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availability varies by location. Hello!

1:15

I'm Allison Raskin. I'm a writer, mental health advocate

1:17

and my bangs are too long right now. Hi,

1:20

I'm Gabe Dunn. I'm a

1:22

writer, bicon, bisexual icon. Wink!

1:24

And once again struggling

1:26

with my skin. You

1:29

know it's so funny because today I too

1:31

am struggling with my skin. I have two

1:33

pimples and I was like, oh should

1:35

I wear a mighty patch to the recording? And then

1:38

I was like, nah I guess I'll just wear it

1:40

later. And then you showed up with one and I

1:42

was like, I could award mine. Oh

1:44

yeah. I gotta get the ones that look

1:46

like stars because I always think that looks

1:48

cute. Oh they make them in star patterns?

1:50

You've never seen? Yeah they make little, now

1:52

people kind of wear them fashion

1:54

a little bit. Like they're like,

1:57

they put like, I don't know, it'll be like a... Star

2:00

or like some cute little color or

2:02

something like people are wearing them as

2:05

like part of the outfit. Is

2:07

a need to ask for you? She gets

2:09

oh yeah, I should. I should because. I

2:12

also really appreciate when people. Show.

2:14

Up and I think I've talked about it on the show

2:16

but like Madison Be are doing national interview with she's just

2:18

got a bunch of those on her face. I.

2:20

Love is. Yeah. Man. I'm

2:23

That's how I make myself feel better. Is

2:25

I go on Server: I'm very real is

2:28

what I am. sort of A and you

2:30

know, When. I'm giving use Very Authentic,

2:32

a survey and acme influencer if you will

2:34

have to take everything bad that's ever happened

2:36

to me and make myself an influence around

2:39

it so that I can survive. Bipolar.

2:42

Influencer: Acne influencer.

2:45

Terrible. Childhood influencer. Affect

2:48

you at influencer said he er

2:50

trauma baby. Without

2:52

really trauma. Bad.

2:54

Knees is when I say. Why

2:58

not? Always

3:00

as an example to show. Or

3:03

any targeted child delayed. All About Super

3:06

communicators. It's fascinating I learned in Ohio.

3:08

I feel like I I leave today

3:10

a better person than I started the

3:13

day with absolutely his incredible interview and

3:15

later we're going to be talking about

3:17

audio books because ah, we've recorded them

3:19

and Melissa directs them a bunch and

3:22

I just find them fascinating. I'm listening

3:24

to one. Where the guys really haven't It's

3:26

clearly a good time read next. Up

3:29

next you got an exciting interview with a highly

3:32

esteemed Guess Charles Do Higgs the Stay Tuned. To

3:39

just. Between us reduce years

3:41

most scandalous most controversial segment

3:43

node all podcast. tough

3:46

question listed on the shelley have

3:48

charles do hague is a pulitzer

3:51

prize winning journalist and author of

3:53

the power of habits which spent

3:55

over three years on bestseller list

3:57

has been translated into forty languages

3:59

super communicators also a bestseller published

4:01

in 2024 and Smarter Faster Better,

4:03

a third bestseller. Hello, Charles. Hello.

4:07

This is so exciting because you emailed

4:09

me and so I felt very thrilled.

4:12

I was like, this poll is so

4:14

crazy. You must get emails all the time.

4:20

Not really. Okay. Now

4:23

everyone listening knows that they should

4:25

send more emails. Yeah, exactly.

4:27

I was thrilled. What did you

4:29

say to John? I was like, you won't believe who

4:31

did this real, really important person. But

4:37

it is such a great topic because today

4:39

we're going to be talking about super communicators.

4:41

And you know, one of the

4:43

first things like you learn in

4:46

psychology is how much we communicate

4:48

through body language and

4:50

how like verbal communication is kind

4:52

of just like one tenth of

4:54

it. And so I'd love

4:56

to know like why focusing on on

4:58

communication became such an interest for you. Well,

5:02

it actually sort of it started when I

5:04

got into this bad pattern with my wife.

5:06

I've been married for almost 20 years. And

5:08

and this is probably something that is familiar to you and

5:11

to anyone who's listening. I would come home from work after

5:13

like a long day and I would

5:15

start complaining about my day. And my wife would

5:17

very sensibly offer these solutions like why don't you

5:19

just take your boss out to lunch and you

5:21

guys can get to know each other. And

5:23

instead of being able to hear what she was saying, I would

5:25

get even more upset. I'd be like, why aren't you supporting me?

5:27

You're supposed to be outraged on my behalf. Then

5:30

she would get upset because I was attacking her for giving

5:32

me good advice. Sometimes this would happen and we'd flip roles

5:34

where she was coming to me to talk about how

5:37

she felt about something. And I was trying to solve

5:39

her feelings. And I wanted to figure out

5:41

like I knew that this was

5:43

not the right thing to do. And yet this

5:45

instinct kept plaguing us. And I wanted

5:47

to figure out why. And so I called up all these researchers

5:49

and asked them like, what do we know

5:51

about the science of communication? And what was some

5:54

of the stuff that jumped out at you as like, oh,

5:56

I had no idea about that. Yeah,

5:58

actually, the very first thing. they said is,

6:00

well, we're actually living through this golden

6:02

age of understanding communication because of advances

6:04

in neural imaging and data collection. And

6:06

they said, look, that one of

6:09

the big things that we've learned is that we tend

6:11

to think of a discussion as being about one thing, right?

6:13

We're talking about our day or we're talking about my book

6:15

or whatever we think the topic

6:17

of discussion is. But actually, every discussion is

6:20

made up of multiple kinds of conversations.

6:23

And in general, those conversations, they tend to fall into one

6:25

to three buckets. So there's these practical

6:27

discussions where we're trying to solve problems

6:29

or make plans together. And then

6:31

there's emotional discussions where I tell you how I'm

6:34

feeling and I don't want you to solve my

6:36

feelings. I want you to empathize. And

6:38

then finally, there's social conversations, which is about how we

6:40

relate to each other in society and the social identities

6:43

that are important to us. And

6:45

they said, look, here's the thing that we know is

6:47

that if you are having if you and the person

6:49

you're talking to are having different kinds of conversations, you

6:52

really can't hear each other. Like you

6:54

got to be on the same wavelength. You have

6:56

to be having the same kind of conversation at

6:58

the same moment. And then once you do, once

7:00

you're both aligned emotionally or you're both aligned practically,

7:03

you can move from topic to topic and kind

7:05

of conversation to kind of conversation together. And

7:07

this, of course, is exactly what was happening with my wife. Right. I

7:10

was coming home and I was having an emotional conversation and she was having a

7:12

practical one. And so we really couldn't

7:15

hear each other very well. And is

7:17

it interesting, you know, having probably

7:19

interviewed so many people for your

7:22

journalism career to sort of like

7:24

be learning maybe new ways to

7:26

ask questions and relate to people?

7:29

Absolutely. Absolutely. I

7:31

mean, it's changed entirely kind of, you know, I think as a

7:33

as a report right now at the New Yorker and I used

7:36

to be at the New York Times and

7:38

I think a lot of my reporting was very

7:40

practical. It was calling people up and asking them

7:42

for details or facts. And sometimes

7:44

people would say something emotional. And

7:47

instead of being able to pick up on

7:49

that or to match them or to invite

7:51

them to kind of get

7:53

deeper with me, I would usually just kind of move on

7:55

to the next question on my list. And

7:57

that's exactly the wrong way to do it. Right. When We.

8:00

Have a connection with someone. It feels

8:02

like connection. Because. There's his

8:04

back and forth because we're listening to each other are

8:06

proving that were listening to each other. And.

8:08

As a result, we feel like we really want

8:10

to connect to the other person because when we

8:13

say something emotional. They. Say oh, you tell

8:15

me more about that are I'm sorry that happened

8:17

or something similar happened to me. And

8:19

that's really, really powerful. How do you

8:21

learn your style? And that way is

8:23

it just without thinking about it like

8:26

just subconsciously, the people that say. Oh,

8:28

I'm so sorry or the people that say okay,

8:30

well this is how I relate to that. Like

8:33

how do you? is that like inherit from your

8:35

family or how do you. Become. The

8:37

type of communicator you are will I see

8:39

a lot of it has to do with.

8:42

Just. Learning some basic skills. Me one of the

8:44

things that we've learned is that there are these

8:46

people who can kind of consistently connect with almost

8:48

anyone and and we refer to them a super

8:50

Communicators. Is what they seem to

8:53

have is just a set of. Skills.

8:55

That they've learned frankly, that any of us can learn.

8:57

In fact, we know that. It. Doesn't matter

8:59

if you're an extrovert, introvert, or charismatic.

9:02

Curmudgeon. Li like anyone can become a

9:05

super communicator. And and that what

9:07

you refer to as that instinct? Is.

9:09

Actually a learnt habits and it's a practiced

9:11

habits and so one of the things is

9:13

really important is for instance asking the right

9:15

kind of question. With. In Psychology

9:17

the the most powerful questions are known as

9:20

deep questions because they ask us about. Our.

9:22

Values are beliefs or

9:24

experiences. And legends own. Kind of

9:26

intimidating, right? Like like we have to cry together.

9:29

But actually it's as simple as like. Bumping.

9:31

Into someone in saying like our your what do you do

9:33

for living in the person says. I'm a

9:36

doctor. And. What you could ask?

9:38

what? oh where do you practice medicine? But a better

9:40

thing to ask is. A What made you

9:42

decide to become a doctor. Or like, what

9:44

do you love about being a doctor. right?

9:47

When you ask that question a deep question

9:49

which are doing is you're inviting this person

9:51

to tell you not only are they see

9:53

themselves and was important to them. But.

9:55

What kind of mindset there is this? If they

9:58

say something like. Oh. I always wanted. be

10:00

a doctor because I just wanted a steady job and I

10:02

knew that I knew that medicine would do that, then you

10:05

know this person's in a practical mindset. But

10:07

if it's someone who says, oh, you know, I saw my dad get

10:09

sick when I was a kid and I

10:12

wanted to be part of healing, then

10:15

that person is in an emotional mindset.

10:18

And it's not hard to pick up on this once

10:20

you know what to look for. It's not that

10:22

some of us are born with this and some of us aren't. It's

10:25

just that if you've learned to look for it,

10:27

then you're a little bit more sensitive to it

10:29

when you see it. We're

10:31

going to take a quick break for commercials and we'll be right

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mean, I went from having

14:37

to go to like a social skills class when I was 12

14:39

to now feeling like I

14:42

have learned how to have a conversation. And

14:44

I love that you say that it is like

14:46

a skill set that you can

14:48

like work on rather than just an innate

14:51

gift. And I almost feel

14:53

like because I struggled socially so much,

14:55

I had to learn how to be

14:57

like a good communicator. And

14:59

I want to ask you more about that class because

15:01

that sounds really interesting. But you're exactly right. One of

15:03

the things that we know about super communicators is that

15:05

when you ask them, were you always

15:07

good at communication? They often say no. They

15:09

often say things like I had trouble making

15:12

friends in high school, or my

15:14

parents got divorced and I had to be the

15:16

peacemaker between them. What they're really saying there is

15:18

I had to think about communication a little bit

15:20

more. And it's that thinking

15:22

about communication just like half an inch

15:24

deeper, that makes us into super communicators

15:27

because then we start noticing all these

15:29

things that we missed before. But

15:31

can I ask about the class? So

15:33

tell me about it when you were 12. Why

15:36

did you go and what happened? I have

15:38

such a poor memory. I don't really remember

15:40

too much about the class itself, but I've

15:42

had OCD since I was four. And

15:45

so that meant that I would impulsively

15:47

say things like I didn't have a sense of

15:49

like what was appropriate to say and what wasn't.

15:51

And I would just like have the thought and

15:53

the need to like release myself of the thought,

15:56

which then obviously caused people not to like me

15:58

and for me to have. So, yeah. And

16:03

so I, you know, like, I don't remember

16:05

exactly like the skill sets in that class,

16:07

but I do know that like, I

16:10

am now hyper aware of

16:12

how I communicate with people. And

16:14

I am hyper aware of trying to be present

16:16

when people are talking to me and be a

16:19

good listener and an active listener

16:21

in a way that like maybe I wouldn't

16:23

have put that time and effort into if

16:25

I hadn't had to struggle to

16:27

begin with. Well, and my guess is, and

16:29

tell me if I'm if I'm wrong on this, even

16:32

though it's hard to remember. Yeah, because when you're 12, you

16:34

learn a lot of stuff. But my guess

16:36

is that they kind of practiced with you a little bit

16:38

like they would they would they would

16:40

model active listening and then have you

16:42

practice doing listening to them. Does

16:45

that sound familiar? You know,

16:47

I can't remember, but something that has been the

16:49

most helpful for me is learning

16:51

what not to say. Yeah,

16:53

that's interesting. That's really like, like, what do

16:56

you mean? Like, to this day, I

16:58

censor myself because I know that I'm having

17:00

thoughts that are not appropriate to

17:02

share, or that would be abrasive or

17:04

that would be off playing. And

17:06

so, like, realizing, like, when

17:08

maybe that there's some people in my

17:11

life, maybe that's that's safe to

17:13

share that with. But like, really,

17:15

I mean, I've told you this, like, there'll be moments

17:17

where I'm just like, Allison, don't say that. Don't say that.

17:22

Yeah. And my guess is, and

17:24

again, tell me if I'm getting this wrong. I

17:26

guess is what's going on is that you have

17:28

learned to realize that some things you say, they

17:30

don't actually they're not matching the other

17:32

person like the other person is saying something personal

17:34

and you have this instinct to say something funny.

17:37

And the reason why that wouldn't work is because

17:40

because they're obviously they're not in a mindset

17:42

where they're asking for funny right now. Right.

17:44

And it might be because you

17:47

feel a little uncomfortable or just because you you're you are

17:49

a funny person and this is what comes to you. But

17:51

I think that like what I hear you saying and tell me if

17:54

you think this is wrong is You've

17:56

learned to match other people. You've learned to pay

17:58

attention to how other people are speaking. And

18:00

what they're saying and how they're saying it. To.

18:03

Help you figure out how to get on the same

18:05

wavelength as them. I. Hope so. What

18:08

interesting is that our our brains have

18:11

evolved to not only be really good

18:13

at this. But. To crave it right?

18:15

So so if you think about it, Communication

18:17

is homo Sapiens superpower like it

18:20

is. The thing that like makes

18:22

us different from every other species

18:24

is allowed us to create families

18:26

and villages and towns and countries

18:28

and he transmit knowledge without haven't

18:30

experienced those things ourselves. Communication

18:33

is the thing that makes Homo

18:35

Sapiens. Homo Sapiens. And so. One.

18:37

Consequence of that is it or brain has

18:39

evolved. To. Crave. Conversation.

18:42

Into crave connection. And so

18:45

often times teaching you skills like the skills you

18:47

learn when you're twelve or the skills that

18:49

you use right now. They're. Just about

18:51

causing you. Didn't notice a little bit

18:53

more. About. How how you

18:55

can connect with other people? Because.

18:58

That's so important actually making that connection come

19:00

true. In this connections are the most important

19:02

things in our lives. Yeah. I've

19:06

noticed Marcel. Trying

19:08

to figure out what kind of conversation

19:10

the other person is trying to have.

19:13

Like. Sometimes.

19:15

With. Me and yell. Called.

19:18

Out Wanna explain? Something

19:20

that I'm like. Over. Explaining it,

19:23

And. I have to be like, okay, what

19:25

is she really asking Like, is she asking

19:27

for me to explain step by step what

19:29

I'm doing Or she does asking like. Okay,

19:32

an hour and like how gonna work

19:34

and what'll I need to deal speaker

19:36

and yeah no I was like and

19:38

we've known each other. Ten Years. And

19:41

I was like something was going on and

19:43

I was. Like trying to figure out. Like

19:46

lot allies like were missing each other

19:48

and then it was like oh year

19:50

ask you're just asking what do I

19:52

need to do and I'm explaining everything

19:54

that needs to happen. Yeah.

19:57

and so i was with my actually my

19:59

ex was like What is she

20:01

actually asking? Look at what she wrote and

20:03

what is the question? And

20:06

I was like, oh, I'm sick

20:08

because I would want to know every step. And

20:10

he was like, but what is she look

20:12

at what she's asking? And

20:15

then I was like, right, right. What is

20:17

she asking? What was this

20:19

about? I was about

20:21

explaining like the something. I

20:24

don't know something to do with the show. Yeah, something

20:26

to do with like accounting for the show. And

20:28

he was like, you're overwhelming her because she doesn't want

20:31

to hear the numbers. And one thing

20:33

you can do that makes it a lot better

20:35

is so something again, we are all

20:37

super communicators at one time or another, right? Like

20:39

when your friend calls you, you know exactly what

20:41

to say to make them feel better. Or when

20:43

you walk into a meeting, you know exactly like

20:45

how to win over everyone over to your idea.

20:48

So we all have moments of super communication,

20:51

but some people can do it consistently. Some people

20:53

can do it basically with anyone. And one of

20:55

the things that we know about them is that

20:57

they tend to ask 10 to 20 times

21:00

as many questions as the

21:02

average person. And like some of those questions are the

21:04

deep questions I just mentioned, but some of

21:06

them are pretty like simple like, you know, oh, would

21:08

you say next? Like I'm going to invite you into

21:10

the conversation or to the point you just

21:13

raised to say to someone, okay, do you

21:15

want me to explain everything about this or do you

21:17

just have one very simple question you want me to

21:19

answer, right? That's what my wife

21:21

and I do now. Like when I come home and I'm

21:23

complaining about my day, the first thing

21:25

she'll often say is, do you want me to help you solve

21:27

this? Or do you just need to vent

21:29

and get this off your chest? And of course I'm like, oh,

21:32

I just need to vent. I just want you to listen. It's

21:34

not that big a deal. And it feels

21:36

good to be asked. It feels like someone

21:38

is giving you what you're looking for, what

21:40

you want. And so

21:42

oftentimes just asking a question

21:45

helps resolve a lot of that

21:47

potential miscommunication. It's

21:50

interesting because I feel like I'm

21:52

a good communicator except

21:55

when I really disagree with

21:57

someone about something. That feels

21:59

like when... and all my tools,

22:01

all my empathy, all

22:03

my self-restraint sort of just flies

22:06

out the window. And so is

22:09

there any difference about how to

22:11

communicate when you're just on polar opposite

22:13

sides of an issue? Yeah,

22:16

and this actually happens all the time. And these are

22:18

often referred to as conflict

22:20

conversations, where we disagree

22:22

about something, or we're fighting with each other,

22:24

or... Okay, so let me ask you this.

22:27

So take yourself back to the last time you had one

22:29

of those conversations. What were you

22:31

feeling? Like this person comes in and they say

22:33

like, I love Trump and you

22:35

hate Trump, or I love

22:37

Biden and you hate Biden. Something where the

22:39

person has kind of defined

22:42

themselves in a way that feels very

22:44

opposite to how you feel. What

22:46

are you feeling at that point, moment? The

22:49

last conversation was over text message,

22:52

but I felt, I

22:54

felt disgust and disappointment. Okay.

22:59

And both of those are actually things

23:02

that trigger our fight or flight instinct, right?

23:05

Like, when we... Disgust

23:07

is actually a really interesting, has a

23:09

really interesting evolutionary past. And when we

23:11

see something that makes us feel disgust,

23:15

it causes us to want to

23:17

run away, right? That's kind of the

23:19

role of disgust, is that it helps us avoid things

23:21

that might be dangerous to us because they're toxins. Disappointment,

23:24

similarly, is disappointing,

23:27

right? It feels like a

23:29

downer. So what's interesting is,

23:31

what's happening is that you are

23:34

triggering, or what's being triggered is

23:36

this fight or flight instinct, right? It could be a

23:38

situation where you can run away. It might also be

23:40

a situation where you think like, actually running away isn't

23:42

the right thing to do. I'm gonna tell this person

23:44

how wrong they are. That fight or

23:46

flight instinct is very, very good in

23:48

a state of nature for situations where

23:50

we have to run away or we

23:52

have to kill someone else. But in

23:54

contemporary society, it's a lot less useful,

23:57

right? Because oftentimes fight or flight is

23:59

not the right. So what is the right

24:01

answer? Well, the right answer is to

24:03

kind of recognize that the goal of

24:05

a conversation is Not

24:07

to be right or wrong. It's not

24:09

to convince the other person that they're

24:11

wrong and you're right It's not even

24:13

to impress them or make them think

24:15

you're smart or get them to

24:18

rethink all of their beliefs the goal

24:20

of a conversation is just to understand what the other person is

24:22

trying to say to you and To speak

24:25

in such a way that they can understand you and

24:27

that doesn't mean you're gonna agree with each other But here's the

24:29

thing You don't agree 100%

24:32

with anyone in your life Right

24:34

the two of you I'm sure have disagreements about things There's

24:37

there's things that if I asked you about, you know Do

24:39

you like Star Wars or Star Trek or pop

24:41

tarts or cereal that you guys would come out on

24:43

different places? And yet yet

24:45

you recognize that this one disagreement. That's

24:47

not really that important What's important is

24:49

that when you guys talk about stuff

24:52

that matters to you that you understand

24:54

each other and and it lowers the

24:56

Expectations and the temperature so much for

24:58

you if you go into

25:00

a conversation saying look I just have to understand

25:02

what this person is saying and I have to I

25:04

have to help them understand what I am saying Whether

25:07

we agree with each other or not whether we even have

25:09

anything in common That's a

25:11

secondary concern now all of a sudden the

25:13

conversation is pretty easy for you And

25:16

there's some ways some skills to make that

25:18

conversation even easier So The

25:22

first and most important one is that in

25:24

a conflict conversation because that fight or flight

25:26

has been triggered There is a

25:28

suspicion in the back of your mind That

25:31

the other person is not listening to you and

25:33

is just waiting their turn to speak and

25:36

similarly They're suspicious of the same thing, right?

25:39

We're talking about politics and like I

25:41

don't really feel like you're listening to what I'm saying I think

25:43

you're just waiting to tell me why I'm wrong So

25:46

one of the things that we can do that's

25:48

really powerful is we can prove that we're listening

25:50

and there's a pretty easy technique for

25:52

this that's known as looping for understanding and

25:54

has three steps step one is ask

25:56

a question preferably a deep question step

25:59

two is Repeat back

26:01

what the person just said in your own

26:03

words. Show them that you heard them. And

26:05

then step number three is, ask

26:07

them if you got it right, which

26:09

is a form of asking them permission to

26:11

acknowledge that you've been listening. What we know

26:14

happens if you do that is

26:16

that the temperature of the conversation goes down

26:18

significantly, and more importantly, they

26:20

become more willing to listen to you. It's

26:23

an instinct in our brain, social

26:25

reciprocity, that when I prove I'm

26:27

listening, you become more likely to

26:29

listen to me in return. And

26:31

the reason that's important is because, again, you're

26:34

not trying to convince them that they're wrong.

26:36

You're trying to convince them that you understand

26:39

what they're saying. And once

26:41

you do that almost inevitably, you

26:43

get to a place where both people are listening

26:45

to each other, both people are understanding each other,

26:48

and then you find ways, things that you have

26:50

in common that actually connect to

26:52

the things that you disagree about, right? Let's take

26:54

politics again as an example. You're talking

26:56

to someone, they love Trump, you hate Trump,

26:59

and you're having this conversation, and

27:01

you ask questions, there's this phrase,

27:03

if you're feeling furious, get curious,

27:06

that I think is a helpful reminder to us. You're

27:09

asking questions, you're proving that you're listening, and what you

27:11

hear the other person say is, I'm

27:13

really concerned about safety, and I feel like

27:15

my candidate is gonna do a better job

27:17

on safety. And then you get a chance to say, actually,

27:21

I'm really concerned about safety, too,

27:23

but the way I think about it is how safe

27:26

my kids are in school. Are

27:28

we doing things on guns? How safe

27:30

my kids are if they're different? Are we doing

27:33

the right things on diversity? But we both care

27:35

about our kids, and we both care about safety,

27:38

and we come at it from different angles,

27:40

and that leads us to different conclusions, but

27:43

that doesn't mean we can't understand each

27:45

other. And in fact, we can have a conversation,

27:47

and hearing why someone cares about safety

27:49

and sharing why you care about safety,

27:52

that actually makes us feel connected. Even if we walk

27:54

away still disagreeing with each other, we

27:56

feel like we've done something

27:58

important. want to hear

28:00

the rest of this episode and let

28:03

me tell you you do head over

28:05

to patreon.com/just between us and for $3

28:07

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