Episode 167 - The Skill That Improves Every Difficult Conversation
Most hard conversations don't start with an invitation. They start with something that sounds more like a verdict: You never listen to me. You don't respect my time. You don't care about my feelings. By the time we say those things, we've already decided what happened, what it means, and who's responsible. But those assumptions rarely resolve conflict. In this episode, I walk you through a shift that can completely change the quality of difficult conversations: moving from certainty to curiosity. When you learn to ask questions rather than make statements, you create more opportunities for connection. Here's what I cover:
Why certainty feels so convincing and the psychological biases that make us believe our interpretation is the truth
How to make observations without turning them into stories about someone else's intentions
A three-step formula for approaching difficult conversations without certainty: observation, impact, and curiosity
Why curiosity can be hard to access when your nervous system is activated and certainty feels safer
Practical questions you can use to create more understanding and meaningful resolution in your relationships
Reserve your seat for my next workshop: sarafisk.coach/sayitwithclarity
Find Sara here:
pages.sarafisk.coach/difficultconversations
youtube.com/@sarafiskcoaching1333
Transcript
00:59
I just got back from a family reunion. 30 of the people that I love. Yeah, 30. I'm the oldest of six. My grandparents have 22 grandkids. So yeah, 30 of us piled into a bunch of condos, Southern California.
01:13
We've been going to the same place for 25 plus years. It's an amazing week. And when you get that many people in one place, of course, feelings are hurt, assumptions are made, expectations are not met, and there's miscommunications.
01:28
And so it was a front row seat again to number one, how important it is to know how to have difficult conversations. And number two, that managed well, conflict is the doorway to connection. It's the doorway to better understanding each other.
01:47
It's the doorway to increased intimacy and vulnerability and really being known and seen in our most important relationships. So I want to talk about a really fundamental skill that I think is going to be easy to understand and even easy to implement once I show you how to do it.
02:08
And it can make a huge difference. And the skill is learning to ask questions instead of making statements. It's making the switch from certainty to curiosity. Here's the thing about certainty. It feels like clarity.
02:28
It feels like confidence. It feels like you know exactly what happened and who did what and who meant what. But it's a problem when we are trying to have conversations with people who matter to us, whose relationships matter to us, because when we are in certainty, we stop asking questions.
02:50
And so we're going to talk about the shift that can completely change the quality of difficult conversations. And that is the shift from being certain about something to being curious about it. Most hard conversations don't start with an invitation.
03:10
They start with something that sounds more like a verdict. You never listen to me. You don't respect my time. You always do this. You don't care about my feelings, right? Those aren't openers. Those aren't invitations.
03:22
That is what you would say as like the closing argument of a trial that's already over. The conclusions have already been reached, right? And this makes a lot of sense because when we're hurt or disappointed or frustrated or scared, our brains want answers.
03:39
We want to know what happened. We want to know what it means. We want to know who is responsible so that we can fix it. And that's what creates the story that we start to tell ourselves. So when we walk into a conversation, we have been telling ourselves, we know what happened, we know what it means, and we know who's responsible.
04:01
And that story has become our reality. I want to suggest something different today. It's not only smarter, but it makes the possibility of connection go way up, which again is the gift of conflict. When it is done well, it leads to more connection.
04:20
So instead of leading with certainty, lead with curiosity. We're going to get into how exactly to do that in just a second, but because I want you to know that you make sense, I want to tell you a little bit about what psychologists have already identified that makes certainty feel so incredibly convincing.
04:43
The first one is called naive realism, and it's just the tendency to believe that we are seeing things exactly as they really are in reality. Now you can understand why it's called naive realism, right?
04:57
Because it's naive to believe that we see things factually. We are seeing our interpretation. We are seeing our perspective. And when we forget that, we think we're just seeing things as they really are.
05:15
So when someone disagrees with us, it doesn't feel like a difference of opinion. It feels like they are missing something very obvious that we can see. It feels like they are wrong or they are stupid or they are intentionally doing something to misinterpret because we have seen things clearly.
05:36
It's really insidious and it's happening unconsciously. Naive realism. Number two is called fundamental attribution error. And once you see this one, it's actually kind of funny. When I'm late, it's because of traffic.
05:51
When they're late, it's because they disrespect my time. When I'm short-tempered, it's because I'm exhausted and I've had such a long day. When they're short-tempered, they're selfish and they're mean.
06:07
When I forget something, it's because I'm overwhelmed and I'm managing a lot of things. And when they forget something, it's because they just don't care about me. So you can see the pattern, right? We explain our own behavior with circumstances that are very easy to understand.
06:24
And we explain their behavior with character or character flaws. We do this constantly, right? If a guy cuts me off in traffic, he's an asshole. If I cut someone off in traffic, it's because I wasn't paying attention and that's the exit and I need to get on it.
06:43
So funny once you see it and it's happening subconsciously below the surface. The third, my personal favorite, confirmation bias. Here's how it goes. Once I've decided what something means, that's the end of it.
07:00
And my brain is now going to collect the evidence to prove that I am right. I'm going to remember all of the things that support my story. I'm going to notice all the moments that fit my theory. That's part of confirmation bias.
07:16
But the more insidious part is that my brain is actually going to ignore or overlook the things that disprove my story. So if I have the story that my feelings don't matter to my husband, I'm going to be collecting all the little bits and moments and texts and exchanges and things he said and what his face looked like to prove that I'm right.
07:40
And I'm literally not even going to notice the times when he is doing things that show that my feelings do matter to him. And here's what's crazy about it. I'm not lying to myself because I'm collecting things.
07:55
I'm not lying to myself. I'm building a case, but I'm only using selected evidence. And if you put all three of those together, here's what happens. I believe that my interpretation is just reality. It is honest.
08:13
It is factual. It is just the way it is. I believe their behavior is about their character. And I have all the proof to bolster my story. So you can see it's so human. And it makes a lot of sense that if I'm bringing all of that into the conversation, there is no room for curiosity.
08:35
Curiosity has no place at the table. I'm literally a prosecutor carrying my case file into the conversation. And it has a real impact on how that conversation is going to go. Two psychologists that I love and respect a lot, John and Julie Gottman, they spent decades studying conflict in relationship.
08:58
And one of their most important findings was that the way a conversation starts strongly predicts how it ends. The Gottmans could watch literally the first three minutes of a conversation and predict with crazy accuracy how it was going to end.
09:17
A harsh startup where it was critical or there was an accusation created a predictable chain reaction. Criticism led to defensiveness and defensiveness led to escalation and escalation led to distance.
09:37
And all of that happened within the first three minutes of the conversation. They could tell how it was going to end. So what this means is the opening of a conversation, especially a difficult conversation, really, really matters.
09:54
There's a different group of researchers. They wrote a book literally called Difficult Conversations, and they described the approach that I am talking about, moving from certainty to curiosity. Instead of assuming you know exactly what happened, you investigate.
10:12
Instead of assuming you know what someone meant, you get curious and you ask. They offer three questions that I think are incredibly useful. Question number one. What did the other person actually say or do?
10:31
That's kind of tough to answer, especially when you're thinking about confirmation bias and naive realism and fundamental attribution error, right? Because those things are constantly going in our brains.
10:42
The first question is what actually happened? Without any adjectives, without any assumptions, like just the facts. What did we observe that they said? Or what did we observe that they did? Number two, what was the impact of that on me?
11:01
Because the impact is important and we need to put that into words as well. But the third question is where a lot of us get into trouble. And so here's the question. What assumptions am I making about what they meant?
11:15
So yeah, that third question is where we go from that hurt to they meant to hurt me. We move from I felt ignored, which is impact, to they don't care, which is assumption. We move from I felt dismissed, which is valid and deserves to be said, to they don't respect me, which again is assumption about their meaning and intention.
11:44
Good intentions don't erase bad impact. And I want to be very, very, very, very clear about that. Impact is what matters. Good intentions don't erase bad impact. But here's what I want you to consider.
11:59
Bad impact doesn't automatically prove bad intent. And we need to pull those two things apart because they are two different things. One last book that I read and loved, Crucial Conversations, the researchers who wrote that book talk about something called a shared pool of meaning.
12:21
And a shared pool of meaning is essential to have a crucial conversation, to resolve differences, to use conflict to become more connected and to know each other better. Think about it like this. If you and I come into a conversation together, we are each carrying our own facts, our own experiences, our own interpretation.
12:45
I have mine and you have yours. But when we stay locked in our own silos and we don't create a shared pool of meaning, we are not going to be able to resolve things. So it is essential to ask questions to create that shared pool of meaning.
13:07
What did you mean by that? What was your intention? How do you define that? Because those questions are what invites the other person to come out of their silo of all their own facts and interpretation and to create something together.
13:24
So before I give you the way that I teach it to my clients, I want to give you an important distinction. Just like I said before, good intentions don't erase bad impact. I really want you to hear that.
13:35
The second thing I really want you to hear is that I'm not suggesting that you stop making observations. I'm not suggesting that you stop talking about what happened and just ask questions. And the goal is to express your feelings and experience and to avoid turning your assumptions into facts.
13:57
I'll say that again. The goal is to express your feelings and experience and to avoid turning your assumptions into facts. Most of us don't get in trouble in conversations because we've noticed something.
14:11
We get into trouble because we assume we know what it means. Let me show you some differences. Noticing something would sound like, I've noticed that you've canceled our plans the last three times that we've put something on the calendar together.
14:28
We don't say that. We say, you don't care about this friendship. We don't say, you've interrupted me three times in this conversation. We say, you never listen. We don't say, this is the observation, you didn't respond for two days.
14:46
We say, you don't respect my time. And so the observation disappears and the assumption takes over. And once the assumption takes over, the conversation becomes about defending our identities instead of understanding our experiences and pouring them into that shared pool of meaning.
15:08
I am not suggesting that observations are not important. I am suggesting that they need to be balanced with curiosity. So here's the formula. Observation impact curiosity. Observation. What happened?
15:28
What is the factual representation of what happened? I was talking with my husband. He interrupted me three times. So that's the observation. And it is clean of any adjectives or assumptions about him or his character.
15:44
Number two, impact. How did that affect me? I felt like you weren't listening. I felt like what I had to say wasn't important. Step number three, curiosity. What am I missing? What might I not be understanding here?
16:00
So, again, observation, impact, then curiosity. Here's how it might sound. I've noticed that this has happened a few times. And when it does, I feel frustrated and disconnected. Can you help me understand how you're seeing it?
16:18
Or when I didn't hear back from you for two days, I started telling myself a story that this wasn't important to you. Can you help me understand what was happening on your side? Or I've noticed that we keep ending up in the same argument and I'm feeling really discouraged.
16:37
Are you seeing it that way too? Or what are you seeing? And just notice what changes. You're still being honest. You can still be very direct and very clear. You are still addressing the problem. You're simply leaving some room for information that you might not have.
16:55
Because as humans, we don't always have all the information. We don't always know everything that's going on. One of the reasons why this is hard is because when our nervous systems are activated, certainty feels safer than curiosity.
17:14
When you're hurt, certainty creates the illusion of control. And we love to go into these conversations thinking that we can control them. That just feels safer. Curiosity actually requires uncertainty.
17:31
And uncertainty can feel really terrifying when you don't know how to take care of that. Especially if you've spent your life trying to stay safe by reading people, by predicting the outcome, by managing relationships, by avoiding surprises, by trying to manage everyone's emotions so that everybody feels safe and comfortable, which that's all of us, right?
17:55
It can be really unsettling to feel uncertain. The moment you become convinced that you know what's happening, your nervous system actually gets some temporary relief because that story feels safer than marching into a conversation that's unknown.
18:17
So, in addition to asking questions, another essential part of this skill is staying regulated enough to remain curious, to be able to tolerate the feeling of not knowing, and to gather information before reaching a conclusion.
18:37
Two, ask more questions before you decide what it means. And so if you want to learn more about how to regulate your nervous system, about how to handle and tolerate that feeling of uncertainty, I've got a great workshop for you.
18:55
It is called Say It With Clarity. And in that workshop, I'm going to teach you two things. Number one, how to find the exact right words for any conversation you need to have. And number two, how to take care of your nervous system, how to take care of the part of you that is scared to have the conversation so that that part can feel calm, so that your nervous system feels calm, and that you can stay in curiosity longer.
19:24
The link for that workshop is in the show notes. It's in my bio. It's two hours of live working workshop with me where you will leave that workshop knowing exactly what to say and how to work with your nervous system so that it doesn't hijack the conversation that you really want to have from curiosity.
19:44
A quick comment about some questions, because some questions don't connect, because not every question creates connection. Some questions are accusations that are kind of just dressed up with a question mark.
20:00
You might have heard this. Why would you do that? What were you thinking? Do you even hear yourself? Those aren't questions. Those are accusations. And so a real question, again, has that uncertainty built into it.
20:16
You genuinely don't know the answer and you are genuinely interested in what the other person might say. A very useful way to test this is, would I be surprised by their answer? Just ask yourself that question.
20:32
If the answer is no, you're probably not asking a question. You're probably making an argument or making a statement. And so go back to observation, impact, and curiosity. I love to have a couple questions in my back pocket.
20:49
And here are a few of my favorites that really create understanding. Number one, am I missing something here? Number two, help me understand what happened from your side. Number three, what am I not seeing yet?
21:08
Number four, can you walk me through how you got there? Those questions really open up an opportunity for the other person to help me better understand something that I might not understand. There are also some questions that I love that check assumptions, and I'm going to give you a couple now.
21:28
Number one, this is how I'm experiencing this. Is that what you meant? Number two, what's your version of what happened? Number three, if I got this wrong, where did I lose the thread or where did I make a mistake in how I'm thinking about this?
21:50
Question number four, what do you think I'm not understanding here? Notice how each of those questions invite understanding, they check assumptions, they give the other person a chance to respond, and if those are asked in a genuinely curious way, they will change the outcome of your conversation.
22:12
Now, just because I think questions are fantastic, I'm going to throw in a few extras that really create connection. Here's my favorite one. What's it like to be in a relationship with me? Number two, what is something you wish I knew?
22:30
Number three, is there anything that you've been afraid to bring up? Number four, what's one thing I could do better? Or what's one thing that you wish I better understood about you? I love to ask those questions when things are good, when it's an opportunity to build or deepen the connection or vulnerability, when it's outside of any kind of conflict happening.
22:56
I love asking my kids those questions. I have been really brave and asked some of my friends those questions, and I always get back two things. Number one, they're always so happy I asked, and it feels like I'm genuinely interested in it.
23:10
And number two, they usually have something very useful for me. And because I love them and because I want our relationship to grow and deepen and be a part of my life, I want to know the answer to those questions.
23:23
So the next time you walk into a difficult conversation, pay attention to what your brain wants to do. It's going to want certainty. It already has a story. It wants a conclusion. And maybe your conclusion is right.
23:40
I'm not saying that it's not right, but connection isn't built on certainty. And I will say some conversations are just about laying out certainty. This episode is not about those conversations. This episode is about conversations where the relationship is something that you want to build on and to deepen.
24:04
And so that connection is built on understanding. So before you start the conversation, just ask yourself these three questions. Number one, what happened? Number two, what was the impact? Number three, what might I be missing?
24:23
That will help you walk in with less conclusions and more curiosity, less certainty and more opportunity for both people to be seen and heard and to create that shared pool of meaning that really is essential when we want conflict to help us have better relationships.
24:45
Thank you for listening. I hope I see you at that workshop. If any of this resonated, if you have a question that you love, I would love for you to DM it to me. I read everything that comes in either to my Instagram DMs or you can email me hello at sarafisk.coach because I do read every single one.
25:03
Thanks for listening. I'll see you next week.
