long as it's the right thing.

If you want to get along better with your with your relatives,

you don't have to call every single one of them.

You don't have to have all the tough conversations.

You just have to call up your mom

and talk about that one thing

that you've been avoiding forever.

You don't have to change everything.

In fact, if you try and change everything, you're going to fail.

Instead, look for one change that seems meaningful to you,

one change that scares you a little bit,

one change where you think to yourself, "If I do that,

that's kind of a big deal.

Even though it doesn't seem like it should be a big deal,

even though going running for two blocks in the morning doesn't seem like it

should be that big a deal,

if I do that,

it actually kind of feels like a big deal to me."

And just focus on changing that one habit.

And when you do, all of a sudden,

all the other patterns in your life will start to become more flexible,

more malleable, and you'll find ways to change them without even thinking about it.

Chapter 4, how your beliefs and communities affect habits.

One of the things

that happens when we're changing a habit is

that we're actually trying to convince ourselves

that change is possible.

And there's a stage in every habit change where you just have to believe

that it's going to work,

right?

You have to have a little bit of faith.

If I run three times this week,

next week it's going to be easier to go out and do a run.

Now, the thing about belief though is it's like a muscle.

If we don't practice it, our ability to believe and change gets atrophied.

And so, what's really important is to find a way to practice belief.

One of my favorite examples of this is Alcoholics Anonymous, right?

So, Alcoholics Anonymous has these 12 steps to stop drinking.

And there's no science behind them, right?

In fact, the guy who came up with the 12 steps,

the reason he chose 12 of them is

because there's 12 apostles in the Bible.

He just made them up one night

when he was sitting on his bed before before creating Alcoholics Anonymous.

And yet for millions and millions of people,

the AA's 12 steps gives us a gives them a way to stop drinking.

So what's going on there?

Well, if you look at the AA steps,

some of them are designed to help you become aware of the cues

that are spraying your habits,

right?

One of the steps is you have to go make amends.

You have to go to to apologize to people.

And when you're apologizing to people,

what you're actually doing is you're looking for the pattern that impacted their life.

And looking for that pattern shows you what the different cues are

that set you off for drinking,

that set you off for acting in a bad way.

There's other steps that ask you to figure out why you're seeking out drinking,

what drinking gave you, what the craving was stemming from.

That's about reward salience, about recognizing rewards.

But what's interesting is there's a number of the steps

that ask someone to believe in a higher power.

Now the higher power doesn't have to be God, could be nature,

could be the force.

It doesn't say that you have to be religious,

but it does say that you have to practice believing.

You have to walk into a meeting and say,

"A higher power is available to me that can help me avoid drink."

A higher power made it possible for Jim to stop drinking.

And you know what?

If Jim can give it up,

I can definitely give it up because Jim is kind of a right?

Like I think that Jim is like the dumbest guy I've ever met.

And if he can stop drinking, I can definitely stop drinking.

I'm going to start practicing this belief that I can give up booze.

And that doesn't mean that at first it's perfect.

Doesn't mean that it's easy.

But that practicing of belief, that practicing of believing in a higher power,

of believing that other people in your community care about you,

of believing and seeing evidence

that this guy was able to stop drinking simply

because he believed he could stop drinking.

That convinces me that that muscle is getting stronger.

When I practice belief in a setting like AA,

it becomes easier for me to believe that I can change.

And when I believe I can change,

that change becomes infinitely more likely to happen.

One thing that we know is

that belief is easier to practice in a community.

And it's easier to practice

because not only do we have other people supporting us,

not only do in AA we have a sponsor

and we're sitting in a room full of people

and they say,

"I believe in you.

Even if you don't believe in yourself, I believe that you can change."

Not only do we get that,

but we get to see the evidence from other people

that this belief can occur.

When I see someone who says,

"I was an alcoholic for 14 years

and I haven't had a drink in 9 months."

When they stand up

and they tell their story about how alcohol had impacted their lives

and how hard it is,

but it's been nine months

and they think that they'll never have a drink again.

That belief becomes easier for me to believe in

because I see it reflected in other people.

Belief is a group activity.

There's a reason why religions have meetings where everyone gets together for mass

or for temple.

Why we all come together and we read a religious book together.

It's because believing in a higher power is easier

when I'm in the company of other people.

We learn to believe in belief.

We learn to practice it.

We learn to convince ourselves

that it's real because we can see it in the lives of other people

when we get together in a community.

And most importantly, when we feel the sense of social expectations,

it's much easier to show up to the gym

when you know that you're going to meet your friend Bob there.

And if you don't show up,

Bob's going to be disappointed in you

and he's going to call you

and he's like,

"Where were you, man?

Why didn't you show up?"

Belief is easier in the company of others.

And so we should take advantage of

that and we should let other people know what habits

and what changes we're trying to make

and we should ask them to hold us to be a part of our

accountability to them.

Change is a really mysterious thing in people's lives.

We don't know exactly why some people change.

We don't know what push them over the edge and makes change easier.

But we do know that it happens in tandem with other shifts.

Like for instance, developing new beliefs about ourselves

and that those beliefs are easier to achieve

when we're in a community

that also believes in us.

Like there's going to be a time in everyone's life

that you're trying to make some change.

You're trying to start running and exercising.

You're training for a marathon.

You're trying to give up cigarettes.

You're trying to give up alcohol.

And there's just going to be some day that it's just so hard.

Something stressful happened at work and you really want to have a drink.

You had to stay up late last night.

Now you're supposed to w up

and do a workout

and go running and you're like,

I'm so tired.

Is it those moments when someone turns to us and they say,

I believe that you can do this.

When they say, look, I know it's hard right now.

I know that like this is the moment when you're feeling weakest,

but I've seen you in

so many different situations just like this where you did the right thing.

You managed to avoid the bar. you managed to to wake up

and do that run even

though you're exhausted.

Even though you can't believe in yourself right now,

I can share my belief in you with you.

And what we know is

that that's often times

as powerful as believing in ourselves.

If we really want to change,

what we should do is we should find other people who either want to

change with us or who can encourage us in making those changes.

Because the truth of the matter is we all have moments of weakness.

And the people who succeed, it's not because they're never weak.

It's because when they are weak,

they are surrounded by other people who remind them that once they were strong.

If you want to change a habit,

the first and most important thing

that you can do is sit down

and create a small plan for yourself.

Just sit down and say, "Okay, the next time that this habit strikes,

the next time that I'm feeling this urge,

I'm going to pay attention to the cues.

What time of day is it?

What's going on around me?

And then I'm going to pay attention to what reward I think this habit

is giving me."

Just sit down and write it out.

And you might not get it right at first, and that's okay.

But then also sit down

and write out why you believe this change is possible.

Part two, what makes conversations work?

Chapter 5, how to become a super communicator.

Before I wrote super communicators,

one of the reasons I got

so interested in it is

that I was working at the New York Times at

that point and I was a reporter

and they made me suddenly a manager

and I figured I would be a great manager,

right?

I went to Harvard Business School to get an MBA.

I've had managers my whole life.

I was like, I got this.

And more importantly, I'm a professional communicator.

And then I got put into the job

and I realized really quickly I was terrible at this.

And in fact, the thing that I was most terrible at was communication, right?

I would have these people who were reporting to me

and they would come to me with a problem

and and I thought

that they wanted me to solve it for them

when actually what they wanted is they wanted me to empathize with them.

or I would try

and explain one of my ideas

and I would find

that I thought the explanation made total sense,

but everyone else walked away from the meeting saying,

"What exactly are we supposed to do here?

I don't understand how this fits into our assignments."

And so, this got me really interested in trying to understand what we know

about communication.

A supercommunicator is someone who manages to connect with almost anyone through conversation,

through language.

And the thing is that we are all supercommunicators at one time or another,

right?

There is definitely a time in the last month

that a friend of yours has called you up

and you've known exactly what to say to make

that person feel better.

You know, whether they're asking for advice or they're asking for empathy,

there's probably some meeting you walked into in the last month where you knew

exactly what to say to get the rest of your teammates on board with

your idea.

We all have these moments of super commmunication where we connect with other people

where suddenly we see the world the same way.

What's interesting though is that there are some people who do this consistently.

There are some people who can connect with literally anyone at any time.

Those people are consistent supercommunicators.

And what we've learned is

that the difference between us

and them is only a couple of skills

that they recognize as skills

and that they practice until they become habits.

Any of us can be a super communicator all the time.

We know how to do this.

We know how to have a conversation with a stranger the same way

that we have a conversation with our best friend.

But we need to understand what the skills are

that allow us to do

that.

And once we do,

it opens up a whole new world of how to communicate

and connect with other people.

There are three different kinds of conversations

that we have most of the time

when we open our mouth.

There's the practical conversation, right, where we're talking about making plans together.

We're solving problems together.

And the goal in a conversation of of a practical nature is really to

answer a question,

to come to a resolution, to make a decision.

But next, there's also emotional conversations where I tell you what I'm feeling.

And I don't want you to solve my feelings.

I don't want you to propose a plan on how we're going to fix

my feelings.

What I want in that conversation is I want you to empathize.

I want you to tell me you understand what I'm feeling.

You acknowledge these feelings

that I'm having and they're completely legitimate to have.

and you know what it feels like to have those.

And then finally, there's the social conversation,

which is about how we relate to each other, how we relate to society,

the identities that are important to us.

When someone says something like, "As a mom,

the way that I see this is that's a clue

that they're having a social conversation.

They're identifying their identity before they're giving you their thoughts,

which means their identity has a role to play in how this is going

to unfold.

And in a social conversation, I'm not looking for a plan or solution.

I'm also not looking necessarily for empathy.

What I'm looking for is acknowledgement.

Somebody saying, "Look, I understand

that you sees the situation differently than I do

because you're a mom

and I don't have kids.

And that doesn't necessarily mean we agree with each other,

but I acknowledge I validate

that you have a perspective on this

that that I don't."

These three kinds of conversations, the practical, the emotional, and the social,

they're all equally important.

And in a discussion, we will have all three different kinds of conversations.

But if I'm in a practical mindset and you're in an emotional mindset,

then it's like two ships passing in the night, right?

You bring up a problem

that you feel really bad about

and I try and solve it for you

and you don't want my solution. you don't appreciate my my my recommendations.

What you really want is you want me to say, "Look, ah,

that sounds like such a rough day.

I'm so sorry that you went through that."

Um, and I'm just wondering,

do do you want me to help you solve these problems

or or do you just need to let me know what you're feeling to

get this off your off your chest?

And what you'll find is the other person will tell you what they need.

They'll tell you what kind of conversation they want.

They'll say something like, "No, no, no.

This isn't a big deal.

I don't I don't need to solve this.

I just I just need to get it off my chest.

Does this drive me crazy?

It's when we get aligned

that we really hear each other

and that we feel connected to each other.

When you're having a great conversation with someone

or even when you're having just a good conversation with someone,

your body and your brain starts to change.

So without you realizing it, you and the person you're speaking to,

your heart rates will start to match each other.

Your breath patterns will start to match each other. the dilation of your pupils.

Even if you're talking over Zoom and you're separated by thousands of miles,

the dilation of your pupils will begin to echo each other.

And most importantly, if we could see inside your brain,

what we would see is

that your thoughts and the thoughts of the person you're talking to are becoming

more and more aligned.

You can actually see it on a graph.

The little valleys and hills, they become similar.

And that kind of makes sense

because if I tell you what I'm feeling

or if I tell you about an idea

that I had,

you actually experience that idea.

And what's important there is that as our brains begin to sink,

what we do is we achieve something known as neural entrainment.

Neural entrainment is the act of thinking in almost a simultaneous manner with the

person that you're speaking to.

And it turns out this is actually the goal of communication.

We think of communication

as this thing that evolved

because it helps us share information.

And that's a nice side benefit, right?

But the reason why language

and communication evolved is to help us get into neural entrainment,

to help us connect with each other,

to help us feel aligned

because that's at the core of the pro-social instinct.

And when you and I are in neural entrainment,

even if we disagree with each other, even if we vote for different people,

even if we think that different religions are the right religion,

at that moment in in that entrainment, we feel closer to each other.

We feel connected to each other.

We're we're likely to trust each other more, to like each other more,

to be persuaded by each other more.

This pro-sociality, this entrainment,

this alignment of how we think is the thing

that allows us to cooperate

and build the world

that we live in.

The matching principle is a concept in psychology

that says successful communication requires having the same kind of conversation at the same

time.

And in general, conversations fall into one of three buckets.

So these practical conversations, these emotional conversations, and these social conversations.

And so what the matching principle says is

that if I see

that you're in a practical mindset,

I should have a practical conversation with you, right?

I should match you.

Or if I'm feeling really emotional, I should invite you to match me.

And it raises this kind of interesting question.

How do we know what kind of conversation is going on,

particularly at the start of a conversation?

And there's a couple of skills that really help with this.

One of them is asking questions,

but the other is listening to the kinds of words

that the person is using,

right?

Because often times we will have what we think should be a practical conversation.

We're talking about the budget for next quarter, but I say things like,

you know, I'm just I'm really worried about about getting this budget right

because if we don't,

we're going to have to lay people off.

And like I just I just feel really anxious about that.

Like I I would hate to lay these people off.

Like they're my friends and I feel close to them, right?

But the words that I'm using, even though we're talking about budgeting,

even though we're talking about planning, the words that I'm using are emotional words.

I'm talking about what I feel.

I'm mentioning that I'm anxious or worried.

I'm obviously showing that I'm thinking about the feelings of other people

if I'm going to have to lay them off.

That's a clue that actually I'm in an emotional mindset

that I need to have an emotional conversation.

You as my boss, you need to acknowledge, yeah, look,

I I feel the same way.

This is a totally legitimate way to feel.

We got to figure this out so we don't have to do layoffs.

When you match me and you show me that you are hearing my emotions,

I suddenly feel calmer.

I feel more welcome in this conversation.

And more importantly, I trust you more.

So when you say next, look,

the best way to do this is to work through next quarter's numbers

and let's try and nail down what's realistic.

In other words, the best way to deal with these emotions is to have

a practical conversation.

I'm willing to go there with you.

Suddenly, we're aligned.

We're having the same kind of conversation at the same moment.

We fulfilled the basic premise of the matching principle,

which says that we have to have the same kind of conversation at the

same time in order to really hear each other.

Chapter six, the what's this really about conversation.

So the practical conversation

or another way of referring to it is the what's this really about conversation.

It often times happens at the beginning of a conversation

and it's when you

and I figure out why we're talking to each other.

Now social scientists actually refer to this process as a quiet negotiation.

And we tend to think of negotiations

as something where we're competing against each other

or it's my job my job to get you to beat you

or to not get beaten by you.

But a quiet negotiation is very different.

The goal is simply to understand what the other person wants.

And so think about when you start a conversation and you say, "Hey Jim,

how are you doing today?"

Right?

What I'm really asking is what's going on with you?

What's at the top of mind for you?

What are you thinking about?

And as I listen to you,

I can I can understand

that you might be talking about the fact

that you're anxious about something.

So you're in an emotional mindset.

Or you might be talking about the fact

that you're trying to get this memo done

and you got to figure out this one thing like how do how do

we explain this concept?

You're in a much more practical mindset.

At the beginning of a conversation,

what we're really trying to do is we're trying to figure out why are

we talking to each other?

Why are we opening our mouths?

And the answer might be

as simple as I like you

and you like me.

And our goal in this conversation is just to kind of entertain each other,

to take a little break.

Or it might be, as is the case of my 17-year-old son,

when he calls up and he says, "Hey, Dad, how are you doing?"

And I say, "Fine."

He says, "Hey, I just I had a question.

Can you loan me $10?"

Now, I know that the goal for Olly in this conversation is to get

$10.

We've all been in those conversations where it feels like it's like two shifts

passing in the night,

right?

I'm talking about one thing, you're talking about a different thing,

and like even though we're talking to each other,

it doesn't actually feel like we're connected.

It doesn't feel like we're actually hearing each other.

That's usually because the what's this really about conversation,

the practical conversation just hasn't occurred.

And so the question is how do we prompt it?

How do we make that happen?

Well, as researchers have looked at this,

they found there's a couple of different ways.

If you're a teacher,

one of the things

that you learned is

that if a student come up comes up to you

and they have something important they want to talk about,

you should start that conversation by saying, "Do you want to be helped?

Do you want to be hugged?

Or do you want to be heard?"

Right?

Which is the the practical, the emotional, and the social.

And anyone who's watching who has like a young child at home,

next time they want to talk to you, just ask them this question.

Do you want to be helped, hugged, or heard?

And what you'll find is that they know exactly what they want.

They'll tell you what they need.

Now, the thing is that for those of us in professional environments,

if we go into work and we ask one of our co-workers,

"Do you want to be helped, hugged, or heard?"

It's not going to go over well, right?

They're going to call HR.

You're not allowed to hug people

or ask if they want a hug in a in a workplace setting.

And so, what researchers have found is

that we have to ask another kind of question.

And it's the asking of the question

that is the skill

that helps us figure out what this conversation is about.

Now, not all questions are created equal, though.

Some questions are what are known as shallow questions.

They're questions just about, "How's your day?

What's going on with you?

Where'd you park this morning?"

But there's another kind of question known as a deep question.

And a deep question is something

that asks about my values

or my beliefs or my experiences.

And that can sound a little bit intimidating,

but it's as simple as if you meet someone who's for instance a doctor.

Instead of asking them, oh, you know, uh, what hospital do you work at?

You can ask them, oh, you know what?

What made you decide to go to medical school?

That second question, that second question is inviting them to talk about who they

are,

right?

It's inviting them to talk about, well,

I grew up and my dad was sick

and I wanted to be one of those healers

or to talk about their values,

right?

I really wanted to be someone who could go in

and help people on a daily basis.

Now, we're having a real conversation.

Now, we really know each other.

And so one of the most critical skills for the practical conversation,

for the what are we really talking about conversation to become a consistent supercommunicator

is to ask deep questions.

And these deep questions,

they surround us all the time if we know to look for them.

Our brain tends to process information in two different ways.

There's a part of our brain centered mostly in the prefrontal cortex

that is very attracted to data

and logic and evidence.

And so, for instance,

if I'm trying to convince um one of my kids to take uh a

pill that I think they ought to take,

what I might do is I might say to them, "Look,

let me just tell you what the science says, right?

The research shows that if you take this pill,

this your acne is going to go away.

And I know that you don't like the pills

and I know that they don't taste good,

but but look at the here's some photos.

Look at the at the evidence.

And in that mindset,

what I'm doing is I'm asking my kid to use their prefrontal cortex.

Now, if my kid turns to me and they say, "Yeah, but dad, like,

yeah, you know, my friend Jasper,

he he took these pills and it didn't do anything for him.

And I hate taking the pills and I always forget to do it.

And I came home from basketball yesterday

and I forgot to take the pill

and then mom got mad at me."

As I'm listening to my son,

what I understand and what I can recognize is

that he's telling me a series of stories.

And what he's saying to me is he's saying,

"I am not persuaded by logic and evidence right now.

I am persuaded by emotion and storytelling."

And that takes place in a very different part of our brains, right?

That takes place in the deeper structures more towards the interior of our brain.

And what we find is

that there are many situations where

if logic and arguments won't persuade you,

then telling you the right story will.

Because with logic and persuasion,

what I'm looking to is I'm looking to the facts.

I'm looking to what makes sense to me.

With storytelling and emotion, what I'm asking myself is,

what do most other people do in a situation like this?

There are two very different ways of making decisions

and there are two very different ways of making decisions

that live inside everyone's brains.

And so if we're trying to persuade someone,

if we're trying to learn about them,

if we're trying to get to know them better,

then it's important that we pay attention to where logic seems to be swaying

them and where storytelling seems to be swaying them

and to use that to help us connect.

Asking deep questions is a lot easier than we think it is.

Because we think about a deep question

and we think that I need to cry on your shoulder

or ask about your mom.

But at the end of the day,

what a deep question is is it's simply something

that asks why do you care about this?

How do you make sense of the world?

A deep question asks about someone's values or beliefs or experiences.

And asking about values can be as simple as saying, "Yeah,

I I saw that you lived up in the Heights.

What do you like about the Heights?

Like why did you move from the valley to the Heights?"

What I'm really asking them is, 'What do you value?

Right?

Because they might say something like,"Oh, the views are amazing."

Or they might say, "Oh, you know,

there's just a sense of community up in the heights that's so powerful."

And what they're telling me there is they're telling me what they value.

They're talking about their values, right?

Or their experiences.

When I ask someone, instead of asking them, "What hospital do you work at?"

When I ask them, "Oh, what made you decide to go to medical school?"

What I'm really doing is I'm asking them to describe their experiences to me,

to tell me how they became the person

that they are today based on what's happened in the past.

And those questions about their past, about someone's past,

that's a question that asks them about their experiences.

And now beliefs, because deep questions ask about our values, our beliefs,

and our experiences.

Beliefs can seem a little bit harder to folks,

but it can be as simple as saying, "Oh, you're an accountant.

Do do you like that job?

like like do you enjoy doing it?

Are you glad you become an accountant?

At that moment, what I'm often times doing is I'm asking them to tell

me about how they see the world,

how the logic of the world makes sense to them.

And they might say something like,

"I love being an accountant

because it's it's a steady job

and I can take care of my my family

and that's really important to me."

Okay, so I know that your beliefs are that you value family,

you value being responsible.

Or they might say, "I became an accountant because I just love numbers.

Like, I love seeing this order emerge from chaos

when I sit down with a with a with a balance sheet

and figure it out."

Okay.

Now, what you're telling me is

that you believe in a world

that has order to it.

That there's this interior beauty to the logic of finding the underlying order in

something that's complicated.

Almost anything can become a deep question, right?

Instead of asking someone what do you do for a living

that asking them what do you like about what you do for a living

instead of asking them just where do you live asking them oh why did

you decide to move there what I'm doing in each of those questions is

I'm asking you why why you made the decisions

that you made why you became the person

that you are today

and when I do

that what I'm really doing is I'm showing through my curiosity

that I want to understand you

and I'm asking you to describe to me who you actually are.

Chapter 7, the how do we feel conversation.

Most of the conversations that we have are emotional conversations.

And yet we are often very bad at recognizing

when an emotional conversation is occurring.

The way that an emotional conversation works is

that I use language

that indicates to you

that I'm talking about how I feel about something,

right?

And and it might sound really practical.

We might be talking about where to go on vacation and like,

should we book tickets to the Bahamas?

That seems like a practical conversation, but then I'm saying things like,

I just feel really stressed lately

and I need something to help me relax

and I thought if we just went to the beach,

it would really help me calm down.

What I'm doing through my language is I'm showing you the words

that I use.

Is I'm showing you

that actually I'm in an emotional mindset

that this decision-making for me about where to go on vacation,

it's not guided by plane prices or schedules, at least not right now.

It's guided by what I'm feeling emotionally.

And we need to discuss that.

We need to acknowledge that before we can move on to the practical considerations.

So a perfect example of how powerful deep questions can be

and particularly when they allow us to have emotional conversations

when they unearth emotions

that otherwise might not be voiced comes from this example of this guy Dr.

Bfara Dy who is a surgeon in New York City and Dr.

Dy is the world's leading expert on removing prostate tumors.

So every day a patient would come into his office having just learned

that they have prostate cancer.

And he would used to give them this little song and dance.

He would say, "Look, I know this is really scary,

but the thing about prostate tumors is they grow really, really slowly,

and the best way to get rid of it is I can go in

and I can cut it out,

but the prostate is located very close to the nerves

that control urination and sexual function.

And so even if the the surgery is a complete success,

in some percentage of patients, there are these side effects, potentially lifelong side effects.

And so here's my advice to you.

Do nothing at all.

I got a practical response to to what you should do.

You don't need to worry about this.

Like just pretend you don't have cancer.

We'll do this thing called active surveillance.

We'll take blood every six months and measure your PSA levels.

We'll biopsy your tumor every two years to see

if it's getting any bigger than we expected.

If it is, we'll put you in an MRI

and we'll figure out what to do differently.

But besides that, don't do any treatment.

No radiation, no surgery.

Just pretend like you don't even have cancer.

And Dr.

D told me the same thing would happen every single time.

Patient would listen to this.

They would say, "Thanks, doc.

That's really that's great to hear.

I really appreciate.

That's good advice."

They would go home.

They would talk it over with their spouse.

They always came in three days later for a follow-up.

And they would sit down and they would say, "You know, doc,

I I really appreciate you spending time with me. if it's okay.

What I've decided I'd like to do is I'd like you to cut me

open as fast as humanly possible.

Like if you can put me on the table today

and do the surgery today,

let's do that.

And for Dr.

Dy, this was bewildering

because they had come to him for advice

and yet they were ignoring his advice again

and again and again until he realized it wasn't

that they were ignoring his advice.

It was that they couldn't hear his advice. he was in a practical mindset

and they weren't.

So, he comes up with a whole new way of talking to patients.

Couple of weeks later,

a 50 or actually a 65-year-old man comes into his office having just learned

that he has prostate cancer.

And instead of going into his song and dance about don't worry about it,

active surveillance, Dr.

Adai starts the conversation by asking a deep question.

He starts by saying, "Tell me what this diagnosis means to you.

And the man kind of takes a beat and he says, "You know,

when they told me I had cancer like just an hour ago,

the first thing I thought about was my dad

because he died when I was 17 years old

and I do not want to put my wife through

that.

I don't want to put my kids through that."

The patient talks for 10 minutes

and never once does he mention cancer

or fears of death

or fears of pain.

And as Dr. guy listens,

he realizes this man needs to have an emotional conversation.

This man is in an emotional mindset.

This man needed the equivalent of a hug.

Now, Dr.

Dye, in order to match him, can't give him a hug.

So, what he did is he did this next best thing.

He did the thing you're never supposed to do as a doctor.

He starts talking about himself.

He starts saying things like, you know,

I know exactly what you're going through

because my dad got sick about seven years ago

and he had all the same anxieties

that you're feeling right now.

But there were also these like you don't want to call them silver linings,

but we had conversations we never would have had otherwise

because of this his illness.

In other words, I see what you are feeling.

I match you in the kind of conversation we're having.

I'm showing you that I empathize with you.

And they talked about that for a few minutes.

And then Dr.

Dice said, you know, now that I understand how you're feeling about this,

can I tell you about some treatment options?

can I tell you about this thing called active surveillance?

In other words, do I have your permission to move from an emotional to

a practical conversation together?

The man says yes.

He tells him about active surveillance.

The man says that sounds like a great idea.

Never changes his mind.

Since Dr.

D started making this one change,

asking a deep question at the beginning of his conversations with patients,

the number of patients following his advice have gone up by 70%.

And it's because when I match you,

particularly when I recognize your emotions and I show you that I empathize,

I show you that I'm hearing what you are feeling.

At that moment, we hear each other much better.

We listen much better.

I can hear the advice that you're giving me.

And you can hear that I want to understand you.

So when we're having an emotional conversation,

what each person really wants out of it is they want empathy.

They don't necessarily need a solution.

They don't need validation.

They don't need a plan.

What they want is they want to know that you are listening.

And there's a couple of ways to do this.

The first is to listen for clues to vulnerability.

And we tend to misunderstand what vulnerability is.

We think of vulnerability as crying on each other's shoulders.

But actually vulnerability is a neural cascade

that occurs whenever I say something

that you could judge.

Instead of judging them,

offer them something about yourself in return that they could judge in your place.

That will make us feel closer to each other even

if we disagree with each other.

Reciprocal vulnerability is something that happens in a conversation when I say something vulnerable.

When I say something that you could judge, at that moment instinctually,

and this has been this has been hardwired into our brains by evolution,

when I say something you could judge,

I pay very close attention to how you respond.

Because what I'm trying to figure out is, is this a dangerous situation?

Is there a threat here?

And so, I tell you something that you could judge.

And it could be something as simple as, you know what, it's really weird,

but I don't like pizza.

I think pizza is disgusting.

And then I pay close attention to how you react.

It'd be totally natural for most people to say like, you ate pizza.

Everyone loves pizza.

This is you haven't had the right kind of pizza, right?

You could judge me.

And even though I don't care about your judgment,

the fact that you judged me, it will close me off.

It will make me feel less close to you.

It will make me trust you less.

If at that moment when I say, you know what,

I just don't like pizza.

If you withhold judgment and you say, "Oh, you know, that's really interesting.

I like pizza, but but I actually hate um I hate spaghetti.

Like, like I just can't.

It just it feels like I'm eating worms to me."

When you respond to my vulnerability by sharing something about yourself

that I could judge,

by sharing a vulnerability of your own,

then even if we disagree with each other,

we're going to feel closer in a conversation.

When people feel close to each other,

when they feel like they can hear each other,

when they feel like they're nurly entrained, it's because reciprocal vulnerability has occurred.

And that doesn't mean

that I need to tell you a sad story about my parents.

It doesn't mean that I mean that I need to cry about something.

It doesn't even mean that I need to reveal something particularly personal.

It just means that I have told you something

that you could judge

and instead of judging me,

you've withheld your judgment

and you've shared something about yourself

that I could judge in return.

When that reciprocal vulnerability occurs, even if we come from different backgrounds,

even if we don't like each other very much,

we will feel closer to each other.

We will feel more trusting of each other.

We will feel like the other person is not a threat.

And at that moment,

we can find that connection

that allows us to overcome all the differences of opinion

that we have.

Sometimes it can be hard for us to recognize

that an emotional conversation is happening,

right?

Particularly if we're at work

or if we're in a setting

that seems really professional

or logical or we're talking about,

you know, banking.

And so in that case,

what we need to do is we need to look at two things.

We need to look at first of all the words that they're using.

Are they were using words like I feel like this, I'm worried about that.

You know, this person brought this up

and it's a really good question

because it seems like they're anxious about it.

Am I using words that point to emotions?

But the other thing

that I can do is I can just look at someone's body language.

Right?

One of the things that we know is that when someone is feeling emotional,

it tends to be portrayed in their nonverbal

or nonvocal communication. the gestures

that I make,

the sounds that come out of my mouth, whether I'm feeling really like,

you know, I'm reading from a script

or my conversation's kind of free flowing

and it's going all over the place

and I'm saying,

um, and you know,

what about when we train ourselves just to look for these signals,

it turns out that we're very,

very good at figuring out what someone is feeling,

even if their words don't tell us.

If someone's going like this, they're really like frowning a little bit.

They're not feeling good.

They're not feeling safe.

They're not feeling open.

And if you're talking about something mundane like 401k plans

and they're going like this

and they're so excited

and they're like,

you know, actually I learned this interesting thing about 401k plans,

what they're showing me is

that even if what we're talking about is the most boring thing on earth,

they are feeling a certain emotion, a positive emotion.

And when we train ourselves to pick up on positive versus negative,

then we're training ourselves to figure out what someone's feeling.

And there's another dimension to this.

We also need to figure out in addition to whether they're feeling positive

and negative,

are they feeling high energy or low energy, right?

Because if you think about anger for instance,

anger is someone who feels who is having a negative feeling

and it's very high energy.

And if we need to if we want to communicate with them,

we sort of have to match that that energy a little bit, right?

If they're shouting and they're really upset and we come in and we say,

"Well, let's just calm down.

Mr.

Smith, thank you so much for bringing up these concerns."

It's going to make them even more infuriated, right?

But if I come in, I say, "Mr.

Smith, I hear what you're saying.

I'm really upset, too.

Let's figure out how to solve this."

Then suddenly this person feels listened to.

But let's say you're having a negative emotion and it's low energy.

That's depression.

That's being morose.

Someone who says like, "I'm just like,

I'm so sad right now because this thing happened.

My team lost the game and I feel so sad about it."

And if I come in and I say, "Dude, there's another game coming up.

Let's get psyched for the next game."

That's not going to help.

I need to match their energy level.

And so there's these two components.

Is someone feeling negative or positive?

Is someone feeling high energy or low energy?

I can usually tell that through their body language.

And once I figured it out, if I match them,

they'll feel like I'm listening to them.

They'll feel like we're connected.

So, this happens all the time, right?

And I'm sure people have experienced this themselves.

You're having a fight with someone

and you don't want to have a fight with them.

You actually want to come to some agreement.

And yet, the fight just gets worse

and worse and worse the more

and more you talk.

It's as if just the act of talking is pouring gasoline on this fire.

And this can happen in almost any conflict.

In fact, one of the things

that we know about conflicts is

that most people in a conflict want to end the conflict.

They want to resolve whatever is causing problems between them.

And yet somehow they get in their own way

and they can't get it done.

So what do we do in a situation like that?

Well, there's been a lot of research that's looked at what's known

as conflict conversations where you

and I disagree about something.

And it could be something important like um what direction we should take our

product and our company next year

or it should could be something really unimportant like who's the best team that's

playing in the Super Bowl this year.

In those moments of conflict conversations, there's two things that are really really important.

The first is to ask more questions.

There's this expression that I love that says when you're feeling furious, get curious.

Because what happens is when I ask you a question, a genuine question,

when I'm genuinely curious, when I say, "Look,

I understand that you love the Chiefs, but I'm just wondering like,

what is it about them that you feel so strongly about?

Like, I really want to understand why you love that team so much."