Speaker 1: One of the things that can lead to a richer
Speaker 1: life is a willingness to stay open hearted to it.
Speaker 1: Welcome to the one you feed Throughout time. Great thinkers
Speaker 1: have recognized the importance of the thoughts we have. Quotes
Speaker 1: like garbage in, garbage out, or you are what you
Speaker 1: think ring true, and yet for many of us, our
Speaker 1: thoughts don't strengthen or empower us. We tend toward negativity,
Speaker 1: self pity, jealousy, or fear. We see what we don't
Speaker 1: have instead of what we do. We think things that
Speaker 1: hold us back and dampen our spirit. But it's not
Speaker 1: just about thinking. Our actions matter. It takes conscious, consistent,
Speaker 1: and creative effort to make a life worth living. This
Speaker 1: podcast is about how other people keep themselves moving in
Speaker 1: the right direction, how they feed their good Wolfe thanks
Speaker 1: for joining us. Our guest on this episode is Michael
Speaker 1: bungay Stainer from Box of Cryans, which helps people and
Speaker 1: organizations do less good work and more grade work. Michael
Speaker 1: has written four or been featured in numerous publications, including
Speaker 1: Business Insider, Fast Company, Forbes, and The Huffington Post. His
Speaker 1: new book is The Coaching Habit, Say Less, Ask More,
Speaker 1: and Change The Way You Lead Forever. If you value
Speaker 1: the content we put out each week, then we need
Speaker 1: your help. As the show has grown, so have our
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Speaker 1: is to get to five of our listeners supporting the show.
Speaker 1: Please be part of the five percent that make a
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Speaker 1: and ideas. We really need your help to make the
Speaker 1: show sustainable and long lasting. Again, that's one you Feed
Speaker 1: dot net slash Support. Thank you in advance for your help.
Speaker 1: And here's the interview with Michael Bungay staying here. Hi, Michael,
Speaker 1: welcome to the show. It is so good to be here.
Speaker 1: Thanks for having me. I'm happy to have you on.
Speaker 1: Your latest book is called The Coaching Habit, Say Less,
Speaker 1: Ask More, and Change the Way You Lead Forever. And
Speaker 1: the book really is a lot about the sort of
Speaker 1: questions that we can ask other people and the questions
Speaker 1: that we can ask ourselves that lead us to a
Speaker 1: richer way of life. So we'll get into that in
Speaker 1: a minute, but I'd like to start, like we always do,
Speaker 1: with the parable. In the Parable, there's a grandfather who's
Speaker 1: talking with his grandson. He says, in life, there are
Speaker 1: two wolves inside of us that are always at battle.
Speaker 1: What is a good wolf which represents things like kindness
Speaker 1: and bravery and love, and the other is a bad wolf,
Speaker 1: which represents things like greed and hatred and fear. And
Speaker 1: the grandson stops and he thinks about it for a second.
Speaker 1: He looks up at his grandfather and he says, grandfather,
Speaker 1: which one wins? And the grandfather says, the one you feed.
Speaker 1: So I'd like to start off by asking you what
Speaker 1: that parable means to you in your life and in
Speaker 1: the work that you do. I love that you've structured
Speaker 1: your podcast around that parable, and it's such a wonderful
Speaker 1: kind of ritualized doorway to invite people through to start
Speaker 1: a conversation. I'm sure people have expressed wisdom far beyond
Speaker 1: what I can get to in terms of just a
Speaker 1: dichotomy of feeding kindness versus feeding hatred or your self obsession,
Speaker 1: whatever it might be. I wanted to give it a twist,
Speaker 1: so um, you can you can pull me back from
Speaker 1: this and just go all right, Michael, that's a disastrous metaphor.
Speaker 1: You have another go at it, But you know, part
Speaker 1: of what we stand for a box your crams and
Speaker 1: through the book and the like, it's really just helping
Speaker 1: people rethink how they show up in their lives. And
Speaker 1: the choice we're presenting people is how do you stay
Speaker 1: curious for just a little bit longer? And how do
Speaker 1: you give advice or in other words, be certain and
Speaker 1: be closed? How do you resist going to their just
Speaker 1: a little bit longer? And I'm not sure curiosity and
Speaker 1: certainty have quite the moral weight of be kind and
Speaker 1: be generous, but I do think that one of the
Speaker 1: things that can lead to a richer life is a
Speaker 1: willingness to stay open hearted to it, to be curious
Speaker 1: about it. And really the essence of being curious is
Speaker 1: to be willing to ask a question or two and
Speaker 1: not rushed to the certainty that you know what's happening,
Speaker 1: in the certainty that you know you're right, the certainty
Speaker 1: that you're right and they're wrong, and a willingness to
Speaker 1: stay open to that conversation. I think it's just another
Speaker 1: one of those wolves that you can choose to feed
Speaker 1: or not feed in terms of how you live a
Speaker 1: good life, right, And I really like that in the book.
Speaker 1: It's really where the book starts off to a large degree,
Speaker 1: which is about talk less and ask more questions. You know,
Speaker 1: let people come to their own conclusions and everything that
Speaker 1: you work on them with is going to be a
Speaker 1: lot more effective. And I certainly saw some of myself
Speaker 1: in that of cases where I could ask questions more
Speaker 1: and not, as you said, rushed to the answer as
Speaker 1: quickly or what I think the answer is. And I
Speaker 1: really like the way you talk about how particularly people
Speaker 1: who work in a job, you know, we're we we
Speaker 1: tend to think of ourselves as being valued for our
Speaker 1: ability to have the right answers. Right. That's true in
Speaker 1: a job, but it's true in life as well. I mean, um,
Speaker 1: you know, when I put on my head about who
Speaker 1: I was thinking about writing this for the first person,
Speaker 1: the first type of person was probably a busy manager.
Speaker 1: Somebody works and doing their best to do a good
Speaker 1: job and do great work. Um. But you know, truthfully,
Speaker 1: I'm like, I'm trying to write a book that actually works.
Speaker 1: If you're a human being and you interact with other
Speaker 1: human beings, and the thing is certainty is really comfortable.
Speaker 1: You know, our brain is wired to love certainty. You know,
Speaker 1: there's a great neuroscience and we call it. I call
Speaker 1: it the neuroscience of engagement, which is how do you
Speaker 1: keep people engaged, you know, in a conversation you're having
Speaker 1: with them, in a way of working with them. And
Speaker 1: to know that you need to understand that. You know,
Speaker 1: five times a second, the brain is scanning its environment
Speaker 1: and asking one fundamental question, and the question is is
Speaker 1: it safe here? Or is it dangerous? And you know,
Speaker 1: the brain is all about survival, so it's like, is
Speaker 1: it's safe, is it dangerous? Is it's safe? Is it dangerous?
Speaker 1: If it feels safe, you could say that it's much
Speaker 1: easier to access our higher natures. You know, our brains
Speaker 1: think better. We're more generous, we're more assuming positive intent,
Speaker 1: We're more better to live with the ambiguity. If it
Speaker 1: feels dangerous, we move into the amygdalaan to fight or flight,
Speaker 1: into that lizard brain. You know, we're like everything is
Speaker 1: black and white. The assumption is you're probably against me
Speaker 1: rather than for me. And there are there are various
Speaker 1: factors that drive um the brain's reaction to any environment.
Speaker 1: You know, it makes it feel safe or dangerous, a
Speaker 1: place of risk or place of reward, and the four
Speaker 1: factors in the way I think of them are tribe.
Speaker 1: In other words, are we as it you versus me?
Speaker 1: Or is it you and me? Um? Expectation and that's
Speaker 1: connected to the certainty piece, like do I know what's
Speaker 1: about to happen? Or is it as the future unknown rankers?
Speaker 1: Am I more or less important than you? And autonomy
Speaker 1: is are you making all the choices or do I
Speaker 1: get to make some choices here? And that second factor,
Speaker 1: the expectation or that certainty piece, it actually makes us
Speaker 1: feel safer if we know what's happening, if we're in control.
Speaker 1: The problem is it can make the other person feel
Speaker 1: less safe. So part of this more uh what do
Speaker 1: you call it? I guess I call it a more
Speaker 1: grown up life that you can choose your enabels on.
Speaker 1: It is a willingness to give up a degree of
Speaker 1: certainty um in service of a bigger win, which is
Speaker 1: perhaps a deeper connection another person feeling more welcome, more honored,
Speaker 1: more respected, more empowered, all of that sort of stuff.
Speaker 1: But willingness to sort of sit in the ambiguity of
Speaker 1: asking a question rather than have the clarity and certainty
Speaker 1: of giving advice, even though your advice isn't nearly as
Speaker 1: good as you think it is. Yeah, I agree. Before
Speaker 1: we go into what some of the questions are, there
Speaker 1: were a couple of things early in the book that
Speaker 1: I wanted to touch on, and the first one was
Speaker 1: you talk about something called the Cartman drama triangle. It's fantastic,
Speaker 1: such a great dynamic. It actually fits beautifully into the
Speaker 1: parable that you start the show with. So the Cartman
Speaker 1: drama triangle created by Stephen Cartman. He studied with Eric Byrne,
Speaker 1: who Nerik Byrne is one of the founders of transactional analysis.
Speaker 1: And if you've never heard of t A transactional analysis,
Speaker 1: it's a excited, dated therapeutic model, I think from the
Speaker 1: sixties seventies, and it gives us language that might be
Speaker 1: familiar to some folks here. You know. It gives us
Speaker 1: like adult to adult relationships and parent child relationships, which
Speaker 1: is interesting enough, but it does feel very therapy esque
Speaker 1: and kind of West Coast stuff. And when I first
Speaker 1: read into it, I wasn't that excited about t A.
Speaker 1: But then when I came across the drama triangle, I
Speaker 1: was like, oh, this is good, this feels applicable to life,
Speaker 1: and the basic way the drama triangle works is to say,
Speaker 1: look when things get dysfunctional, and things always get dysfunctional.
Speaker 1: You know it doesn't have to be you know, it
Speaker 1: doesn't have to be a car crash, but you know,
Speaker 1: when relationships just go off the rails of the a bit,
Speaker 1: three basic roles play out. There's the victim, there's the persecutor,
Speaker 1: and then there's the rescuer. Victim, persecutor and rescuer. All
Speaker 1: three of the roles are equally dysfunctional. And you know, people,
Speaker 1: what I like about it is people immediately understand what
Speaker 1: the three roles look like and sound like, you know
Speaker 1: what the somebody playing the victim role looks like and
Speaker 1: sounds like they're kind of whiny, annoying. My life is
Speaker 1: so hard sort of thing. It's not my fault, it's
Speaker 1: your fault. They did it to me, the persecutors at
Speaker 1: finger waggling shooky, I'm right, you're wrong. If anything gets
Speaker 1: done around here, it's because of me. If it doesn't,
Speaker 1: if it fails, it's because I'm surrounded by turkeys. Um.
Speaker 1: And the rescuer is the Oh, don't worry, don't fight,
Speaker 1: let me take it on, let me jump in, let
Speaker 1: me fix it, give it to me right. And you know,
Speaker 1: I mean, the rescuer sounds a little better than the
Speaker 1: other two, Eric, but honestly, it's just as broken a
Speaker 1: role as as the other two. And there are advantages
Speaker 1: and disadvantages to both those roles and all three of
Speaker 1: these roles, and you can kind of guess what those are.
Speaker 1: You know. The victim attracts people, has no responsibility, but
Speaker 1: the price you pay is you annoy everybody. And you know,
Speaker 1: you feel like you're you have no power, you can't
Speaker 1: change anything in the system, and so on. And the
Speaker 1: truth of the matter is, we bounce around and we
Speaker 1: play all three of these roles all the time. I mean, Eric,
Speaker 1: I'm sure you're like, oh yeah, I can. There are
Speaker 1: times when this is happening and I'm in this role
Speaker 1: and this is happening in another role, And even in
Speaker 1: a single conversation, you can be bouncing around and playing
Speaker 1: all three of the roles. But we do tend to
Speaker 1: have a default role, one that we most identify with.
Speaker 1: And if I got your your listeners to write down
Speaker 1: the role they think might be the one they play
Speaker 1: most often, victim persecute a rescuer. My bed is that
Speaker 1: everybody listening in or them will have just written down
Speaker 1: the word rescuer because that's the one most people go to.
Speaker 1: And what's powerful about that is that people sunny see
Speaker 1: that rescue role what's not working for them? So you know,
Speaker 1: you asked me, so, how's it going being a rescuer,
Speaker 1: and they're like, well, I'm exhausted, I'm overwhelmed, I have
Speaker 1: my fingers and too many other pihs. I'm not getting
Speaker 1: my own work done. I'm realizing that rescuers create victims
Speaker 1: and rescuers create persecutors, so they kind of unbalanced. The
Speaker 1: dysfunction that's showing up in some of these relationships you
Speaker 1: can track back to my own behavior. And when people
Speaker 1: see this, they're like, ah, all right, forget this whole
Speaker 1: coaching thing. How do I get out of the drama triangle?
Speaker 1: And I'm like, exactly, how do you get out of
Speaker 1: the drama triangle? And one of the most powerful ways
Speaker 1: is to actually stay curious, to ask questions, to be
Speaker 1: supportive like that, And it's one of the it's not
Speaker 1: the only way, but it's one of the core ways
Speaker 1: of shifting out of the drama triangle by getting a
Speaker 1: little more curious and asking people questions so that they
Speaker 1: can solve their own issue, you know, and different roles
Speaker 1: have different questions that work particularly you all. I mean,
Speaker 1: as an example, if you find yourself playing the victim
Speaker 1: role and the heart of being the victim role is
Speaker 1: this inside that. And there's only one way to do this,
Speaker 1: but you don't like the way it's being done, so
Speaker 1: you're feeling stuck. You know, you can't do much about it.
Speaker 1: This is the way forward. I don't like the way forward.
Speaker 1: But one of the best questions, and this is the
Speaker 1: second question in the book, is we call it the
Speaker 1: best coaching question in the world. It's called and what else?
Speaker 1: And what else? And I know that feel is pretty
Speaker 1: small and simple to be the best coaching question in
Speaker 1: the world. But the reason is is this inside that
Speaker 1: the first answer somebody gives you, it's never their only answer,
Speaker 1: and it's really their best answer. The other powerful about
Speaker 1: it is that it's a great self management tool. So
Speaker 1: this is great for rescuers who like to jump in
Speaker 1: and fix things. That keeps you staying curious longer by
Speaker 1: asking simply and what else? So asking and what else
Speaker 1: to untangle the victim role. It creates options, and when
Speaker 1: you have options, it's much harder to stay stuck in
Speaker 1: the victim role. Does that don't make sense? I mean,
Speaker 1: I know there's a bit theoretical perhaps, so I just
Speaker 1: want to make sure it feels grounded for people. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it does for me. And you know that idea about
Speaker 1: and what else? You quoted from a book that I love,
Speaker 1: which was the Chip and Dan Heath book about making decisions,
Speaker 1: and and that idea that most people only consider two
Speaker 1: decisions in most cases, like if you're in a relationship,
Speaker 1: but should I stay or should I go? That's the
Speaker 1: that's the that's the degree in which we consider and
Speaker 1: that adding a third option to things makes your your
Speaker 1: likelihood of success so much better. And I just have
Speaker 1: when I read that, that was just a big light
Speaker 1: that went on for me about always asking, you know,
Speaker 1: and I think the question and what else gets you there?
Speaker 1: You know it, Well, I don't know whether I should
Speaker 1: stay or should I go? Well, you know, is there
Speaker 1: another option? You know what else? Yeah? I agree. I
Speaker 1: think that's such a powerful question, both for ourselves and
Speaker 1: for others. The statistics behind this are pretty cool and
Speaker 1: I mean, I love that you love that book because
Speaker 1: that those Hea brothers, they're just right good. They're really good. Yeah. Um.
Speaker 1: And the statistic is this, you know, most decisions as
Speaker 1: are study done in organizations. Most decisions were these kind
Speaker 1: of binary decisions is it this or not? Um? And
Speaker 1: the failure rates really high. It's like more than fifty
Speaker 1: failure rate based on that decision criteria, which if you're
Speaker 1: wondering if that's good or not, is a worst decision
Speaker 1: rate than most teenagers. And there are there are a
Speaker 1: few people who make worst decisions than most teenagers. You know,
Speaker 1: their brains are completely regrowing, so you're batting lower than that.
Speaker 1: That's not that great. Um. Adding just that extra option
Speaker 1: and what else is one of the driving forces for
Speaker 1: that drops the failure rate from I think it's like
Speaker 1: the mid low fifties down into the low thirties. So
Speaker 1: it really makes a big difference to how successful your
Speaker 1: outcomes are. Yeah, I agree. I think the drama Triangle
Speaker 1: Yours was not the first place I came across it,
Speaker 1: but when I did, I immediately recognized, um, how powerful
Speaker 1: it was. And I think it is that inclusion of
Speaker 1: the rescuer as that third piece that really completes it
Speaker 1: for me, because I think I tended to see things more,
Speaker 1: you know, victim, perpetrator or persecutor or whatever the word
Speaker 1: we want to use is um. But the rescuer is
Speaker 1: a great addition, and the fact that it can be
Speaker 1: dysfunctional in its own way was a big learning for me,
Speaker 1: because yes, I fall into the rescuer category for sure. Eric.
Speaker 1: It's a great insight um and worth almost lingering just
Speaker 1: a bit because most people get the first to the
Speaker 1: victim and the persecutor. But if that's all you have,
Speaker 1: you just have two people at logger heads, and I
Speaker 1: feel like those roles don't change. It's just me versus you.
Speaker 1: By introducing that third role, the rescuer, it becomes as
Speaker 1: much more dynamic and more subtle way of understanding the
Speaker 1: bouncing around that goes on. So here we are week
Speaker 1: two in our donation campaign and things are off to
Speaker 1: a pretty good start. Our goal is to get to
Speaker 1: five of our listeners, which my public radio friends tell
Speaker 1: me is impossible. But we can do this. We can
Speaker 1: do this, but we need your help. We're better than
Speaker 1: public radio, right we don't even have commercials. Well we
Speaker 1: do now, well, yeah, yeah. We at least our drive
Speaker 1: is for like, yeah, We're going to keep this brief.
Speaker 1: The longest short of it is, the show costs money
Speaker 1: to make. It takes an enormous amount of time. We've
Speaker 1: been paying those costs out of our pocket for about
Speaker 1: three years now. We really need your help to keep
Speaker 1: this show going. Our goal is always to bring you
Speaker 1: high quality content week after week that enriches your life.
Speaker 1: So please consider being part of the five percent that
Speaker 1: we need in order to keep the show sustainable. Chris
Speaker 1: tell him where to go. We'd love you to go
Speaker 1: to one new feed dot net slash support and there
Speaker 1: you can see the Patreon page and make a donation
Speaker 1: on any level you wish to. And we really need
Speaker 1: your help. Thanks great rewards too. Yep. One of the
Speaker 1: things that you focus on is saying, hey, look, here's
Speaker 1: all these questions that you can be asking, but in
Speaker 1: order for any real change to happen, you actually have
Speaker 1: to remember to ask him in the best way to
Speaker 1: remember to do something or to do it consistently is
Speaker 1: to build a habit. And we talk a lot on
Speaker 1: the show about habit and behavior change. A lot of
Speaker 1: the coaching work to do with people. Is is very
Speaker 1: much focused on that, and so you had a whole
Speaker 1: section in the book about making habits, and I wanted
Speaker 1: to just spend a little time on that because that's
Speaker 1: one of my favorite topics. And you say, to building
Speaker 1: an effective new habit, you need five essential components, a reason,
Speaker 1: a trigger, a micro habit, effective practice, and a plan.
Speaker 1: Can you just walk us through those that are relatively
Speaker 1: high level? Sure? I want to do that, but I
Speaker 1: want to turn the tables for a bit, because I
Speaker 1: love that you're you're a fan of habits. I knew
Speaker 1: you would be and behavior change. But let me ask you,
Speaker 1: who do you look to as kind of the key
Speaker 1: people who have smart things to say about habit building
Speaker 1: or behavior change. I'm just curious to know, you know,
Speaker 1: who might you have referenced before? Who do you kind
Speaker 1: of think is saying interesting things in the space My
Speaker 1: partner here, Chris and Kim Kardashian are really the main people,
Speaker 1: the main people that I turned to. Um, so I
Speaker 1: don't I don't know about Chris, Chris who whatever. Kim
Speaker 1: Kardashian Absolutely, it's just got something there. Yeah, Um, you know,
Speaker 1: I think probably some of the same people that that
Speaker 1: you've looked at like M B. J. Fogg. I think
Speaker 1: James Clear I've is an amazing writer about habits. We've
Speaker 1: had both those guys on the show. Um, Charles do
Speaker 1: Hig wrote a good book about it. Um. You know,
Speaker 1: there's there's been a variety of different ones over time,
Speaker 1: but those are the top three that come to mind. Yeah, fantastic,
Speaker 1: Well that's useful. Collect provides context to me just setting
Speaker 1: out the insights I want to share and habit and
Speaker 1: you I feel like I stand on the shoulders of giants,
Speaker 1: or maybe just stand in the shade of the giants.
Speaker 1: Because um, because I think you know, the first thing
Speaker 1: is about making the way. The language in the book
Speaker 1: is make a vow. In other words, do you know
Speaker 1: why you are doing this? Um, it's really hard just
Speaker 1: to create a habit because in theory that it's a
Speaker 1: good thing, you've got to find some sort of you know,
Speaker 1: emotional human real connection as to why you are up
Speaker 1: for the painful process of behavior change. And I love
Speaker 1: a name that you haven't brought up. A Leo Bboucher,
Speaker 1: the Leo zen Habits. I mean, he's just such a
Speaker 1: nice guy and massively successful blog. I mean people should
Speaker 1: check out. There's Habits blog and his book Cards zen
Speaker 1: Habits as a beautiful book, I mean beautifully crafted and
Speaker 1: thoughtfully written. So he's doing something really interesting in this field.
Speaker 1: I mean, he's got that great book, the zen Habits Book,
Speaker 1: which is terrific, but he's also developing an app that's
Speaker 1: his latest project to help drive behavior change through an
Speaker 1: app that has the same elegance and kind of precision
Speaker 1: that his writing and that his books have. Um And
Speaker 1: that's where I kind of got clear on the importance
Speaker 1: of his vow. That's setting the reason he talked about
Speaker 1: it in the context of giving up smoking and how
Speaker 1: he tried many times but until he connected that he
Speaker 1: was doing this for his wife and his children rather
Speaker 1: than for himself, he just kept trying and failing. So
Speaker 1: that vow really important part of it. And honestly, the
Speaker 1: Child Do Hig book is where I kind of first
Speaker 1: hooked into that. Although speaking of Hooked, there's another good
Speaker 1: book by near Aisle is an odd named n. I. R. E.
Speaker 1: Y A. L is Court Hooked, and his book is
Speaker 1: about how people in Silicon Valley basically develop these gadgets
Speaker 1: and these apps and these technologies that kind of sucker
Speaker 1: us in you know, why do we want to check
Speaker 1: Facebook all the time? So coming at habits from a
Speaker 1: kind of slightly darker place perhaps, But both of those
Speaker 1: guys talked about the importance of the trigger and the
Speaker 1: inside is this, If you don't know what sets you off,
Speaker 1: it's impossible to change your habit because you're already halfway
Speaker 1: through it before you realize you're doing it again. So
Speaker 1: you need to have the discipline to pull back and go,
Speaker 1: what's the trigger that sets off this bad behavior? And therefore,
Speaker 1: how might I either avoid the trigger, or identify a
Speaker 1: new trigger, or repurpose this trigger to set up the
Speaker 1: next habit um you know, b J Fog of course,
Speaker 1: one of the things that he's brilliant for is this
Speaker 1: whole inside that if you're going to define a new habit,
Speaker 1: make it a small habit, make it a short habit,
Speaker 1: make it less than sixty seconds, because if you make
Speaker 1: it any bigger than that, it's a more complex action,
Speaker 1: and your big brain and the power of the status
Speaker 1: quo will more likely kind of hack your best intentions
Speaker 1: to try and change your behavior. So, b J. Folks key,
Speaker 1: inside is the whole thing about if you define a habit,
Speaker 1: make it sixty seconds or less. In his writing and
Speaker 1: his work, he often talks about flossing and trying to
Speaker 1: build a flossing habit, which most of us have failed at,
Speaker 1: which is because he has no teeth. I think last
Speaker 1: I checked that is I didn't know that it's a
Speaker 1: it's a it's a little known want one tooth, Chris.
Speaker 1: It's a little known fact, that one tooth. But that's
Speaker 1: his thing. He's just you know, his start of his
Speaker 1: habit was floss one tooth. Clearly that worked really well
Speaker 1: for that one tooth, but not for the rest of them. Um.
Speaker 1: But you know. Another another example was like, instead of going,
Speaker 1: I'm going to go for a run in the morning, um,
Speaker 1: because I know if you're like me, come the next morning,
Speaker 1: you're like lying in bed going I'll just, I'll just
Speaker 1: I'm going for a run tomorrow morning. But this morning
Speaker 1: obviously not this morning. Um. And he'd say, look to
Speaker 1: find your habit not as go for a run, but
Speaker 1: to put on your running shoes and step out the door.
Speaker 1: And I think that idea of starting small, whether it
Speaker 1: be you know, sixty two small or you know, very small,
Speaker 1: has so much power and in my experience, works so well,
Speaker 1: and yet we're so hesitant to do it. The reaction
Speaker 1: I get from a lot of people is, well, I
Speaker 1: should be able to do more than that, Like I
Speaker 1: can do more than that, or I'm never going to
Speaker 1: get in shape putting on my gym shoes, or you know.
Speaker 1: So I think it's it's it's it works so well,
Speaker 1: and yet there's a lot of resistance to it, just
Speaker 1: given that it's a it's a longer, but more certain path.
Speaker 1: This is the problem with our brain is that it
Speaker 1: has convinced us that we're much smarter and more rational
Speaker 1: than we actually are. You know, that's saying the brain
Speaker 1: is the most important organ. Wait, who's telling me that?
Speaker 1: You know? The truth is we are this kind of twitchy,
Speaker 1: responsive animal that isn't nearly as smart as you think
Speaker 1: we are. I mean this whole inside that and this
Speaker 1: is from the do Hig book that I think it's
Speaker 1: fort of our waking behavior is habitual now that you
Speaker 1: don't really think about it. We just react and we respond,
Speaker 1: and really our rational brain, what it's doing most of
Speaker 1: the time is just confirming the decision or unconscious brain
Speaker 1: has already made for us. I mean, this stuff is
Speaker 1: very disconcerting if you look into it, which is, like,
Speaker 1: you know, our unconscious mind decides about a third of
Speaker 1: a second before our conscious mind is aware of it
Speaker 1: what we're about to do. So as you reach forward
Speaker 1: distraction nose, or pick up your coffee carp or grab
Speaker 1: a pencil to write down a note, your unconscious brain
Speaker 1: has already made that call. And then your conscious brain goes, yeah, okay,
Speaker 1: I've reviewed that. Carry on right, So you would think
Speaker 1: that's why, that's why our rational brain goes, come on, look,
Speaker 1: I'm a I'm an intelligent adult. I'm a fully you know,
Speaker 1: a fully grown man. For goodness, say how hard is
Speaker 1: it for to get me to go to the gym?
Speaker 1: And the answer is it hard. Our habit tracks run
Speaker 1: deep and they run at an unconscious level. That's what
Speaker 1: a habit is. It's unconscious action. So it's you against
Speaker 1: your unconscious mind. And not only is of your behavior habitual,
Speaker 1: but I remember reading a study that said of your
Speaker 1: brain activity happens in the unconscious part of the brain.
Speaker 1: So there you go. Now, now you understand the odds.
Speaker 1: It's five percent versus no wonder you struggle the writer
Speaker 1: and the elephant right exactly back to the dawn and
Speaker 1: chip Heath metaphor so the other thing that you point
Speaker 1: out in the book, and I think it'll be the
Speaker 1: last thing we'll we'll say on habits and move on,
Speaker 1: although we could have the rest of this conversation and
Speaker 1: more on it is um you you talk about the
Speaker 1: one that's been floating around there forever, which is such
Speaker 1: a big myth, which is that it's twenty one days
Speaker 1: to get all the new habit, I know, really annoying
Speaker 1: and uh and you know, for a while my line
Speaker 1: was somebody's just made that up and now it's on
Speaker 1: the internet, so now it never goes away to die,
Speaker 1: and that's partially true. But I actually found the origin
Speaker 1: of that just recently or fairly recently, and it's it
Speaker 1: actually dates back to the early days of plastic surgery,
Speaker 1: where a plastic surgeon noticed that it talk about three
Speaker 1: weeks for somebody to get used to a new nose
Speaker 1: after they had their nose operated on. And somehow, weirdly
Speaker 1: that's got corrupted over time too. If you do it
Speaker 1: for twenty one days, it becomes a habit. Now everybody listening,
Speaker 1: you know, as well as I do just from your
Speaker 1: own lived experience, So that doesn't work. Um, it just
Speaker 1: depends on you, and it depends on the habit and
Speaker 1: depends on where you are with your life. The most
Speaker 1: recent number I've read, if you had to have a number,
Speaker 1: is that it's more like sixty four or sixty six days.
Speaker 1: But the truth is, it's like, don't even set yourself.
Speaker 1: I should have this on to my boat by twenty
Speaker 1: one days. It's like classic, you show up, you do
Speaker 1: the habit. You show up, you do the habit. You
Speaker 1: show up, you do the habit, and you keep doing
Speaker 1: it till it is truly a habit. You know, you
Speaker 1: don't have to think about it. It just becomes the
Speaker 1: way you act. I also think on habits that take
Speaker 1: a significant amount of time and effort, that yes, they
Speaker 1: do become relatively habitual, and that our resistance to do
Speaker 1: them is a lot less. Um, they're much much easier
Speaker 1: to do. But I think these things like going to
Speaker 1: the gym every day, or or going to the gym,
Speaker 1: you know, five or six days a week, something that
Speaker 1: takes a significant amount of time, regardless of whether it's
Speaker 1: habitual or not, and having it be habitual makes a
Speaker 1: huge difference. It's still not always easy, just because of
Speaker 1: the how crammed our lives are with stuff and how
Speaker 1: how volatile our schedules can be. And so I think
Speaker 1: the idea that like, well, once I get to that point,
Speaker 1: you know, I'll never miss again is probably a little
Speaker 1: delusion all but there is certainly a point where the
Speaker 1: at least I've noticed, the level of resistance most of
Speaker 1: the time, you know, goes way down. It's it's much
Speaker 1: easier to do than it was in the beginning, but
Speaker 1: it's you know, I wouldn't exactly call it autopilot. I
Speaker 1: love the way you put that, and the experience or
Speaker 1: the metaphor perhaps that works best for me is it's
Speaker 1: like meditating. Thing is you meditate for forty years, You're
Speaker 1: still not that good at it. You still get distracted,
Speaker 1: You still kind of you know, your mind wanders off
Speaker 1: until you realize and look, I'm I'm I'm just a
Speaker 1: bad meditator, you know. I try and do it. I
Speaker 1: do it a bunch of days in a row that
Speaker 1: I forget. Um, I sit down on the cushion and
Speaker 1: I spend the whole time thinking about stuff, and I'm like,
Speaker 1: but part of the way of being gentle with yourself
Speaker 1: around that is it's the It's the waking up and
Speaker 1: realizing you've got distracted again is the very point of meditating.
Speaker 1: It's actually the moment of coming back that makes meditation work.
Speaker 1: And I'm sure there's a thousand meditators listening to the
Speaker 1: story about to write angry emails to you and me
Speaker 1: about this, But for me anyway, there's just something about
Speaker 1: It's the waking up to realize it's time to come
Speaker 1: back again is where the learning slowly happens. And likewise
Speaker 1: with this whole habit stuff, you know, it's the bigger
Speaker 1: thing is you will fall off. You will fall off
Speaker 1: the bus or the train or whatever vehicle you want
Speaker 1: to make your metaphorical habit. And in fact, I make
Speaker 1: the point in the book that's one of the final things,
Speaker 1: which is what's useful is to have a plan to
Speaker 1: know that you're going to fall off the rails and
Speaker 1: go So when I do fall off, what's my best
Speaker 1: guess about how I will fall off and how will
Speaker 1: I get myself back on the rails, Because of course
Speaker 1: I'm going to fall off. That's the nature of habit building.
Speaker 1: You fail until you get back and make it more
Speaker 1: like order pilot. Yeah. I think that's the key insight
Speaker 1: to long term sustainable change is knowing how to be
Speaker 1: flexible and and and having to plan and knowing how
Speaker 1: to keep it going even when it's not perfect. You know.
Speaker 1: The b J. Fog uses a great example that I like,
Speaker 1: he talks about you know that in his life, you know,
Speaker 1: he thinks of a you know, a habit is like
Speaker 1: a plant, right, And there's times in his life where
Speaker 1: he's just you know, watering the plant and giving it
Speaker 1: plant food and you know, talking to it and doing
Speaker 1: all kinds of stuff. And then there's times like if
Speaker 1: he's on the road traveling, where his goal is simply
Speaker 1: just not to kill the plant, you know, like have
Speaker 1: your neighbor stopped buying water at least twice this week
Speaker 1: so the thing doesn't die, so that when I get home,
Speaker 1: I can, you know, And I think there's a lot
Speaker 1: that's really for me. That was where a lot of
Speaker 1: things in my life sort of turned turned the corner
Speaker 1: from being something that I do for a little while
Speaker 1: and then I stopped for a long while. Then I
Speaker 1: do it for a little while, and I stopped for
Speaker 1: a long while into something that I do, you know,
Speaker 1: nine plus percent of the time, you know, year after year,
Speaker 1: was really recognizing that, like, Okay, I'm not going to
Speaker 1: stick to this perfectly, So what do I do when
Speaker 1: I can't? And how can I How can I just
Speaker 1: keep the habit alive enough that when I'm you know,
Speaker 1: when whatever the current challenge I'm facing is resolves, I
Speaker 1: can kind of step step on the gas. Again, that's
Speaker 1: a bunch of metaphors about plants and cars, and your
Speaker 1: your show is based on that metaphor, right, which is
Speaker 1: about the wolf you feed. And you know, there's an
Speaker 1: obvious way about kindness or hatred that you can you
Speaker 1: can fit that in. But for me, some of that
Speaker 1: more subtly shows up in this conversation, which is, how
Speaker 1: do you hold yourself to account when you're trying to
Speaker 1: build a new habit, when you're trying to be disciplined,
Speaker 1: and it can be very easy to be really hard
Speaker 1: on yourself to to feed the other wolf. And you know,
Speaker 1: it's one thing for us to be thinking about our
Speaker 1: behavior as we interact with others, but it's true for
Speaker 1: ourselves as well, which is, like, how do you hold
Speaker 1: yourself firmly but compassionately to account um. And I do
Speaker 1: think that's the choice of a wolf to feed because
Speaker 1: your your other options are you cruelly hold yourself to
Speaker 1: account and you beat yourself up, or you kind of
Speaker 1: let yourself off the hook too easily. And there's something
Speaker 1: in the middle, which is that compassionate accountability, which can
Speaker 1: be a very powerful, gentle, persuasive way to be with yourself.
Speaker 1: We're fairly far into the interview and we've not even
Speaker 1: gotten any of the questions yet. So the conversation is
Speaker 1: far more interesting than than than the book. I mean,
Speaker 1: the book is fueling the conversation, but it's good to
Speaker 1: talk about this stuff, yea. So let's go into the
Speaker 1: questions a little bit here for a few minutes before
Speaker 1: we wrap up. So the first question is called the
Speaker 1: kickstart question, and what I love about is I think
Speaker 1: it's a great way to start conversation with anybody. So
Speaker 1: why don't you tell us what that first question is
Speaker 1: and why it's so effective? So let me start by
Speaker 1: saying that, you know, the purpose in writing this book
Speaker 1: was to write the shortest book I could that would
Speaker 1: still be useful. I don't know about you, Eric, I
Speaker 1: know you read a lot, but I find that too
Speaker 1: many books, either in the self help world or the
Speaker 1: business world, I feel like there's an awful lot of filler.
Speaker 1: I know I read them all the time, so yes,
Speaker 1: I know, yeah, And I'm like, wow, you honestly, if
Speaker 1: you if, if I, if you're if you're a tough
Speaker 1: editor on this, what you'd have is a half blog post.
Speaker 1: Somehow you turned it into a children twenty page talk
Speaker 1: filled with dated stories about Southwest airlines. So I'm like, ah. So,
Speaker 1: part of the goal for me was like, Okay, how
Speaker 1: do I write a book that is short, readable, beautiful
Speaker 1: and practical. Um? And I went through all sorts of
Speaker 1: versions of us. I mean, this is the book that
Speaker 1: almost killed me. I wrote four bad versions of this
Speaker 1: book before I finally got to writing a good version
Speaker 1: of it, you know. And one version was like, here
Speaker 1: are hundred and sixty eight questions that I think are awesome.
Speaker 1: I was like, wow, that's just a terrible, terrible walk,
Speaker 1: boring is overwhelming. How can you use that? And it
Speaker 1: all is to say, you know, we ended I ended
Speaker 1: up with seven questions because I tried five and that
Speaker 1: wasn't enough. And I tried nine and that felt too many,
Speaker 1: so seven felt about right, and you're right. The kick
Speaker 1: style questions the first one in the book, and it
Speaker 1: comes from an insight that we spend too much time
Speaker 1: in conversation talking about the stuff that's not that interesting
Speaker 1: or not that borring, and we're kind of like, this
Speaker 1: is the warm up that's going to get us to
Speaker 1: the real conversation. But sometimes the real conversation never gets there.
Speaker 1: And it's not to say that so called small talk
Speaker 1: is a is a bad thing, because it's the time
Speaker 1: when small talk is exactly the thing to be doing,
Speaker 1: you know, sharing stories about you, the love of your life,
Speaker 1: your kids, the sporting team, whatever. But um, there are
Speaker 1: also times where you're like, let's have a conversation about
Speaker 1: something interesting, um, something personal, something kind of a little deeper. Um.
Speaker 1: And in the workplace setting it's even more origin because
Speaker 1: people are so busy they don't have time for the
Speaker 1: chick chat. Really, they want to If you're gonna have
Speaker 1: a conversation, let's make it a real interesting question about
Speaker 1: something that matters. And so this chick start question is
Speaker 1: the longest ramble to a question ever there is. Can
Speaker 1: I ask you what's on your mind? Michael, Yes, thank you,
Speaker 1: thank you, and of course every listening. And that is
Speaker 1: the question what's on your mind? Um, which is both uh,
Speaker 1: it's power. I think it's open. You're you're inviting the
Speaker 1: other person to talk, You're not setting their agenda for them.
Speaker 1: But it's also implied in that is a but let's
Speaker 1: talk about something that matters, that's that you're excited about
Speaker 1: or worried about, or waking up at four o'clock in
Speaker 1: the morning about let's talk about that. Yeah. I think
Speaker 1: it's a great question. I've heard variations on it about
Speaker 1: like you know, how to engage in conversation with people, um,
Speaker 1: you know that gets you past the small talk. And
Speaker 1: I've heard things that I'm like, I can't see me
Speaker 1: ever walking up to somebody I don't know that well
Speaker 1: and saying like what are you really excited about these days?
Speaker 1: Or you know, like those are just strange, you know,
Speaker 1: But what's on your mind? It is a little bit more,
Speaker 1: you know, A I think in I can see in
Speaker 1: the work setting or coaching setting how effective it is.
Speaker 1: And I also think it's actually a question that you
Speaker 1: could use, you know, with with people in the world
Speaker 1: in in and not get quite the same strange looks.
Speaker 1: You might. It might be a slightly strange look, but
Speaker 1: certainly not like you know, what are you fired up
Speaker 1: about these days? Bob? I know, I'm like, Okay, now
Speaker 1: I'm anxious. What if I'm not fired up about anything?
Speaker 1: And who are you anyway? And why are you asking
Speaker 1: me this question? What's in your mind does have a
Speaker 1: kind of h and it doesn't have a judgment built
Speaker 1: into it. It's just a curiosity about what's going on
Speaker 1: for you. And you know, honestly, if you walked up
Speaker 1: to a stranger and when hey, what's on your mind,
Speaker 1: they're actually still going to think you're slightly odd. Um.
Speaker 1: But you know, I got introduced to somebody the other day.
Speaker 1: Somebody wanted to chat about something. And after we did
Speaker 1: the usual Hey, it's good to talk to you. I'm
Speaker 1: glad to meet you. Wonderful that Laurel introduced us. I
Speaker 1: wasn't able to go, hey, so what's on your mind?
Speaker 1: And it was a way for us just to go bang,
Speaker 1: we're into the real conversation now. And so the next
Speaker 1: question we talked about briefly, um, and let's just throw
Speaker 1: it into kind of what's on your mind, that conversation happens,
Speaker 1: and then you know, and instead of jumping in with
Speaker 1: advice or solution or or whatever, then it's and what else?
Speaker 1: So this is bringing yeah, yeah, I mean it's I
Speaker 1: want to say that the seven questions are there and
Speaker 1: you could almost follow them one by one and kind
Speaker 1: of go through the arc of a conversation, but they're
Speaker 1: really not design necessarily is a script like that that
Speaker 1: you know, if you've asked what's on your mind? You
Speaker 1: must ask and what's the real challenge for you or
Speaker 1: what you want? You know, it's like you can go
Speaker 1: where you want. What I want for people is more
Speaker 1: about the can you stay curious just a little bit longer?
Speaker 1: Can you rush to action and advice and solutions and
Speaker 1: opinions just a little bit slower. It's not to say
Speaker 1: never give anybody advice, because that's that's ridiculous and impossible advice,
Speaker 1: you know, suggestion, But it's to say, how do you
Speaker 1: stay curious a little bit longer? And you know, if
Speaker 1: we're into a conversation and um, and this conversation I
Speaker 1: had with this woman just a day or two ago
Speaker 1: is exactly this so much on your mind and she's
Speaker 1: like blah blah blah blah blah, and I was out
Speaker 1: great anything else and she's like, blah blah blah blah
Speaker 1: bla I get anything else, but bah blah blah. It
Speaker 1: was like this kind of kind of this rush of
Speaker 1: stuff that she's been thinking about. Some of it was,
Speaker 1: I'm going to say, kind of trivial, some of it
Speaker 1: was more profound. Some of it got into a kind
Speaker 1: of self identity who am I in this world? Um?
Speaker 1: And what then happened is rather than me getting caught
Speaker 1: up in it because I knew a bunch of suggestions
Speaker 1: about a bunch of the stuff that she brought up.
Speaker 1: Some of it was productivity stuff, so how do you
Speaker 1: be a bit more productive? Some of it was do
Speaker 1: I hire a coach? And I know a bunch of coaches,
Speaker 1: so I could give her advice on that. So it's
Speaker 1: part of me twitching with the kind of the desire
Speaker 1: to be useful to this person and give her the
Speaker 1: best bits of advice I could. But there's other parts
Speaker 1: of me going every time you do that, Michael, you
Speaker 1: kind of end up a sucking the life out of
Speaker 1: the conversation and be your advice isn't nearly as good
Speaker 1: as you actually think it is, So why don't you
Speaker 1: just slow down the rushans? And what I literally asked
Speaker 1: her was um, after that and what else questions, which
Speaker 1: are the second question in the book. We literally went
Speaker 1: right to the third question in the book, which is
Speaker 1: the focus question. And I was like, Wow, with all
Speaker 1: that stuff going on for you, what's the real challenge
Speaker 1: here for you? And that's the focused question, what's the
Speaker 1: real challenge here for you? And and the way it's
Speaker 1: expressed like that is actually a deliberate choice, and it's
Speaker 1: not a kind of accidental collection of words, because I
Speaker 1: want to demonstrate how you can increase the power of
Speaker 1: this question. That the least powerful version of that question
Speaker 1: is what's the challenge here? And if I'd asked you
Speaker 1: that should have kind of looked at me slightly oddly
Speaker 1: and repeated one of the things you'd already told me,
Speaker 1: because you're gonna get a you're going to get an
Speaker 1: initial reaction. I could have asked her what's the real
Speaker 1: challenge here? And she would have kind of scanned that
Speaker 1: the things you'd already told me and probably come up
Speaker 1: with something. So that's a better question. But I asked,
Speaker 1: what's the real challenge here for you? And for you
Speaker 1: swings the spotlight away from the challenge and swings it
Speaker 1: onto the person who's dealing with the challenge, And it
Speaker 1: just makes for a more powerful, more personal, more learning
Speaker 1: conversation because now we're not trying to fix something so
Speaker 1: much as we're trying to help understand how this person
Speaker 1: is entangled in the problem that they're wrestling with and
Speaker 1: getting to what's kind of driving them. So you get
Speaker 1: to a deeper place that much more quickly by what's
Speaker 1: the real challenge here for you? And those last two
Speaker 1: words for you are part of the sort of secret
Speaker 1: source here. Yeah, I think that does make a big difference.
Speaker 1: And I love the way the questions you know, one
Speaker 1: through seven there is, like you said, it doesn't have
Speaker 1: to be a script, but there's there is an order
Speaker 1: that you can you can do them in and I
Speaker 1: just really found it a very helpful way to look
Speaker 1: at conversation with people and how to increase the depth
Speaker 1: and effectiveness of our conversations, right, And the magic of
Speaker 1: us is to come back to that and what else question,
Speaker 1: because you go, Okay, so wow, a lot going on here,
Speaker 1: What's the real challenge here for you? And then you
Speaker 1: go okay to whatever their answer is, you go, okay,
Speaker 1: anything else, anything else? A real challenge here for you? Okay?
Speaker 1: Is there anything else? All right? So let me ask
Speaker 1: you again, what's the real challenge here for you? And
Speaker 1: you know, in a not very long period of time,
Speaker 1: you kind of dropped down a level or two to
Speaker 1: a more intimate, more personal, and more vulnerable and more
Speaker 1: useful conversation. Yeah. I agree. I really like the way
Speaker 1: it was laid out. It wasn't easy read. There wasn't
Speaker 1: any fluff in it, so as someone who has to
Speaker 1: read multiple books a week, I appreciate that. And um,
Speaker 1: you know, I've really enjoyed the conversation also, and thanks
Speaker 1: so much for coming on my pleasure. You know, Erica
Speaker 1: is a great conversation. It is such a powerful metaphor
Speaker 1: a great story that you start and you invite people
Speaker 1: in through that lens, and I do think it sets
Speaker 1: up for it's such a great interesting conversation like the
Speaker 1: one we've had. So thank you very much for having
Speaker 1: me my pleasure. And we will have links in the
Speaker 1: show notes and everything to the book, to your website.
Speaker 1: You've got a great download that lays out some of
Speaker 1: the advice on habits from different people, and I'll make
Speaker 1: sure I linked to that also because I found that
Speaker 1: really good and useful. Perfect. Thank you all right, take care, thanks,
Speaker 1: see you, thank you, see you. Guys. By If what
Speaker 1: you just heard was helpful to you, please consider making
Speaker 1: a donation to the one you Feed podcast. Head over
Speaker 1: to one you Feed dot net slash support