Speaker 1: Good, our champions. I hope this finds you well. So
Speaker 1: we talk a lot here on the project about understanding
Speaker 1: other people, Understanding how they see us, Understanding how they think,
Speaker 1: understanding how we think. The external world of physical three
Speaker 1: dimensional world what seems to be happening, and then the
Speaker 1: internal world of experience and subjective stories and understanding and
Speaker 1: awareness and connection or disconnection or pain or pleasure or
Speaker 1: excitement or terror or all of those things. And so
Speaker 1: I think it's the stepping off point for this conversation
Speaker 1: is maybe around the awareness that none of us are
Speaker 1: living in the same reality. We might be living in
Speaker 1: the same environment or a similar situation or what seemed
Speaker 1: to be similar experiences outwardly, but nonetheless all of us
Speaker 1: kind of straddle this two world concept. And the two
Speaker 1: world concept of which I speak grasshoppers, is the one
Speaker 1: that we can all see in touch and feel and
Speaker 1: poke and experience and observe and measure and all of
Speaker 1: those things, the world that we inhabit. And then there's
Speaker 1: the other world, where I think is really where we live.
Speaker 1: So one's about habitation, one's about subjective experiences and feelings
Speaker 1: and those lived emotions and ideas and fears and anxieties
Speaker 1: and triumphs and losses and all of those things. So
Speaker 1: when we're sitting with somebody, for example, in a border
Speaker 1: room or at a table in a cafe or whatever,
Speaker 1: we're sitting with somebody and we're in the middle of
Speaker 1: from the outside looking at a conversation or a negotiation
Speaker 1: or a conflict resolution or a problem solving session or
Speaker 1: some kind of leadership moment or whatever it is, there's
Speaker 1: the thing that appears to be going on. Right for
Speaker 1: the observer, you and me looking over at two people
Speaker 1: at a table, you go, what's going on or what's
Speaker 1: going on as a conversation, what's going on as two
Speaker 1: people interacting, And of course that is correct, But then
Speaker 1: trying to understand what's going on for the individuals at
Speaker 1: the table personally, in that inner space, in that feeling, emoting, understanding, storytelling,
Speaker 1: experiencing the external from the internal. In that place, we
Speaker 1: don't know what's going on. We don't know what's going on.
Speaker 1: And I think that not understanding the experience of others
Speaker 1: or what is real for somebody else on the inside
Speaker 1: is a big challenge for us who want to build
Speaker 1: connection and rapport and understanding and healthy relationships and be
Speaker 1: effective communicators and problem solvers and all the things that
Speaker 1: we talk about. So you're trying. You're trying to have
Speaker 1: a meaningful dialogue with your kid or your next or neighbor,
Speaker 1: or your parent, or your boss or your employee or
Speaker 1: your friend. You're trying to have a meaningful dialogue to
Speaker 1: resolve something, fix something, expand awareness whatever it is. Yet
Speaker 1: you have no idea how they think, or you have
Speaker 1: very little insight into how they think. So you understand
Speaker 1: your mind, you understand your version of reality. You understand
Speaker 1: what you think and feel and believe and know, but
Speaker 1: you don't understand any of that the other way around,
Speaker 1: that is through their window, through their kind of experience
Speaker 1: of life. So how do we build How do we
Speaker 1: build a relationship that's built on an understanding bigger than
Speaker 1: our own or an experience bigger than our own. So
Speaker 1: for me, I spend much of my life thinking about
Speaker 1: how you think you my listener, I think about I
Speaker 1: try to understand via the feedback that I get, whether
Speaker 1: it's verbal or written, positive or negative. I try to
Speaker 1: get an insight into what is the Craig experience like
Speaker 1: for the people that intersect with me, whether that's on
Speaker 1: a podcast or in a corporate presentation, or at a
Speaker 1: university or on the street, or in a one on
Speaker 1: one consultation, or in a social setting where we're all
Speaker 1: friends and hanging out. The reason that I want to
Speaker 1: understand the experience of others is because one, I'm interested
Speaker 1: in understanding things that live beyond my head. I'm under
Speaker 1: no illusion that my reality is anyone else's reality, that
Speaker 1: my story is the greater story. This is just Craig's story.
Speaker 1: And so I think navigating life through that lens that
Speaker 1: what goes on in my head is just what goes
Speaker 1: on in my head. The story that I have in
Speaker 1: my head about John or this group of people or
Speaker 1: my audience, it is just my story. So how do
Speaker 1: I understand other people? Not agree with them, as I've
Speaker 1: said to you before, not necessarily agree with them or
Speaker 1: align with them, or necessarily support their ideas or ideology
Speaker 1: or philosophy or theology, but just to understand. Remember that
Speaker 1: seek first to understand, then to be understood, and the
Speaker 1: seek first to understand is in a twenty eight font,
Speaker 1: and then to be understood as in a four. Because
Speaker 1: if I don't understand other people, I only understand me,
Speaker 1: I only understand my thinking. I only understand my version
Speaker 1: of what's real. Then, at the very best, when I'm
Speaker 1: talking to somebody, I'm guessing. I'm guessing. I'm guessing what
Speaker 1: they think. I'm guessing what their reality is. And more
Speaker 1: often than not, if i'm I don't like this word,
Speaker 1: but you know, closer to typical or normal is more
Speaker 1: often than not, I will be assuming that they understand
Speaker 1: what I'm saying because I understand what I'm saying. What
Speaker 1: I am saying is clear to me, it is easy
Speaker 1: to understand to me, it makes sense to me, it's
Speaker 1: logic to me, it's all the things positive. So therefore
Speaker 1: they will understand because I'm speaking slowly and clearly, and
Speaker 1: I'm articulating my ideas very succinctly and intellectually. Therefore they
Speaker 1: will know exactly what I mean and where I'm coming from,
Speaker 1: and my intention in this moment will be their experience
Speaker 1: in this moment, which we know as bullshit, which we
Speaker 1: know as bullshit. So constant in our world is stimulus response.
Speaker 1: Stimulus response a thing happens. We respond. Someone says something,
Speaker 1: stimulus we respond. Somebody looks a certain way we respond.
Speaker 1: It rains. We respond. We never get hit by a car.
Speaker 1: We respond. We see something on Facebook or Instagram or
Speaker 1: wherever that kind of rubs us up the wrong way.
Speaker 1: That's a stimulus. We respond. We either go fuck that
Speaker 1: guy or fuck that girl, or we write some emotional
Speaker 1: response and we stand on our sidebox and whatever.
Speaker 2: That's all about our response. That's all about how I think.
Speaker 2: That's all about how I feel. That's all about my stories,
Speaker 2: about the thing that just intersected with my reality, the
Speaker 2: thing that just slid into my consciousness, the thing that
Speaker 2: just slid into my awareness, into my immediate world.
Speaker 1: Now, the challenge for us, or we respond, before we
Speaker 1: respond in appropriately or in a misinformed way, is to
Speaker 1: try to understand what that is about, or at the
Speaker 1: very least, obviously, if somebody's about to run us over
Speaker 1: a car with a car, let's not consider the choice
Speaker 1: of options too slowly. But in general terms interacting with others,
Speaker 1: you know, as soon as I realize that somebody is
Speaker 1: saying something to me that could sound offensive, that could
Speaker 1: be offensive, or I could make it offensive, but I know,
Speaker 1: on no level are they trying to hurt me, even
Speaker 1: though they may have been mildly insensitive or unaware. It's
Speaker 1: still up to me whether I choose to react in
Speaker 1: an unoffended way. Because I know this person. I know
Speaker 1: how they think, or at least have insight into how
Speaker 1: they think. I know their kind, and I know they
Speaker 1: have empathy, and I know they care about the people.
Speaker 1: They just said something that in the moment, I'm pretty
Speaker 1: sure one they didn't intend on any level to hurt
Speaker 1: or offend, and two they were probably a bit underwear unaware.
Speaker 1: I didn't mean underwear, they were unaware, and so too
Speaker 1: the other way around. I know because of how I am,
Speaker 1: which is I am definitely not for everyone. I know
Speaker 1: that I know that I'm under no illusions. There's that
Speaker 1: term again. But I'm under no illusions that Craig harper
Speaker 1: Will or my thinking or my teaching or my coaching
Speaker 1: is going to resonate with everyone. In fact, probably not
Speaker 1: with many. Also, that's okay, that's not good or bad.
Speaker 1: I'm not mad or sad. That's just are an outcome
Speaker 1: or an ever present reality of the human experience is
Speaker 1: that you say the same thing to one hundred people,
Speaker 1: especially if you say it collectively on mass, to the
Speaker 1: one hundred people, one thing, one hundred people. So there's
Speaker 1: what you're saying, there's what you're intending. There's the stimulus
Speaker 1: that's coming out of your God. There's the thing, the idea,
Speaker 1: the concept, the words, the sentences that you're pushing out
Speaker 1: of your energy, out of your consciousness into a room
Speaker 1: full of other consciousnesses. Other personalities are the brains, are
Speaker 1: the filters, And all of a sudden, there's six people
Speaker 1: in that room that think you're a prick, not because
Speaker 1: you're a prick, but that's how they interpreted what you
Speaker 1: pushed out there. Right, there's twenty five people who think
Speaker 1: you're pretty cool, there's a bunch that think you're great,
Speaker 1: and there's a few that are confused. So that's not
Speaker 1: as much about what you are saying as it is
Speaker 1: about their story about what you are saying, it's about
Speaker 1: how they interpret that data, that piece of information, or
Speaker 1: that idea that came out of your mouth. Now, so
Speaker 1: we know that we know that no matter what we say,
Speaker 1: somebody is going to be that at some stage, we
Speaker 1: know that somebody is going to be confused. You know
Speaker 1: that somebody's going to get angry. You know you know that.
Speaker 1: But what we want to do is we don't want
Speaker 1: to totally eliminate or eradicate that. Well, we'd love to
Speaker 1: if we could, but we can't because that will always
Speaker 1: be a part of the human experience, because there will
Speaker 1: always be disconnection and connection. There will always be confusion,
Speaker 1: there will always be misinterpretation. But what we want to
Speaker 1: do is we want to close the gap. And how
Speaker 1: we make that gap smaller and how we create more
Speaker 1: resonance and how we create greater connection is without compromising
Speaker 1: our values or our own ideas, we open the door
Speaker 1: of understanding on trying to genuinely right now, this is
Speaker 1: the challenge to genuinely understand somebody who doesn't think like us,
Speaker 1: or agree with us, or align on us, somebody who
Speaker 1: might live in a different echo chamber of thought or
Speaker 1: idea or religion or philosophy or whatever it is. Because
Speaker 1: we want the least conflict and the most harmony. We
Speaker 1: don't want we don't want to be the person that's
Speaker 1: constantly in the middle of some kind of confusion or
Speaker 1: conflict or debate or is that inevitable. Of course it's
Speaker 1: going to happen at some stage, But if I'm in
Speaker 1: a conversation if you're in a conversation, if you're a leader,
Speaker 1: if you're a manager, if you're a mum, if you're
Speaker 1: a dad, if you're a friend, if you're anyone in
Speaker 1: any kind of role, professional or not, where you are
Speaker 1: trying to build meaningful relationships, where you are trying to
Speaker 1: have meaningful conversations and to build healthy connections, then this
Speaker 1: is of the utmost important I think important. So I
Speaker 1: think understanding how other people think is it's a superpower.
Speaker 1: You know, it's a communication, it's an interpersonal it's a
Speaker 1: social logical weapon. And I don't mean that in a
Speaker 1: negative way. The tool is probably a better word that
Speaker 1: we can use to just make things better in that
Speaker 1: kind of space. So I think it's right up there.
Speaker 1: So how do we understand How do we start to
Speaker 1: understand others? Well, as I said, we really think about
Speaker 1: how they think, We really think about their words. And
Speaker 1: if I sit long enough and I talk little enough,
Speaker 1: and I am plugged into their energy and their words
Speaker 1: and their intentions as much much as I can without
Speaker 1: asking them overtly, I will. I will, as a byproduct
Speaker 1: of the things that I'm doing, I will begin reasonably
Speaker 1: quickly to understand their needs and wants and their values
Speaker 1: and what excites them and what scares them, and what
Speaker 1: they looking forward to, and what their story is and
Speaker 1: where they've been and what they've seen, and how their
Speaker 1: beliefs have come to be what they are. Did they
Speaker 1: choose those beliefs? Did they inherit those beliefs? Were those
Speaker 1: beliefs programmed into them by cognitive and or psychological osmosis
Speaker 1: just by virtue of the fact that they've been around
Speaker 1: that guy or that girl, or that teacher or that
Speaker 1: coach or that parent for a long time and so,
Speaker 1: and because they loved or respected or looked up to
Speaker 1: that person, then that person's thinking became the other person's thinking.
Speaker 1: You think about the amount of times when people typically
Speaker 1: decide what a belief will be, or what belief they're
Speaker 1: going to now embrace and move forward and build a lot.
Speaker 1: I'm going to build part of my life on this belief. Well,
Speaker 1: that doesn't typically happen. And what typically happens is people
Speaker 1: look up metaphorically and now they're fifteen or twenty or
Speaker 1: forty or fifty, and they've got this deeply ingrained belief
Speaker 1: that impacts their life significantly for better or worse that
Speaker 1: they never chose. They did not choose that. So your job,
Speaker 1: my job is not to criticize them. It's not to
Speaker 1: point out that perhaps their belief is flawed or problematic.
Speaker 1: It's to understand their belief. It's to understand it, not
Speaker 1: agree with it, not support it necessarily. Maybe we do
Speaker 1: agree with it, but what I'm saying is agreement and
Speaker 1: alignment and endorsement are not important factors in the journey
Speaker 1: of understanding others. It's all about just awareness, insight, reading
Speaker 1: the room, reading them, and assuming that old chestnut I've
Speaker 1: spoken about before, the false consensus effect. We assume that
Speaker 1: other people think like us because the only world we know,
Speaker 1: the only internal world we know real well, is our own.
Speaker 1: And so we look at even you know, peeling it
Speaker 1: back to just consciousness on an individual level, thinking about
Speaker 1: the world, thinking about the environment, and by that I
Speaker 1: mean the median environment around us, the context of the situation,
Speaker 1: the people that I'm in the room with, or the
Speaker 1: conversation with them, Realizing that I, yes, me, Craig Harper,
Speaker 1: doing the podcast, doing the teaching, I am still always
Speaker 1: looking through my window at the world, and my window
Speaker 1: being my ideas, my beliefs, the way I see things,
Speaker 1: my likes and dislikes, my bias, all my bullshit. Because
Speaker 1: you can't not help but see things through your lens
Speaker 1: and your understands and your experiences and your values, beliefs, ideas, etc.
Speaker 1: That's not bad, that's human. Where we start to step
Speaker 1: up another level is when we start to recognize that
Speaker 1: we recognize our own bullshit, we recognize our own limited thinking,
Speaker 1: we recognize our own bias in real time, in real time,
Speaker 1: and so that understanding that right now, what I think
Speaker 1: is real, what I think is right, what I think
Speaker 1: makes sense may not. It definitely may not to the
Speaker 1: person in front of me. But maybe in five years,
Speaker 1: when I'm less emotional and less intentional about being right,
Speaker 1: I might look back at this thing that I currently
Speaker 1: think or hold to be true or intertwine with my
Speaker 1: identity and go, fuck, why did I think? Where did
Speaker 1: that come from? But this is one of the great
Speaker 1: challenges for all of us in this pursuit of self discovery,
Speaker 1: self regulation, self awareness, self acceptance, self improvement is to
Speaker 1: be able to, with humility and courage, look at who
Speaker 1: I am and how I am through another lens, and
Speaker 1: to be okay with Hey, world, this is what I think.
Speaker 1: Here's my thought, here's my belief, here's my idea about
Speaker 1: this topic. Also, world, I could be wrong. I could
Speaker 1: be wrong. You know why, because I've been wrong many
Speaker 1: times and I will definitely be wrong more in the future.
Speaker 1: And this is a hard thing to live because we
Speaker 1: don't like being wrong. We also don't like not knowing.
Speaker 1: We want to know. We like predictability and familiarity and
Speaker 1: certainty and knowing, and we love all that shit. We
Speaker 1: gravitate towards that because that's where we feel the safest,
Speaker 1: and we love feeling safe. But guess what, Life doesn't
Speaker 1: give a fuck about your safety, or your emotions, or
Speaker 1: your state or mine. And the truth is more complex
Speaker 1: and bigger than I am right. They are wrong. This
Speaker 1: is a good conversation, this is bad, this is productive,
Speaker 1: this is destructive. It's bigger than that, because even in
Speaker 1: just a conversation, there are a myriad of factors and
Speaker 1: variables that are at play that determine the in the
Speaker 1: moment experience for both people in that conversation or all
Speaker 1: ten or whatever it is, and also the outcomes of that.
Speaker 1: So when I'm talking, for example, to a sixteen year
Speaker 1: old girl about her eating disorder, for example, which I
Speaker 1: have done many times, or her body dysmorphia, or her
Speaker 1: self esteem or emotional issues or whatever. So you know, firstly,
Speaker 1: there's the sixteen year old teenager that I need to
Speaker 1: factor in. I'm not talking to a fifty year old woman.
Speaker 1: I'm talking when I was sixteen year old, young lady, right.
Speaker 1: I need to factor that in. I need to factor
Speaker 1: in that I look fucking scary and I'm terrifying for
Speaker 1: some people. So I need to try to somehow mitigate that,
Speaker 1: because just sitting across from me, I know for some
Speaker 1: people is intimidating. For other people, it's fun. For other people,
Speaker 1: it's very comfortable. Again, you know, stimulus response. But in
Speaker 1: the middle of that, then talking to this young woman,
Speaker 1: I've got to try to understand her personality. I've got
Speaker 1: to try to dig into her beliefs and where they
Speaker 1: come from. I've got to try to dig into the
Speaker 1: origin of her self sabotage and her overthinking and her
Speaker 1: underdoing and her self loathing. And then I've got to
Speaker 1: take into consideration the context, which is we're sitting in
Speaker 1: a fucking cafe and Brian and Doris are sitting a
Speaker 1: meter away talking about their European holiday. Well that's not
Speaker 1: because I meet a lot of people in the cafe,
Speaker 1: right and so there are so many things that we
Speaker 1: need to and this is not easy, and this is
Speaker 1: not quick, and this is not a fast kind of adaptation.
Speaker 1: But when we can sit there in real time and
Speaker 1: even slow things down a little bit, slow down the judgment,
Speaker 1: slowed down the reaction, maybe slow down the response to
Speaker 1: the words that preceded it, and start to be more present,
Speaker 1: more aware, less needy of being right or showing the
Speaker 1: person how much we know, or you know, putting on
Speaker 1: the coach's hat or the leader hat, or being the
Speaker 1: super parent in the moment or whatever it is. But
Speaker 1: it's just the beginning of looking at things that we
Speaker 1: do all the time through a different lens, you know.
Speaker 1: I know, for myself, I had to slow the fuck down.
Speaker 1: I had to assume less, I had to ask more.
Speaker 1: And the thing is that we have this capacity I
Speaker 1: definitely do where I would look at somebody doing something
Speaker 1: and I'm sure you've thought this, and I'm like, why
Speaker 1: are they making this so fucking hard? What? Oh my god,
Speaker 1: they're going to Sydney from Melbourne, but they're going via
Speaker 1: New York, Paris, London, Munich. It's like, dude, this is
Speaker 1: so much easier than you're making it. Now, that may
Speaker 1: be true on a practical level, but the thing is
Speaker 1: that is what they're doing, That is their version of reality.
Speaker 1: And so how and when and if we might scent
Speaker 1: share some kind of external insight that is our thinking
Speaker 1: and molding into their I mean, that is a really
Speaker 1: tricky thing because you can give people feedback that is
Speaker 1: absolutely well intended. Let's say, in this hypothetical I'm giving
Speaker 1: you it's well intended, it's one hundred percent correct, it's
Speaker 1: relevant to the individual, and should they take that advice
Speaker 1: or thought or coaching on board and operationalize it, then
Speaker 1: they would probably create a much better result. However, despite
Speaker 1: the fact that you might be right and corrected and
Speaker 1: correct and well intended and kind and all of those
Speaker 1: things and empathetic, you might share something with them that
Speaker 1: in the time, in that moment, in that situation, does
Speaker 1: more harm than good, creates more of a problem than
Speaker 1: a solution. Now, it's in my interest in yours to
Speaker 1: know that ahead of time. Let's not throw the grenade
Speaker 1: let's not throw the psychological grenade into the picture and
Speaker 1: then look all confused and bewildered when they don't respond
Speaker 1: well or they metaphorically blow up because you said or
Speaker 1: did or shared something which for them in that mine
Speaker 1: moment was not the right thing and definitely not the
Speaker 1: right way. And I think even about this right now,
Speaker 1: like I really don't know. I don't know where to
Speaker 1: start and where to finish with this because it's such
Speaker 1: a big conversation understanding others. Theory of mind. You've heard
Speaker 1: me say that a lot. Theory of mind is your
Speaker 1: ability to have an insight into how others think, operate, choose, act, react,
Speaker 1: you know, a feel. It's your ability to understand another
Speaker 1: person as well as you can. And it's just that
Speaker 1: that intention of understanding like nothing more like and obviously
Speaker 1: the benefits will come from that. But how do I understand?
Speaker 1: You know? One of the arguably one of the greatest
Speaker 1: books ever written was written by a guy called Sunsu,
Speaker 1: which some of you have heard of, And he wrote
Speaker 1: a book called The Art of War, and this was
Speaker 1: written to five hundred years ago, and he was always
Speaker 1: talking about like the core theme in the Art of
Speaker 1: War was about understanding how other people think. Like this
Speaker 1: is two and a half thousand years ago. This is
Speaker 1: pre Bible. You know, this is understanding how other people think.
Speaker 1: So that obviously his motives were not as generous as
Speaker 1: yours and mine. He was talking about how to do
Speaker 1: war well and how to kill and conquer the enemy. Cool,
Speaker 1: but even in order to create that outcome, which is
Speaker 1: not one that we want. But this guy two and
Speaker 1: a half thousand years ago was fully cognizant of how
Speaker 1: important it was to understand how people think and what
Speaker 1: they might do and what they might choose. Before he
Speaker 1: was worried about what he thought. You know, here's this
Speaker 1: Chinese military strategist twenty five hundred years ago who says,
Speaker 1: to know your enemy, you must become your enemy. So
Speaker 1: you must be able to think like they think. You know,
Speaker 1: what did he say? What he said, war is a
Speaker 1: contest of minds before it's a contest of bodies. Think
Speaker 1: about that, war is a contest of minds before it's
Speaker 1: you know, we need in a much more generous and
Speaker 1: wholesome fashion. But if part of our agenda is to
Speaker 1: build connection, rapport and great relationships and be an effective
Speaker 1: communicator and love others in a way that feels loving.
Speaker 1: Then it is paramount that we start to ponder this stuff.
Speaker 1: And so when I start to think about people's culture,
Speaker 1: like where they come from, Oh, they don't come from
Speaker 1: the place I came from, you know, they don't. They
Speaker 1: didn't grow up in a kind of an environment that
Speaker 1: I grew up in. A for an environment. What environment
Speaker 1: do they live in? Where did they grow up? What country,
Speaker 1: what area, what suburb? Like? What religion did they grow
Speaker 1: up wh I grew up in this religion, And so
Speaker 1: I was completely programmed like a little Catholic robot. And
Speaker 1: that's not good or bad. That's just where I grew up.
Speaker 1: So by the time I was ten eleven twelve, I
Speaker 1: thought I saw the world in a certain way. And
Speaker 1: much of the way that I saw the world was
Speaker 1: through that lens of education and programming and conditioning, and
Speaker 1: I just I saw it how I'd been trained to
Speaker 1: see it, because we're not. For the most part, children
Speaker 1: are not taught how to think, but rather told what
Speaker 1: to think. And yes, I know there are exceptions, but
Speaker 1: there's not a whole lot of time spent in any
Speaker 1: or many teaching environments where children are being taught, told,
Speaker 1: and trained in a good way how to think for themselves,
Speaker 1: how to consider things, how to break down the data
Speaker 1: and form their own ideas or own conclusions. And I
Speaker 1: think the intention behind the other option is tell them
Speaker 1: how to think is I don't think it's all terrible,
Speaker 1: but I think the or it's not badly intended always
Speaker 1: because the grownups that are teaching the kids, they think
Speaker 1: they've got it sorted, so they're going to give them
Speaker 1: a little shortcut. But we know that it's often not true.
Speaker 1: We know that that belief that's been programmed is not
Speaker 1: the best belief for that person. And so when we
Speaker 1: meet someone straight up, and it could be a new
Speaker 1: staff member, it could be a new friend, it could
Speaker 1: be an acquaintance that we've got to do a project with,
Speaker 1: or it could be someone across whatever, whoever it is,
Speaker 1: I ask them questions. I encourage you to do the
Speaker 1: same if you're interested in building connection, rapport, etc. Ask
Speaker 1: them some questions. Hey, where'd you grow up?
Speaker 2: Oh?
Speaker 1: Wow, what was that like? How many siblings have you got?
Speaker 2: Oh?
Speaker 1: Wow, six? That's crazy? What was that like? And where
Speaker 1: are you in the six? Oh you're the youngest, what
Speaker 1: were you kind of just the neglected one at the
Speaker 1: end of the litter, like, what was that like for you?
Speaker 1: Where'd you go to school? But and I'm not talking
Speaker 1: about banging these out rapid fire. I'm talking about over time,
Speaker 1: you know, where I might say to somebody, like I said,
Speaker 1: people that get nervous being around me, They'll come and
Speaker 1: meet with me. They'll sit down, and I go, straight up,
Speaker 1: be brave, be honest, I go, how are you feeling
Speaker 1: right now? Because I want to know how they feel?
Speaker 1: I go, be brave, be honest. You can't fail or lose,
Speaker 1: you can't get it right or wrong. How you're feeling.
Speaker 1: And they'll often say I'm excited, but I'm nervous, or
Speaker 1: sometimes they'll be super brave and go, honestly, I'm intimidated,
Speaker 1: or sometimes they'll just say I'm excited and I'm happy.
Speaker 1: Doesn't matter again, no right or wrong, just me understanding
Speaker 1: where they're at. So, okay, I realized this person is
Speaker 1: a bit uncomfortable, a little bit intimidated. I need to
Speaker 1: move forward with that in mind. With that in mind,
Speaker 1: how can I Is there a way that I can
Speaker 1: alleviate some of that anxiety? Is there a tone of voice,
Speaker 1: Is there a language, is there a question? Is there
Speaker 1: a direction I need to go? So when we you know,
Speaker 1: when we start to really understand the person's story, then
Speaker 1: we start to understand the person. And I've shared this
Speaker 1: a couple of times, but I'll share it once more.
Speaker 1: I remember when I was young and dumber and thought
Speaker 1: I knew a lot when I didn't. But I used
Speaker 1: to look at some of my mum and dad's choices
Speaker 1: and behaviors and responses and the way they did things
Speaker 1: or didn't do things, and of course I thought it
Speaker 1: I was smarter. I definitely wasn't smarter, and I was
Speaker 1: making Craig judgments through the Craig lens about their choices
Speaker 1: and their life and their behaviors. And you know, so
Speaker 1: I had a very one dimensional understanding of something which
Speaker 1: is definitely multi dimensional. And one of the first times
Speaker 1: that this really dawned on me that I wasn't seeing
Speaker 1: the world at all. I was just seeing my story,
Speaker 1: my story about the world. I wasn't seeing the totality
Speaker 1: of the mum and dad experience. I didn't understand them.
Speaker 1: I only thought I understood them, and I thought I
Speaker 1: knew what was better for them. Or best. I thought
Speaker 1: I could fix it, solve it. I thought all of
Speaker 1: these things which were really coming from ignorance, lack of understanding, ego,
Speaker 1: and ten other things. And one of the first ones
Speaker 1: for me was really thinking about, what's it like being
Speaker 1: born in nineteen thirty nine, what's going on in nineteen
Speaker 1: thirty nine. Well, it's the first year of the Second
Speaker 1: World War. This is my dad's story, and he ends
Speaker 1: up being one of six boys, so one of eight
Speaker 1: in the family. The first six of his six years
Speaker 1: of his life have been spent in the turmoil of
Speaker 1: anxiety and lack of food supplies and no doe, borderline poverty,
Speaker 1: very little resources, very little hope, none of the resources
Speaker 1: or a lot none of the technical resources we now
Speaker 1: have at our disposal, not knowing whether or not you
Speaker 1: will have a meal next meal, being sent off at
Speaker 1: six years of age to be a paper boy on
Speaker 1: the street of Melbourne selling newspapers to get some income
Speaker 1: for the family, and just growing up in an environment
Speaker 1: and a paradigm that wasn't great for any child, that alone,
Speaker 1: any person. And so he had to be hard, he
Speaker 1: had to be adaptable, he had to be resilient. He
Speaker 1: needed to figure it out. He needed to figure it out.
Speaker 1: And then I'm six. My dad's selling papers in nineteen
Speaker 1: forty five, the end of the World War. What am
Speaker 1: I doing at six? I'm eating cake, I'm hanging out
Speaker 1: with my friends, I'm watching television. I'm figuring out whether
Speaker 1: or not I'm going to take my bike on my
Speaker 1: skateboard to school or whatever it is. Yes, I lived
Speaker 1: in the country with independent quite early, like, I have
Speaker 1: no problems, I have no adversity, no real problem, I
Speaker 1: would say, no real adversity. My dad had all of that,
Speaker 1: and then growing up trying to then, you know, still
Speaker 1: through the forties and fifties, living in a world that
Speaker 1: wasn't as easy and comfortable as the world that definitely
Speaker 1: the world that I live in. I can't talk to
Speaker 1: your world, but the world that I live in is
Speaker 1: easy and comfortable. And then there I was in my easy,
Speaker 1: comfortable world, judging my dad's behavior through my lens, having
Speaker 1: zero understanding of my own father, of his emotional damage,
Speaker 1: if there was psychological damage, sociological damage, all of the
Speaker 1: things that my dad had to deal with, all of
Speaker 1: the adversity, and his brothers. It was shipped for all
Speaker 1: of them. It was fun for none of them. And
Speaker 1: then my mum, you know who, who's died giving birth
Speaker 1: to her and you've heard that, and I apologize for
Speaker 1: the repetition, but that's imagine that's the start of your life.
Speaker 1: The start of your life is your mum dies. That's
Speaker 1: chapter one. Fuck, how do you deal with that? And
Speaker 1: there I was looking through my lens of privilege and
Speaker 1: comfort and convenience, judging people that I knew nothing about, really,
Speaker 1: despite the fact that they were my parents, because I
Speaker 1: never looked at anything but their behavior. Their behavior is fine,
Speaker 1: by the way, but I would always be finding a
Speaker 1: way for me to be right. This speaks to the
Speaker 1: fact that it is so important that we are at
Speaker 1: the very least curious about other people's world. They're inner world,
Speaker 1: their feelings, thoughts, ideas, experiences. Knowing that you and I
Speaker 1: are in the same situation, but you and I are
Speaker 1: not in the same experience. Please tell me about your experience.
Speaker 1: I want to understand you more. You know, whatever you're
Speaker 1: comfortable with. I want to know how you think. I
Speaker 1: want to know why this scares scares you and that
Speaker 1: doesn't scare you. I want to know where that lack
Speaker 1: of self esteem or that body image stuff. I want
Speaker 1: to know. Tell me about that. When do you think
Speaker 1: that started? What is that like for you? How does
Speaker 1: that affect you today? How does that affect you when
Speaker 1: you're socializing and you've got to get dressed up, or
Speaker 1: you've got to eat in front of other people, or
Speaker 1: you've got to speak in front of other people, or
Speaker 1: you need to you need to show up and be
Speaker 1: a certain way so that you fit in. Tell me
Speaker 1: how is that for you? That's what I want to know.
Speaker 1: I know I didn't finish anything today, but I just
Speaker 1: think that it's so important that we start to open
Speaker 1: this door. And by where I mean you unless you've
Speaker 1: mastered this, if you have put it on the show shelf,
Speaker 1: well done. But I think for all of us, me
Speaker 1: for you, whether or not I know you or don't
Speaker 1: know you've met you or never met you, you know,
Speaker 1: think about think about the potential of this. Think about
Speaker 1: the potential and possibilities and influence and power in a
Speaker 1: good way, not in a controlling, manipulating way. But that
Speaker 1: can come from from just having a greater understanding of people,
Speaker 1: more compassion, more awareness, more insight. You know, not necessarily compassion.
Speaker 1: You might find out they've done some shit things which
Speaker 1: don't align with you, but at the very least we
Speaker 1: get an insight into who we're dealing with and how
Speaker 1: we can move forward, and if we like, how we
Speaker 1: can build healthy, sustainable relationships with others and be a
Speaker 1: positive in the life of others that we want to
Speaker 1: be something of a positive influence for them. See you
Speaker 1: next time.