Speaker 1: The human mind is prewired to make assumptions about people
Speaker 1: in situations and things, and it's an impulse that we
Speaker 1: kind of have to fight against when you're trying to
Speaker 1: see somebody from their own perspective. Welcome to the one
Speaker 1: you feed. Throughout time, great thinkers have recognized the importance
Speaker 1: of the thoughts we have, quotes like garbage in, garbage out,
Speaker 1: or you are what you think ring true, and yet
Speaker 1: for many of us, our thoughts don't strengthen or empower us.
Speaker 1: We tend toward negativity, self pity, jealousy, or fear. We
Speaker 1: see what we don't have instead of what we do.
Speaker 1: We think things that hold us back and dampen our spirit.
Speaker 1: But it's not just about thinking. Our actions matter. It
Speaker 1: takes conscious, consistent, and creative effort to make a life
Speaker 1: worth living. This podcast is about how other people keep
Speaker 1: themselves moving in the right direction, how they feed their
Speaker 1: good wolf. Thanks for joining us. Our guest on this
Speaker 1: episode is Kira assitry On, a certified relationship coach, author, blogger,
Speaker 1: loneliness expert, and speaker. She loves to speak publicly on
Speaker 1: the topic of loneliness. Kira has spent her coaching career researching, pondering,
Speaker 1: and reflecting upon what specifically makes relationships feel good or bad.
Speaker 1: Her book is called Stop Being Lonely. Three Simple Steps
Speaker 1: to developing close friendships and deep Relationships. Here's the interview. Hi, Kira,
Speaker 1: welcome to the show. Hi, thank you so much for
Speaker 1: having me. I'm excited to have you on. Your book
Speaker 1: is about loneliness in our culture. And one of the
Speaker 1: things that I've been saying on the show a lot
Speaker 1: lately is more and more I've realized how important human
Speaker 1: connection is defeating the good wolf. So I'm really excited
Speaker 1: to get more into your book and some of your
Speaker 1: suggestions around how we can do that. But let's start
Speaker 1: with a parable. There's a grandfather who's talking with his grandson.
Speaker 1: He says, in life, there are two wolves inside of
Speaker 1: us that are always at battle. One is a good wolf,
Speaker 1: which represents things like kindness and bravery and love, and
Speaker 1: the other is a bad wolf, which represents things like
Speaker 1: greed and hatred and fear. And the grandson stops and
Speaker 1: he thinks about it for a second, and he looks
Speaker 1: up at his grandfather and he says, grandfather, which one wins?
Speaker 1: And the grandfather says the one you feed. So I'd
Speaker 1: like to start off by asking you what that parable
Speaker 1: means to you in your life and in the work
Speaker 1: that you do. That's the first time that I had
Speaker 1: heard that parable. I really love it. It's very simple
Speaker 1: yet profound um for me. You know, I do a
Speaker 1: lot of work with people who are experiencing loneliness and
Speaker 1: social isolation. And for me, the bad Wolf is a
Speaker 1: lot of times it's about shame or about out fear
Speaker 1: of making one self vulnerable to other people. That's what
Speaker 1: it was for me, and my good Wolf was a
Speaker 1: lot of self acceptance and kind of trust that other
Speaker 1: people would like me if I revealed, you know, parts
Speaker 1: of my my inner self. Yeah. And your book certainly
Speaker 1: talks about being intentional about taking those chances with people. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's come up a lot, actually, you know, trusting that
Speaker 1: things will work out okay if you if you reveal
Speaker 1: aspects of yourself. Uh. And I think that's more of
Speaker 1: a challenge for some people than other. Some people just
Speaker 1: put it all out there and it's natural for them.
Speaker 1: But but I and many others are in the camp
Speaker 1: of being concerned that if we reveal our inner world,
Speaker 1: that it'll be rejected or somehow, you know, turned upon.
Speaker 1: You say that there is you know, in contemporary society,
Speaker 1: we have sort of a new type of loneliness. Can
Speaker 1: you describe what you mean by that? Yeah, So loneliness
Speaker 1: in the past was was more of a rare event.
Speaker 1: And what I mean by the past was when we
Speaker 1: lived in more more traditional communities. Um And, typically you
Speaker 1: had to really do something wrong, or you had to
Speaker 1: leave and try to join another community, or something unusual
Speaker 1: had to happen to feel chronically lonely. Um. But chronic
Speaker 1: loneliness is becoming more and more common in modern society.
Speaker 1: I think a lot of us know this actually kind
Speaker 1: of intuitively, that modern society is making people lonely. Um And.
Speaker 1: And the new loneliness that I talked about is not
Speaker 1: so much literal isolation, meaning like you don't have people
Speaker 1: in your life. It's more that you feel like the
Speaker 1: people that are around you really don't know you and
Speaker 1: they don't really care about you very much. You say
Speaker 1: that the cure for loneliness is it sounds sort of
Speaker 1: obvious on one hand, but I think you're being very
Speaker 1: specific about it. You say that it's in in closeness.
Speaker 1: You use that word very specifically in being clo with
Speaker 1: other people. What does closeness mean in the sense that
Speaker 1: you're using it? You're right that I did. I I
Speaker 1: deliberated over what that word should be For me. Closeness
Speaker 1: means direct access to another person's inner world, and it's
Speaker 1: it's created through doing to two types of things. The
Speaker 1: first one is knowing and the second one is caring.
Speaker 1: And I'm happy to talk more about what those mean. Sure, yeah,
Speaker 1: why don't you go ahead and explain them both a
Speaker 1: little bit more so? Knowing is is about kind of
Speaker 1: establishing the what I call the mental connection with another person.
Speaker 1: So it's really about seeing somebody from their own perspective
Speaker 1: and and allowing them to see you from your own perspective,
Speaker 1: which is actually kind of different from how we usually
Speaker 1: get to know people. UM. It tends to be pretty surface,
Speaker 1: is one thing, in like normal day to day life. UM.
Speaker 1: And we also tend to kind of like ascribe our
Speaker 1: own labels to other people and make a lot of
Speaker 1: assumptions about people, UM, which doesn't really facilitate closeness. We're
Speaker 1: seeing them from our view of them, not necessary early
Speaker 1: their view of themselves. Exactly. Yeah. And then and then
Speaker 1: caring is about being interested and invested in their well being.
Speaker 1: So it's not necessarily about you know, being concerned about
Speaker 1: them or being worried or what have you, which is
Speaker 1: where a lot of people go with like being emotionally
Speaker 1: invested in somebody, um, but it's just really being present
Speaker 1: and available to them emotionally. One of the things that
Speaker 1: you talk about the idea of closeness is that a
Speaker 1: lot of us have been taught to care about people.
Speaker 1: So that's the second aspect of closeness, knowing and caring.
Speaker 1: We've been taught to care about people by worrying about them.
Speaker 1: I think we all know why. That's probably not good
Speaker 1: for ourselves to worry. Why is that detrimental in us
Speaker 1: being close to other people? Yeah, it's very interesting. It's
Speaker 1: like there there are times in places where being worried
Speaker 1: might be the right reaction. But if if you're trying
Speaker 1: to be close to somebody through worrying about them, it
Speaker 1: has the effect of usually pushing them away because it
Speaker 1: will prompt the other person this impulse to be like no, no,
Speaker 1: everything is fine with me, because they don't they don't
Speaker 1: actually enjoy seeing you uncomfortable or they it feels like
Speaker 1: you're sort of implying weakness in them or something like that, right,
Speaker 1: And it it also is kind of becomes I have
Speaker 1: a person in my life who I will not name,
Speaker 1: but um is the situation becomes it's and it's not Chris,
Speaker 1: he's looking at me, it's not Chris. Um where any
Speaker 1: situation suddenly becomes about how it affects them. Yeah, totally,
Speaker 1: and all of a sudden, like but I'm the one
Speaker 1: that's got the problem over here. But I think that's
Speaker 1: very common. I was really struck by you sort of
Speaker 1: calling that out as one of the ways we think
Speaker 1: we get close to people but actually causes distance. Yeah.
Speaker 1: The classic example not to call out the moms of
Speaker 1: the world, but everybody. Everybody goes to their mom. Yeah.
Speaker 1: I do too, and I love my mom. But it's
Speaker 1: you know, it's a it's an instinct when you're very
Speaker 1: One of the things that we talked about in those
Speaker 1: social sciences is like being being a meshed with another
Speaker 1: person and and that can that that has some negative repercussions.
Speaker 1: When you feel like you know the well being of
Speaker 1: somebody else, it's really is really about you. Yeah, you
Speaker 1: talk about that and maybe we'll get to it. You
Speaker 1: describe the idea of relationship a sort of a separate
Speaker 1: thing between two people that doesn't engulf them. And I
Speaker 1: don't know if we'll get that far into all the
Speaker 1: all the stuff I want to talk about, but you
Speaker 1: definitely address that later in the book. Um, it's sort
Speaker 1: of a cliche these days people talk a lot about it,
Speaker 1: but I would be interested. You know, we all talk
Speaker 1: about how technology is causing this distance and loneliness between us.
Speaker 1: From your perspective, what is it about technology that can
Speaker 1: cause distance between us even when we're around other people. Yeah,
Speaker 1: there's a couple big ways that technology has kind of
Speaker 1: inserted itself in our relationships. The first one is that
Speaker 1: it's just made it less necessary to be around people.
Speaker 1: And and in some ways that's nice, Like it's wonderful
Speaker 1: for you know, working parents to have flexibility in terms
Speaker 1: of where they work. But when you're not physically with
Speaker 1: people as much, it's just harder to to get close
Speaker 1: to people. You have to really make an effort to
Speaker 1: set up time to to see people. Is easier to
Speaker 1: let relationships just lag if you're not if you don't
Speaker 1: need to go see them. The other one I talk
Speaker 1: about in the book is very it's very Silicon Valley
Speaker 1: because that's where I live, and I grew up here,
Speaker 1: and I do work in that field as well. And
Speaker 1: all of our devices are totally based on the principle
Speaker 1: of efficiency. And the more that we spend time waiting
Speaker 1: for a bus playing on our phone, or waiting for
Speaker 1: our food to arrive playing on our phone, the more
Speaker 1: we get used to like this type of interaction that's
Speaker 1: incredibly efficient, um, and it becomes harder and harder to
Speaker 1: have patients with real people. Yeah. Yeah, I totally relate
Speaker 1: with that. I mean, I've read the various books and
Speaker 1: and and heard the various things about, you know, what
Speaker 1: technology is doing. I still don't feel like I can
Speaker 1: quite put my finger on exactly what spending so much
Speaker 1: time with my phone does, but I feel like it
Speaker 1: when I'm spending a lot more time looking at it
Speaker 1: in every every turn, it it weakens me in some
Speaker 1: way that I can't quite name yet, but I definitely
Speaker 1: can feel it. Yeah, it's a feeling that a lot
Speaker 1: of people are feeling. And you know, at the same time,
Speaker 1: like people tell me these beautiful stories of reconnecting with
Speaker 1: an old friend over Facebook and it became this great relationship.
Speaker 1: So it's there's there's another side to it too that
Speaker 1: you know, technology in a way is just a tool,
Speaker 1: and it's about how you use it. Do you use
Speaker 1: it to to encourage close relationships or to like kind
Speaker 1: of avoid you know, real face to face interaction. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I think that any idea that we're gonna technologically go backwards.
Speaker 1: I always think that people are like, well, we should
Speaker 1: be like we were twenty years ago. I always feels
Speaker 1: like a failed effort. That's just not the way that
Speaker 1: the world moves. So the question then becomes, Okay, this
Speaker 1: technology is a part of our lives, how do we
Speaker 1: use it skillfully and wisely? I mean, this show wouldn't
Speaker 1: exist without the internet, you know, and and the thousands
Speaker 1: of people that are listening wouldn't hear this without you know,
Speaker 1: technology and the internet. So I believe strongly and it
Speaker 1: as a really powerful tool. But like any tool, you
Speaker 1: can use it wrong. Like a hammer, you can you
Speaker 1: can use it to hammer and nail, or you can
Speaker 1: use it to hit hit your hit your producer and
Speaker 1: engineer who's sitting nearby. That's exactly the the analogy that
Speaker 1: I used a couple of days ago, and then and
Speaker 1: then the person I was talking to was like, you
Speaker 1: might not want to say that. When we think about loneliness,
Speaker 1: people tend to go right towards the idea of love,
Speaker 1: like love is the best way to conquer this loneliness.
Speaker 1: And I'm going to, uh, I'm going to quote you
Speaker 1: here and then ask you to elaborate. You say, the
Speaker 1: notion that love is a reliable solution to loneliness is
Speaker 1: a myth, because, simply put, love is a mystery. Closeness, however,
Speaker 1: is not. Yeah, this kind of hearkens back to when
Speaker 1: we first started talking about closeness and why did I
Speaker 1: pick that word? At first, I gave a lot of
Speaker 1: thought to it, it being you know, is it love, um,
Speaker 1: because I'm a relationship coach and I love love and
Speaker 1: all that stuff. Um. But but the but the key
Speaker 1: for me was that it's not terribly reliable and we
Speaker 1: really don't know what causes it. Um. In a in
Speaker 1: a way that I think we have a much better
Speaker 1: idea of what causes to people to feel close to
Speaker 1: one another. And of course, you know I talked in
Speaker 1: the book about how you know, you can love people
Speaker 1: over ask distances, you can love people after they die,
Speaker 1: and that's like a to me, that's more of a magical,
Speaker 1: mystical experience than than the type of closeness that I'm
Speaker 1: talking about. Yeah, I have to say you your reference
Speaker 1: in your book, and I had seen it elsewhere the
Speaker 1: way that somebody I can't remember where he's from, but
Speaker 1: can can cause people, you know, to fall in love
Speaker 1: or a very reliable way to induce the feeling of
Speaker 1: love and people. Can you describe that experiment or that story.
Speaker 1: I just think it's fascinating. Yeah, I know, I love
Speaker 1: it too. Yeah. The man who came up with it
Speaker 1: is Dr Arthur Aaron, and he he essentially brought couples,
Speaker 1: well to individuals, not not pre existing couples into his
Speaker 1: lab and had them ask each other thirty six questions
Speaker 1: and then look each other in the eye for four minutes. Um.
Speaker 1: But it's really the questions part that was interesting to me,
Speaker 1: because essentially what it is is accelerated knowing it was
Speaker 1: it was questions that were that went incrementally deeper into
Speaker 1: the other person's needs, values, what motivates them, you know,
Speaker 1: what do they care about? In this world, um, and
Speaker 1: carrying tends to follow that, right. I Mean, there's that
Speaker 1: old saying of the you know, the surest way to
Speaker 1: stop hating somebody is to learn a lot more about them,
Speaker 1: you know, to hear their whole story is usually one
Speaker 1: of the quickest ways to to feel empathy towards someone
Speaker 1: totally and and also to reduce assumptions and prejudices against them. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: it's uh. You know, there certainly are relationships where you
Speaker 1: can care about somebody but not know them very well.
Speaker 1: I will, unfortunately go back to the parent example because
Speaker 1: that's that's kind of a classic thing. Um. But but
Speaker 1: people who have those types of relationships can feel that
Speaker 1: something is not quite as close about them as as
Speaker 1: somebody who has both the knowing and the carrying aspect going. Right.
Speaker 1: So in your book you discus ribe really how to
Speaker 1: know someone, how to be close to someone, and what
Speaker 1: the skills are that it takes to do that, a
Speaker 1: question that I didn't really see in the book, and
Speaker 1: I'm curious about because I get it often, particularly in
Speaker 1: this day and ages, you get people who are a
Speaker 1: little bit older. You know, you're out of college, you're
Speaker 1: you're working a career and you you moved to a
Speaker 1: new city and you just don't know anyone, and it
Speaker 1: just seems harder and harder to make friendships. It seems
Speaker 1: like they're easier to form when you're younger. What do
Speaker 1: you tell people who are sort of in that boat?
Speaker 1: What is what is some of the ways that they
Speaker 1: can try and you know, work with that loneliness it's
Speaker 1: in their life. Yeah, it's a it's a hard problem
Speaker 1: to face and a lot of people face it these
Speaker 1: days because people move to cities all the time now
Speaker 1: where they don't know anybody. Um. There are a couple
Speaker 1: of tips that I usually go to. The first one
Speaker 1: is to start where you are, so meaning if you
Speaker 1: moved to a new city to attend a school, you know,
Speaker 1: look for like minded people in your school. If you
Speaker 1: if you went for work, start at work and try
Speaker 1: to make some connections at work. Um, if you really
Speaker 1: know nobody, one thing that I like to suggest is
Speaker 1: I call them friends in laws. So you may not
Speaker 1: know somebody there, but one of your friends may have
Speaker 1: a friend who's where, who's near where you are. Um,
Speaker 1: and you can kind of leverage your pre existing social
Speaker 1: network too to meet new people. But but it's it's
Speaker 1: the third thing I would say, which is a little
Speaker 1: more like you know Fluffy is also just be patient
Speaker 1: with with the whole situation, because it's it's very likely
Speaker 1: that you will feel lonely for a little while if
Speaker 1: you if you transplant yourself. In the book, you describe
Speaker 1: a lot about becoming sort of like you said, they're
Speaker 1: about becoming closer with people who are already there, like
Speaker 1: how do you build closeness with co workers? And what
Speaker 1: are some myths we have about what we can and
Speaker 1: can't do their how do you build closeness with, say
Speaker 1: a schoolmate. The thing that you talk about is this
Speaker 1: idea of watching for something and another person that interests
Speaker 1: you and then having then taking deliberate steps to try
Speaker 1: and foster that relationship. So what does that look like?
Speaker 1: Say I'm I'm in a new city, I've got a
Speaker 1: new job, and there's a you know, there's a guy
Speaker 1: that I work with, you know, he's in some meetings
Speaker 1: that I'm with occasionally, and you know, I just sort
Speaker 1: of have a sense like, oh, you know, I'd like
Speaker 1: to get to know this guy better. What what are this?
Speaker 1: You know, what are some steps from there that don't
Speaker 1: look incredibly creepy or strange. Everybody is fighting this battle
Speaker 1: against the creepy factor. It's totally true. And and also
Speaker 1: this is a sidebar, but I think I think men
Speaker 1: face it more more than women do. I think that
Speaker 1: women feel quite a bit more comfortable approaching another woman
Speaker 1: and kind of like going on a friend date. I
Speaker 1: think it's harder for men. So, but if you're in
Speaker 1: that situation where you know you're a guy and there's
Speaker 1: another guy who you feel like you could be friends with,
Speaker 1: I would start with work talk, but but I wouldn't
Speaker 1: leave it at work talk. So if there were a
Speaker 1: way to, you know, ask him if you wanted to
Speaker 1: go get coffee and talk about this thing that we're
Speaker 1: working on. But then but then throw in a couple
Speaker 1: questions to gauge, you know, is he interested in willing
Speaker 1: to kind of reveal little bits about what's going on
Speaker 1: with his life outside of work. Right, you talk about,
Speaker 1: you know, being willing to reveal some of those things yourselves.
Speaker 1: And we had a woman on the show. I don't
Speaker 1: know if you're familiar with her work, Glenn and Mountain Doyle,
Speaker 1: and she writes a blog called Momastery that's largely targeted
Speaker 1: at mother's But she said something on this show that
Speaker 1: just kind of blew me away, and it's it's stuck
Speaker 1: with me ever since. She said, because she is known
Speaker 1: for just giving way too much information about herself, way
Speaker 1: too fast, Like you know, her husband's always like giving
Speaker 1: her the cut, you know, the cut sign at parties.
Speaker 1: But what she said is when you stay on the
Speaker 1: surface with people, it's really hard to connect because everybody's
Speaker 1: surface is different. But if you're willing to go just
Speaker 1: a little bit deeper, it's a lot easier to connect
Speaker 1: with people because deep down, we're very much all the same.
Speaker 1: And I was really struck by that, and it really
Speaker 1: does mirror my experiences in life when I actually take
Speaker 1: a moment and go a little bit further than I
Speaker 1: might normally in a casual conversation. I find that so
Speaker 1: often reciprocated in really positive ways. I do too. I
Speaker 1: do too, and I talk a lot in the book
Speaker 1: about how to ask questions that that get at these
Speaker 1: deeper conversations. But but the other avenue works works well too,
Speaker 1: which is just sharing something about yourself that you may
Speaker 1: not have. It very often makes other people feel more
Speaker 1: comfortable sharing about their own lives too. Yes, let's head
Speaker 1: into questions, because that was another area. Had you talk
Speaker 1: about questions either being too soft or too hard? What
Speaker 1: does that mean? Yeah, the too soft kind of question
Speaker 1: is the kind that just dances on the surface. It's
Speaker 1: it's the kind that's that's asking about the trivialities. You know,
Speaker 1: what are you going to be doing this weekend? Oh
Speaker 1: that's cool, Okay, bye? You know they what's new? What
Speaker 1: are you working on? It's you know, they're a comfort
Speaker 1: zone for most people, I would say. But then the
Speaker 1: too hard question is the kind that feels either like
Speaker 1: you've broached something that's just way too personal, or you've
Speaker 1: asked it in a way that sounds um like you
Speaker 1: are accusing them of something. So one of the one
Speaker 1: of the tips, and I actually didn't really come up
Speaker 1: with this tip, it's a classic life coaching tip is
Speaker 1: don't ask why, um, because why can instantly sound like
Speaker 1: you're interrogating somebody. So almost any why question can be
Speaker 1: turned into a what or a how question, and then
Speaker 1: it feels much more balanced. So give me an example
Speaker 1: of that. Well, my favorite one and I probably overuse it,
Speaker 1: but my favorite one is if you were going to
Speaker 1: ask somebody, well, let's say you're having a conversation and
Speaker 1: they say, I'm going to go sailing this weekend. Okay,
Speaker 1: So the first thing that might come to your mind
Speaker 1: is why do you like sailing? That could very easily
Speaker 1: be transformed into what do you like about sailing? And
Speaker 1: it and it feels like like a trivial change. But
Speaker 1: if it were about something more, you know, serious or
Speaker 1: controversial or anything than sailing, that the why do you
Speaker 1: like it can feel like an implication that you shouldn't
Speaker 1: like it. Yeah, your example in the book is really good.
Speaker 1: Like you, you know, you you take a romantic partner
Speaker 1: home to meet your parents, and afterwards one of your
Speaker 1: parents says, why do you like her? Instead of what
Speaker 1: do you like about her? I mean the difference there
Speaker 1: is very profound. Why do you like her? Sounds like
Speaker 1: you know, I'm questioning your judgment and what do you
Speaker 1: like your about? Or is a much more And you
Speaker 1: use this word inviting question right exactly? Yeah, that is
Speaker 1: how I think about it. Yeah, I like that idea.
Speaker 1: So any why question can be transformed into a water
Speaker 1: or how And then you also say your favorite catch
Speaker 1: all question if you're trying to think of a good
Speaker 1: inviting balance question is what does that get you? Yeah,
Speaker 1: my husband is obsessed with this question, like, yes, is
Speaker 1: it way too much? But but an example of when
Speaker 1: of when it would be a sensical time to use
Speaker 1: it is if like, let's say you just met somebody
Speaker 1: and they're talking about how they they just left their job.
Speaker 1: So if you ask them what does that get you?
Speaker 1: It opens up this whole like reasoning for why they
Speaker 1: did something. So maybe maybe they left their job to
Speaker 1: spend more time with their kids, or maybe they left
Speaker 1: it because you know, they weren't feeling appreciated or something. Um,
Speaker 1: it's just it's it's a very elegant way to to
Speaker 1: get at the motivation be high and a decision. You
Speaker 1: talk about diving deeper on once. So if Chris and
Speaker 1: I are in a conversation he says he wants this thing,
Speaker 1: I can just hear that and I can have my
Speaker 1: own assumptions of why he wants that. You call it
Speaker 1: the want assume misunderstand cycle. Yeah, what are you driving
Speaker 1: at their? Yeah? So well, why did you ask such
Speaker 1: a question? You don't have to deal with me. It's okay,
Speaker 1: I won't feel interrogated. Um. Yeah, But so the the
Speaker 1: human mind is is pre wired to make assumptions about
Speaker 1: people in situations and things, and and it's an impulse
Speaker 1: that we kind of have to fight against when you're
Speaker 1: trying to see somebody from their own perspective. So, if
Speaker 1: you've just met somebody and they say, you know, I
Speaker 1: want to buy a new car, and you think, oh, cool,
Speaker 1: like I want to buy a new car too, we
Speaker 1: have something in common. You actually may not, because there's
Speaker 1: a whole litany of reasons why somebody might want to
Speaker 1: buy a new car, and and you know, that particular example,
Speaker 1: it may not lead to anything that you know, dramatic
Speaker 1: about the person, or it may not matter. But there
Speaker 1: are opportunities that come along all the time where we
Speaker 1: assume that somebody's deeper reasons for doing something is the
Speaker 1: same as ours. So it's back to this asking another
Speaker 1: question about what does that get you? Or Um, the
Speaker 1: first question that comes to mind is why do you
Speaker 1: want to buy a house? Yeah? Well, what what does
Speaker 1: the house get you? Is a perfectly good question I
Speaker 1: would do in that particular situation, I would do a
Speaker 1: couple of questions to not be like the weirdo who's
Speaker 1: asking weird like coaching questions. But but but I would
Speaker 1: ask you know, I would do a little bit of
Speaker 1: the surface stuff, and I would ask, you know, where
Speaker 1: are you looking to buy? How big? What have you?
Speaker 1: And then maybe you know who would live with you
Speaker 1: in the house. Okay, then I'm then I'm going to
Speaker 1: learn a little bit about what that person's like relationships
Speaker 1: are like, or what's important to you about that neighborhood
Speaker 1: or exactly. That's a great one. So and in general
Speaker 1: you talked about I'm always interested in questions because I
Speaker 1: ask a lot of them. UM's port of doing this job.
Speaker 1: But you described that the main thing with the question
Speaker 1: is to have an inviting mindset, you know, is to
Speaker 1: sort of be asking them in such a way that
Speaker 1: you're trying to really invite the other person into a
Speaker 1: conversation if you can con just like hold this intention.
Speaker 1: It's coming from a place of being curious about the
Speaker 1: other person and and not not trying to, you know,
Speaker 1: find things that are like you in them, because that's
Speaker 1: a again, that's a natural impulse that the human brain
Speaker 1: has is to find similarities and and there are relationships
Speaker 1: that could be wonderful out there in the world with
Speaker 1: people who aren't exactly like you. Yep. So the book,
Speaker 1: a lot of it is is talking about getting to
Speaker 1: know people better, and then you you get into how
Speaker 1: do we care for people better? And and it starts
Speaker 1: to get into more about how you work within a
Speaker 1: relationship with somebody, whether that be a parent or a child,
Speaker 1: or a lover or a friend. And you've got a
Speaker 1: line that I absolutely love, which is, separate the person
Speaker 1: from the problem. I know, don't you love that? I
Speaker 1: do explain it for people who don't automatically get it
Speaker 1: because it seems fairly straightforward, and then maybe elaborate on
Speaker 1: it a little bit. Sure, Yeah, separate the person from
Speaker 1: the problem is actually it's a principle that comes from
Speaker 1: business negotiation, of all places. But when when I learned
Speaker 1: about it, I thought that totally has to do with
Speaker 1: regular relationships as well. Um. And essentially, what it says
Speaker 1: is that when two people are in conflict or somehow
Speaker 1: different in some type of way, or have different opinions
Speaker 1: on something, it's extremely hard to come to a resolution
Speaker 1: when you view the other person as the problem. Um.
Speaker 1: And if you can make the separation in your mind
Speaker 1: that the person that you're speaking to is you know,
Speaker 1: deserving of of love and respect and all that stuff,
Speaker 1: and the problem is something separate from either one of
Speaker 1: you that you can eliminate. Then the whole conversation becomes different,
Speaker 1: and it's it's quite awesome. Yeah, the way you say,
Speaker 1: and I'll quote you again, you say, separating the person
Speaker 1: from the problem allows us to go easy on the
Speaker 1: person and hard on the problem. This is a profound shift.
Speaker 1: We no longer need to be trapped in the conundrum
Speaker 1: of whether we should treat the person who's disappointing us
Speaker 1: or upsetting us nicely or sternly, whether we should show
Speaker 1: him love or tough love or just yell, intimidating conjole.
Speaker 1: Always treat the person with love. Always treat the problem
Speaker 1: as if you're determined to destroy it. Yeah, yeah, I
Speaker 1: like that. And then you talk about the fact if
Speaker 1: you do that, then you're back on the same side exactly.
Speaker 1: That's a that's a very big deal. This is something
Speaker 1: that I most of my coaching has to do with couples,
Speaker 1: and like newly engaged or or married couples, and that
Speaker 1: this is a big, big thing that I emphasize is
Speaker 1: as much as possible be on the same side, we
Speaker 1: might need to engage you to do some podcast Partner Consulting,
Speaker 1: Ship Consulting UM and you you talk about that the
Speaker 1: couples tend, you know, successful couples tend to do something
Speaker 1: and it's one of my favorite I did a mini
Speaker 1: episode on it called the fundamental attribution error. You didn't
Speaker 1: call it that, but it's the same thing, which is
Speaker 1: that you say, happily married couples tend to attribute undesired
Speaker 1: negative spouse behavior to situational characteristics, then the specific dispositional
Speaker 1: characteristics of the spouse, and the fundamental attributionary is exactly
Speaker 1: is sort of the exact opposite that when you do
Speaker 1: something wrong, I assume it's your personality, and when I
Speaker 1: do something wrong, I know the circumstances behind it. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's a very difficult pattern to break out of once
Speaker 1: you start believing that you know, problems that are caused
Speaker 1: in the relationship are due to the other person's character
Speaker 1: or personality. Yeah, it strikes me though, that I see
Speaker 1: how you can get mired in that you know the
Speaker 1: personality of the other person, and we get mired into
Speaker 1: relationships where that gets really hard to break. It does
Speaker 1: seem though that within a relationship would be one place
Speaker 1: that you'd at least if you tried, you'd have the
Speaker 1: data to be able to dispute it where you could
Speaker 1: if you fostered the closeness with someone else, you could
Speaker 1: start to hear more about those situational things and start
Speaker 1: to hear that and to be something you could do
Speaker 1: with someone versus a lot harder with a stranger somebody
Speaker 1: you don't know. Well, it's easier in one way, but
Speaker 1: but harder another, If that makes sense. Yeah, I do
Speaker 1: understand that. Yeah, yeah, I agree. So you say that
Speaker 1: there are four skills that we need to foster closeness.
Speaker 1: So both in looking at myself, like, okay, I want
Speaker 1: to be closer, here's four skills I need to have,
Speaker 1: but also in looking at people that we want to
Speaker 1: invest with getting closer with What are we looking for
Speaker 1: both to cultivate in ourselves and to see in someone
Speaker 1: else before we invest in getting too close to them? Yeah? Well,
Speaker 1: the big one for knowing for sure is the ability
Speaker 1: to to self disclose, and what that means is just
Speaker 1: both comfort ability saying anything about their personal lives and
Speaker 1: also being receptive to somebody else talking about their personal lives.
Speaker 1: And and you know, every time I say it, I
Speaker 1: feel like we can't everybody do that. But but when
Speaker 1: you run into somebody who really deflects or avoids going
Speaker 1: into anything that's not you know, readily apparent or something
Speaker 1: they would tell anybody. Um, those people definitely do exist,
Speaker 1: and you know, not that they are you know, to
Speaker 1: be avoided or anything, but it's going to be hard
Speaker 1: to get close to them. Um. And then on the
Speaker 1: on the caring side of things, that's all about having
Speaker 1: the capacity to to feel and express emotions. Um. A
Speaker 1: lot of people call it empathy, and I talk a
Speaker 1: little bit about empathy in the book. Um, but empathy
Speaker 1: is a confuses people, including myself, from time to time
Speaker 1: what that really means. So in the beginning, when you're
Speaker 1: kind of determining if if somebody could be a good
Speaker 1: closeness partner or not, really just look for, you know,
Speaker 1: do they have feelings about anything, and can they express
Speaker 1: feeling about anything ing like I love my daughter so
Speaker 1: much or what have you, you know, because that's at
Speaker 1: least they can go there within themselves. And so this
Speaker 1: is a way if I go back to I'm lonely.
Speaker 1: I want to meet people or I want to build
Speaker 1: relationships with people. This is sort of a way to
Speaker 1: to start to wait into those waters, to be looking
Speaker 1: for these sort of things. And if there's no reciprocation there,
Speaker 1: maybe that's not the place to put all my energy. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that is also that is one of the skills on
Speaker 1: the list as well, is somebody being willing to reciprocate.
Speaker 1: I call them moments um, but all all that that
Speaker 1: means is that they're willing to both put their attention
Speaker 1: on you and allow the attention to be on them
Speaker 1: at times as well. Excellent. Well, I think that brings
Speaker 1: us to the end of our time. The book is
Speaker 1: called Stop Being Lonely. Will have links to your book,
Speaker 1: to your website, to all your various Twitter feeds. Will
Speaker 1: also have a download of a couple of my favorite
Speaker 1: quotes from the book available in the show notes, and
Speaker 1: that will be when you feed dot net slash Kira
Speaker 1: k I r A. Thank you so much for taking
Speaker 1: the time to come on the show. I really I
Speaker 1: really enjoyed the book and I think I think I
Speaker 1: got a lot out of it. Of course, thank you
Speaker 1: so much for having me. This was a lot of fun. Okay, excellent,
Speaker 1: take care, okay, bye bye. You can learn more about
Speaker 1: CIA assitry on and this podcast at one you Feed
Speaker 1: dot net. Slash Kira that's k I r A.