How To Enter and Exit a Conversation without Being Rude | Jefferson Fisher

Jefferson Fisher 0:00 If you want to avoid an unwanted conversation, number one, don't fight them. Because the more that you do, the more you're gonna find yourself in one. Instead, just let it go by. You do that by making yourself sound, well, disinteresting. This is what I mean. When somebody's pushing an opinion onto you, any controversial topic, whether it's religion, politics, whatever, they're trying to push something onto you, and you say, "Yeah, I don't know." Simple as that. "Yeah, I don't know." Or, "You know, I'm not sure. You know, I'm not sure about that." You're finding ways to communicate to them of, if you're looking for a fight, you're not gonna find one here. Number two, this one is the easiest, but it's the most critical. You are making them feel heard. It's just simply acknowledging their point, and it's very simple to do. This is what it sounds like: "I agree that's an issue," period. Somebody's wanting to get all worked up, and they're telling something to you. All you need to respond is, "Yeah, I, I agree that's an issue. I agree that's an issue." You're not saying whether you agree with it or disagree with it. If anything, they just feel acknowledged and heard, and g- they say to themselves, "Oh, okay. They understood and heard what I said." And number three, if you need to be a little bit more direct, you need to tell them that you're not interested in this conversation. If they're not getting the point, here's the way I suggest to do that. You say, "I typically avoid this topic." The key word is typically. "Yeah, I typically avoid this topic," or, "I typically, uh, try not to talk about X, Y, and Z." The key here is when you say typically, you're communicating of, "I've had this conversation before. It's not really stimulating to me anymore, so I just, um, avoid this topic altogether." You're not saying that they're wrong. You're not giving them a fight. You're not giving them anything for them to bare their teeth on. You're just sim- simply saying, "I tend to avoid this. I typically don't do this." And I'm gonna give you a disclaimer on this episode, particularly when it comes to political topics. I'm all in favor

Jefferson Fisher 2:01 of educating yourself and making sure that you know about the issues out there. I think you should absolutely ex- exercise your right to vote, no questions asked. That's a different question on whether or not somebody is allowed to force their opinion onto you and say whether they're right or wrong, or if you're supposed to push your opinion back and always have these discussions where you know it's just beating your head against a wall. If this person is open-minded, and it's a discussion that you enjoy having... And people have political discussions all the time, and there's no issues, but other people, it's not so much about change. They don't care about the change. They care about the competition. It's like a sport to them. It's like arguing over their favorite sports team. Who's going to win? Who's going to lose? Day to day, w- the ultimate consequence of the discussion, who wins, makes no bearing, no change on their life. It's just something that they feel like a team on, so they wanna have this discussion, uh, of intellect to intellect or just issue to issue, and they just wanna talk it out. All kinds of different reasons why these kinda topics should or may come up in your life. The key is, how do you balance them? The reason why I have number one be to pass it by is because it's that idea of don't attend every argument you're invited to. Just because somebody pushes their opinion onto you to talk about any controversial topic does not mean that it's an invitation for you to mandatorily give your opinion right back. Whenever you decide, "You know what? I wanna push against you. Actually, I don't agree with that," you can disagree all you want. Just know you're walking right into the conversation. It's no longer an unwanted conversation. It is a desired conversation now that you're giving your opinion. If you want to avoid these, then you need to just let them pass by. I say disinterested or be disinteresting because in many ways you're taking all the oxygen out of the room, and their fire can't burn. They have nothing to get upset about because you're not giving them anything to jump onto. You're finding ways to say, "You know what? I don't know about that. You know what? Huh, that's a good question. I'm really not sure. I'm not sure." It's not that you're, that you don't have your own opinion. It's not that you're uneducated. It's just you're not in a mood to say, "I don't wanna get in this conversation right now." And there's nothing wrong with that. When it comes to agreeing with them, understand nobody can make you agree to something you don't want to agree to. Nobody can force you to say something you don't want to say. But it's critical that these kinda people, when they're pushing these unwanted conversations, just feel heard. Often, if they just feel acknowledged in some way, they're going to go away. Not only have you made yourself disinteresting, they know they're not gonna get anywhere with this. They know that you're not gonna give them that fight and that excitement that they're looking for. They just want to feel acknowledged. So when you can say things like we mentioned in number two of, "I agree that's an issue.

Jefferson Fisher 5:03 I hear you," simple as that. "I hear you. I agree that's an issue. I agree." That's all you have to say. Even if you disagree with them, you're just making them feel heard. But if they continue to push and press, uh, on you to make you feel uncomfortable in some certain way, don't hesitate for one second to say, "I prefer" or "I typically." You're talking about what you do in the past. "I prefer not to talk about X, Y, and Z. Uh, I typically try to avoid topics about blah, blah, blah." You can make it even situational. Uh, "I, I typically avoid topic X at dinner or at home or at work." You make it situational, where you are in your environment. Simple as that. And if they continue to press the button, it's absolutely okay to say, "I'm not going there," period. "I'm not going there." You're saying, "I'm not going into this conversation. I've given you plenty of lead-ups. I've given you signs that I'm not interested in this. That, that means I have to be explicit with you. I'm not interested in this conversation." I typically don't enjoy talking about topics of X, Y, and Z. This subject matter isn't for me. That subject isn't for me." You find ways to, if they're not gonna be taking the signs, be very direct with them to say, "I have a boundary here. I'm not gonna be goaded into this. I'm not gonna be led into this conversation. I'm not going there." Now we're at the part that's one of my favorite parts, and that is I'm going to answer a question from a follower. If you're not already part of my weekly

Jefferson Fisher 6:34 newsletter, I send one email once a week right to your inbox on a communication tip, and those that are on the newsletter can email me questions, and I'm able to answer it here on the podcast. So I have my, my other phone here, and this one that I picked is from Sammy. Sammy is in Florida. He says, "Hey, Jefferson, uh, love your tips. I have an issue with work. There is a boss that I have who always likes to talk about whether it's gossip or politics. Whatever it is, he's always wanting my input on it, and I'd rather not give it. It's not that I don't have an opinions. I'm just not that much of a social person, and it makes me uncomfortable. Love to hear your thoughts on this." Sammy, I feel you, man. So any time... Let me give you a, an example of what's this making me think of in, in my own mind, my own, my own world, is I'd have these conversations with my grandfather. I'd go up every summer to see him, and it never failed. And this happened definitely in the last five, 10 years or so, where I'd start to come talk to him, and every time, he'd turn the conversation to politics or some issue that I did not want to talk about. It's not that he... I mean, he and I agreed on some things. We also disagreed on some things, but that's all he ever wanted to talk about. It just kind of consumed his mindset. This is what I'm gonna encourage you to do, Sammy. Often, the issue that you hear is not the real issue. All right? It's not the political issue that they wanna talk about or that, um, let's say maybe he's oversharing or there's gossip, there's something else. It's not that. It's an underlying layer. I'm gonna continue on with my grandfather example. My grandfather was the ty- is the type that, you know, he doesn't see a whole lot of people day to day, and so whenever I'm coming around and I'm giving him my full attention, I might be the first person he's really been able to talk to that day, and he wants to get out everything that's on his mind. There's also that element of he kind of wants to... You know, there's people out there who want to feel impressive with their knowledge, regardless of what side of the fence anything is on. It doesn't mean it's political, not political or religious or any other controversial topic. They just want to share that they're knowledgeable about a given topic. So I'll, I'm going to encourage you to look behind the issue. Why does he continue to come to you with this, this boss or manager, Sammy? Why does he continue to come to you with this? Is it that he's just looking for other conversation with you? Maybe it's he just wants to have some kind of interaction with somebody, especially if it varies. If it's always the same issue every single time, that's a little bit different, but if he always comes to you with something different, that might be a suggestion that, well, he's just wanting to interact with somebody. Like we talked about at the beginning of this episode, some people, it's not about who's right, who's wrong. It's just the competition. It's like a, it's a hobby for some people to find out, hey, can we just kind of feel alive for a second if we get up and angry about things, even though nothing in our world's going to change? So when that happens and you feel like you need to set some boundaries in this discussion, I would, number one, I'd encourage you to continue to indicate to him that you're not going to give him any kind of fight. You're not gonna be on his side or against his side. You're just gonna be disinterested. You're gonna be disinteresting by saying things like, "You know, I don't know. You know, I'm not sure about that," or, "Man, if I had an opinion, I'd give one. Simple as that. I don't know enough about it." Or it's, "Hey, I agree this is an issue. Yeah, I agree. That's, that's definitely an issue." You're simply just acknowledging something that they said, or if you need to be really, really, um, clear that this is not something you're interested in and you don't like this, it's okay to say, "I'd prefer not to, to discuss this kind of stuff at work." Simple as that. You have to do things that sound authentic and genuine to you. What you can't do is start to engage. If you start to engage or you, you begin to just eng- agree and be a yes man, uh, to everything and go, "Yep, you're exactly right. You're exactly right," then he's gonna continue to come to you with things. But if you continually show that you're not gonna be that much fun, you're not gonna be his person, or you just find that these aren't the kind of topics that he's gonna get with somewhere, if you were able to say, "You know, I'd rather talk about you," that was the key of how I kind of had to fix my grandfather and our conversations. I had to tell him anytime he got into this rut, this continuous repeat of a hamster wheel conversation, I'd say, "You know, I'd, I'd much rather hear about you." That was it. "I'd, I'd rather hear about how you're doing." Nobody gets mad, Sammy. Nobody gets upset if you want to move the conversation about them. Nobody's like, "Oh, h- no, I don't want to talk about that." Everybody likes to talk about themselves. So when you just kindly say, genuinely say, "I'd rather hear about you. How's everything going? Work good? How's, how's everything?" It shifts the mindset, and they're not gonna be like, "Oh, you, you changed the topic." Everybody likes talking about themselves, uh, especially if it's genuine, this, s- this social connection that you're creating. So that's the way I'd handle that, Sammy. Best of luck.

Speaker 12:06 What about exiting a conversation? I'm, I'm not good at it. Uh...

Jefferson Fisher 12:11 Not good at it?

Speaker 12:12 Well, socially, I, socially Uh, I'm regularly telling a friend or my wife, like, "Don't leave me alone too long," 'cause I don't know how... I don't, I don't... I, I have built s- several skills communication-wise, but one of them is not, like, we've sort of tapped out this conversation. We've maxed this one out. Let's, let's exit gracefully. So whether that's on the phone or in person, the only thing I've ever stumbled into is starting to speak in the past tense, but I'd like to know your strategy on that if you do that as well. But, like, what do you do? You know what I'm talking about? Everyone's been there.

Jefferson Fisher 12:47 Yeah.

Speaker 12:47 They're at a cocktail party, and you get bumped into this wonderful person. You're eight minutes in. You're like, "I'm gonna be here all night if I can't somehow rotate out of here."

Jefferson Fisher 12:55 Yeah.

Speaker 12:56 How do you do it?

Jefferson Fisher 12:57 [laughs] Uh, well, you can just do what we do in the South. I think we just slap our thigh and go, "Well-"

Speaker 13:03 [laughs]

Jefferson Fisher 13:03 "... yeah, it was good s- you know? Better get, better get moving. All right."

Speaker 13:09 [laughs]

Jefferson Fisher 13:09 Um, no. It's, um... A, a real easy trick that, um, I like to teach is that you just loop it. So whatever you began talking about at the beginning, so let's say it's family or work, whatever it is, typically something very surface level like that.

Speaker 13:24 Mm-hmm.

Jefferson Fisher 13:24 You just loop it there at the end. So if you started talking about family, that means you're gonna end with, "Well, I'm glad to hear the family's doing well. I'll, you know, I'll, I'll see you around," or, um, "Look forward to catching up later. Have a good evening." Whatever it is, you just kind of close the loop of whatever you first started talking about. There are some people that also, um, like a method of, of acting like you're the one kind of inconveniencing their time. When you're like, "All right. I'll let you get back to it," you know? "All right. Well, I know you're busy." Um, that cuts both ways. Sometimes if it sounds really disingenuous, if it's like, "What do you mean? I don't have anything going on. It's just me and you in the corner here," you know? [laughs]

Speaker 14:04 Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

Jefferson Fisher 14:05 Um, so you kind of have to feel that out I, I feel like. But for the most-

Speaker 14:09 Do you ever use the past tense, like, "I gotta tell you, I've enjoyed this so much. It's been so good to see you"?

Jefferson Fisher 14:14 Yeah.

Speaker 14:14 Do you do that?

Jefferson Fisher 14:15 Yeah.

Speaker 14:15 I mean, a- and be sincere about it, but it allows, by past tense phraseology, at least for me-

Jefferson Fisher 14:21 Mm

Speaker 14:21 ... if they are actually listening, which maybe they're not, they go, "Oh, we're at the end of this conversation, not in the middle of it anymore."

Jefferson Fisher 14:29 Yeah. Whenever you can say, "It was," or, "It's been"-

Speaker 14:32 Right

Jefferson Fisher 14:32 ... anytime you can use past phrases, uh, that is, it's just saying, "Hey, uh, this is our signal that the conversation has now ended. [laughs] We are now-"

Speaker 14:41 Yes

Jefferson Fisher 14:41 "... talking about it as it's now happened in the past. I'll see you when I see you." Yeah, definitely, definitely, uh, that's, that's a great way to do it.

Speaker 14:50 The last section of rule number two in your book is about boundaries.

Jefferson Fisher 14:55 Yeah.

Speaker 14:57 What do you mean by boundaries in this context? And, and also, could you explain to me this, this image here? Do you know that image? I'll put it on the screen for anybody to see it.

Jefferson Fisher 15:05 Yeah, yeah, yeah. So this is all about how to say no, especially let's put it in a context of somebody invited you to, uh, anything. Let's say somebody invited you to grab a cup of coffee.

Speaker 15:17 Yeah.

Jefferson Fisher 15:17 All right? Let's put it in terms of that's what this, this graph is. So the graph says when you have the chance to say no or yes to something and you decide not to say no, instead you go, "Oh, maybe," and then it just lives in your head for the next, you know, week until they ask again. You're like, "Ah, I just put it off." But if you say no when you need to say no, then it doesn't live in your head rent free. So let's, let's put it in terms of, let's say you and I, uh, work at the same place.

Speaker 15:43 Yeah.

Jefferson Fisher 15:43 And I ask you for, "Hey, uh, Steven, let's go, wanna go grab a, a cup of coffee at this new place that I saw?" And you don't... You're like, "Look." You're thinking in your head, and you're like, "Look, Jefferson, you're nice, you know, but you're not, we're not friend friends. We're, we're just work guys. You know, I like you at work, but you're not that cool. Like, let's, I don't wanna go have coffee with you." That's what you're thinking in your head. And besides, you're so busy, you got too many things to do, uh, and you need to say no. And instead you go, "Oh, oh man, um, you know, maybe, maybe I, I... It, it just depends. I'll, I'll, uh, let you know." And like, "Oh, okay." And then I'm waiting the whole day to hear from you, and now in your head you're like, "How do I tell him I don't wanna do this? How do I tell him?" And now you're just thinking about it, and you're just wasting your emotional energy, and it just... Instead of saying no when you needed to say no.

Speaker 16:32 But what if I come up with an excuse? I say, "I, I just checked. I've got a meeting, Jefferson, so I can't come for a coffee."

Jefferson Fisher 16:36 Well, if that's real.

Speaker 16:37 But if it's not real.

Jefferson Fisher 16:38 Yeah. Well, that's a problem.

Speaker 16:39 Why is it a problem?

Jefferson Fisher 16:40 Well, because, one, there's always a chance that they could find out. Two, it's just not genuine. It's not, it's not sincere. You, you owe it to yourself to, to be a truth teller.

Speaker 16:48 But we, we don't want to offend somebody.

Jefferson Fisher 16:52 Yeah. That's the people pleasing, right?

Speaker 16:54 Yeah. So, like, someone says to me, "Hey, Steve, I know you're in Austin." But, I mean, this actually happens. "Hey, Steve, I know you're in Austin. Um, would be great to, to get a coffee with you while you're in town-"

Jefferson Fisher 17:03 Right

Speaker 17:04 "... um, on Monday." And I look at my calendar and I go, "Well, I am free on Monday, but I just don't [laughs] wanna go."

Jefferson Fisher 17:09 Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Speaker 17:09 So d- what do I say to them? I just go, "Uh, listen, I..." [laughs]

Jefferson Fisher 17:12 Yeah, exactly. Yeah, yeah. [laughs]

Speaker 17:14 No.

Jefferson Fisher 17:14 Yeah, yeah. [laughs]

Speaker 17:16 Yeah.

Jefferson Fisher 17:16 Actually, no. Uh, no, I don't.

Speaker 17:18 Yeah. [laughs]

Jefferson Fisher 17:18 Um, no, thanks. Pass. Hard pass.

Speaker 17:21 Yeah.

Jefferson Fisher 17:21 So here's where the mistake happens, all right? Is when it's that feeling of I don't wanna disappoint them.

Speaker 17:27 Yeah.

Jefferson Fisher 17:27 I don't want them to not like me. That's what we want. That's what really it is. I don't want them to not like me. I still want them to like me. The mistake happens when you go, "Oh, man, that sounds so great and, and wonderful. I love to, but I can't. I have a, a full day of, uh, meetings." Um, and that's, that's all you leave it at right there. Okay? Problem with that, aside from it just being not true, whatever. To put it as, "Hey, man, I'd love to, but..." All right? The word but has a magic of erasing everything that happened before it. If I were like, "Look, I love you, but..." Blah, and I have to say something else. "Oh, I think it was great. Yeah, I, I mean, I think being on your podcast was, was wonderful, um, but, uh..." Like, it just takes away, it feels less than what you said. So instead- Starting with the gra- like, we wanna start with the gratitude. "Oh, thank you so much. That sounds wonderful. I can't." That's what we wanted is, like, that soft landing. Uh, reverse it. Start with the no, then end, uh, with the gratitude. So it would be if somebody said, "Hey, can you come to dinner, whatever, on... I know you're in Austin." "I can't. Thank you so much for inviting me. I, I, I'd, I'd love to meet you or see you the, the next time around." And if you can, add some kindness. "I've heard that place is awesome. Hope it's a great time." Like, uh, same thing if, if you need to tell me no to having coffee. "I can't," or, "I have bad news. I can't. Let me know how it goes. Like, I, I'm sure it's gonna be great. I've heard wonderful things about it. Let me know how it is." Like, it's much easier if you tell them that you can't upfront. Have you ever had somebody tell you no to an invitation and they're like, in a, in a text they're going, "Oh my gosh, thank you so much. I have been, I've just been so busy, and you know, I've had to go feed my cat, and it's just been so stressful lately. And I'm, uh, I might be able to go. I'll let you know if I can. And if anything changes, I'll definitely let you know." Like, you're like, if, if you just, if you don't wanna go, just tell me no.

Speaker 19:32 Yeah.

Jefferson Fisher 19:32 And it's that kind of feeling.

Speaker 19:34 We don't know the wo- we don't have the words, though. This is the problem.

Jefferson Fisher 19:37 Yeah.

Speaker 19:37 And I was reflecting over, over, um, New Years. I was at a restaurant and I was reading this book about, I think it was called The Courage to Be Disliked, and it was just developing my thinking on just trying to be a bit more sort of radically can- give more radical candor to situations.

Jefferson Fisher 19:50 Yeah.

Speaker 19:50 And we were sat in this, like, bar or whatever, me and my friend, and um, the owner of the bar had come over and he was being really nice, and he likes the podcast and stuff, and we were talking. And I was trying to practice this art of just being honest with like, in those sort of-

Jefferson Fisher 20:04 Mm-hmm

Speaker 20:04 ... people-pleasing moments. And my friend says to him, "Oh, we've got to, um, we've got something to get to," blah, blah. And we hadn't got anywhere to go.

Jefferson Fisher 20:13 Yeah, of course.

Speaker 20:14 We just wanted-

Jefferson Fisher 20:14 Yeah.

Speaker 20:14 So I remember interjecting and going, "We wanna leave in 10 minutes, so, um, if they can get here before then, then I'll, I'm more than happy to, like, sign the books and stuff-"

Jefferson Fisher 20:22 Yeah, yeah

Speaker 20:22 ... whatever they want me to do. And it was so interesting how much better I felt about myself when I was just honest with this guy.

Jefferson Fisher 20:27 Yes.

Speaker 20:28 Like, I was like, "No, I don't have anywhere to be. I just wanna go."

Jefferson Fisher 20:30 Exactly. [laughs] Yeah.

Speaker 20:32 But it's not, it's not easy on a day-to-day basis, 'cause even when I did land here in Austin-

Jefferson Fisher 20:36 Yeah

Speaker 20:36 ... there were people that texted me saying-

Jefferson Fisher 20:37 Of course

Speaker 20:38 ... "You're in Austin. Let's go for a coffee."

Jefferson Fisher 20:39 Right.

Speaker 20:39 And in reality, what, here's what my brain's saying. My brain is saying, "I need to spend time with my partner."

Jefferson Fisher 20:43 Yes.

Speaker 20:43 "When I'm not recording this podcast, I need to do my bloody, like, my to-do list-

Jefferson Fisher 20:47 Yeah

Speaker 20:47 ... and my Slack and my emails."

Jefferson Fisher 20:47 Priorities.

Speaker 20:47 "And then I need to go to the gym as well."

Jefferson Fisher 20:49 Yeah.

Speaker 20:50 So it's not that I don't wanna go for coffee with you.

Jefferson Fisher 20:53 Right.

Speaker 20:53 It's that, like, I have other priorities that are pressing.

Jefferson Fisher 20:55 Exactly.

Speaker 20:55 So how would I communicate to them in that moment that they're just, like, not a high priority? Like, it's not a high priority for me to go for a coffee.

Jefferson Fisher 21:03 Yeah. So what you wanna do is, like we said, instead of beginning with a, "Oh, I'd love to. That sounds-"

Speaker 21:08 Yeah

Jefferson Fisher 21:08 ... "terrific, you know, uh, but I've had, you know, I got so much to do and I can't do this." They're like, "Oh, okay." Instead of that, just flip it and say, "I can't make it this go around. Thank you so much for inviting me. I look forward to hopefully seeing you soon or the, the next time." Or, you know, if you can't go to wherever they're wanting to go, uh, you can say, "Got bad news. I'm not gonna be able to make that happen. Thank you so much for thinking of me," or, "I appreciate you inviting me. I hope it's a wonderful time."

Speaker 21:39 And you don't even need to give them a reason.

Jefferson Fisher 21:41 No reason. No, no, no. That's where you make a mistake, is when you give them a reason, you start to have to feel like you have to justify.

Speaker 21:47 Mm.

Jefferson Fisher 21:47 Because you start, you're very subjective. We're all subjective in our head of, "Ah, that's not a good enough excuse. I have to give something that is worthy enough of the excuse that I'm not gonna be able to make it." And then that's where the anxiety kicks in, and that's where we just push it off.

Speaker 22:01 What if the excuse is real? So I've been invited to this dinner in London. I actually can't go.

Jefferson Fisher 22:06 Yeah.

Speaker 22:06 But it's a very, someone that I care about a lot. Um, I can't go because of my calendar, and I haven't responded to the email yet.

Jefferson Fisher 22:12 Yeah.

Speaker 22:12 Um, I think in part 'cause I'm, like, trying to figure out how to let them... Even though my-

Jefferson Fisher 22:16 You see how it's taking up your energy even now?

Speaker 22:18 It is taking up my fucking energy, yes. [laughs]

Jefferson Fisher 22:19 Yeah. Yeah.

Speaker 22:20 So I, in that situation, I should say... I, I was gonna say terribly sorry.

Jefferson Fisher 22:27 Yeah. No, no, no.

Speaker 22:28 Okay. I can't make it on this occasion because I'm in the Middle East. Um, but thank you for the invitation.

Jefferson Fisher 22:37 Yes.

Speaker 22:37 And if this ever pops up again, please do let me know. I'd love to come.

Jefferson Fisher 22:42 Yeah.

Speaker 22:42 'Cause all of that is true.

Jefferson Fisher 22:43 Yeah. There it is.

Speaker 22:44 Okay.

Jefferson Fisher 22:45 I think that's perfect. There's nothing wrong with saying, "Because I'm in the Middle East." It's when, it's when it's more like that bar scenario, when you don't have anywhere else to go, you-

Speaker 22:52 Saying it

Jefferson Fisher 22:52 ... don't want to.

Speaker 22:53 Okay.

Jefferson Fisher 22:53 Uh-

Speaker 22:53 And don't say terribly sorry.

Jefferson Fisher 22:55 Uh-uh. No, no, no.

Speaker 22:56 Why?

Jefferson Fisher 22:56 Yeah, because there's nothing to apologize for. You haven't done anything wrong. Save your apologies for when you said something you should not have done. You've made an actual mistake.

Speaker 23:04 And I'm not terribly fucking sorry.

Jefferson Fisher 23:05 Of course you're not.

Speaker 23:06 Of course I'm not terribly sorry-

Jefferson Fisher 23:07 You're not sorry at all

Speaker 23:08 ... for not coming to a dinner.

Jefferson Fisher 23:08 You're very thankful.

Speaker 23:09 Yeah.

Jefferson Fisher 23:09 You're very thankful about it.

Speaker 23:10 [laughs]

Jefferson Fisher 23:11 You know? You're not sorry at all. So instead of the so terribly sorry or unfortunately, it's, "I can't make it work." You see how that's... It sound- When I say I can't make it work, I'm signaling to you that I have other things going on and I cannot fit it in.

Speaker 23:25 Mm-hmm.

Jefferson Fisher 23:25 It's not that you're not a priority, I just can't make it work. And so any time you get that out front, and then follow it up with the gratitude, "I appreciate you. Thank you. So kind of you for thinking of me," and then add on a little bit, like, just a sprig of kindness of, like, it's, "I know it's gonna be a wonderful time."

Speaker 23:42 Mm-hmm.

Jefferson Fisher 23:43 Perfect. That's, I mean, that's, that's all you need right there. Instead of going, "Ah, I need to respond to that email," and then, like, two weeks later you're like, "Ah, I gotta respond to that email," and you just get yourself worked up.

Speaker 23:53 How do you stand up for yourself in the times where you know you should?

Jefferson Fisher 23:57 The biggest thing to know about standing up for yourself is knowing when to do it. There's a lot of people that you... If you always get out of your chair to stand your ground on every little issue, your legs are gonna get tired. Like, you just, some people are worth getting out of your chair for, and some people aren't.

Speaker 24:16 Mm.

Jefferson Fisher 24:16 There are some people that if you really feel like a, an injustice... Like for me, a driving principle is justice. If I feel like something is-

Speaker 24:24 Mm

Jefferson Fisher 24:24 ... unjust, I'm much more Um, I guess it's unjust f- then I'm much more prone to get out of my seat and say, "No, no, this is not... This isn't cool. That's not fair."

Speaker 24:35 Mm-hmm.

Jefferson Fisher 24:35 "This isn't equal. Th- you don't talk... You don't treat people that way." But if you, if you're the, the yippy dog that always barks at every car that goes by, it's that same principle of really nobody's gonna, nobody's gonna listen-

Speaker 24:48 Mm-hmm

Jefferson Fisher 24:48 ... nearly as much. It's, it's the walk quietly with a, a big stick-

Speaker 24:52 Mm

Jefferson Fisher 24:52 ... kind of mentality. I mean, when, when you wanna stand up for yourself, it is this truth of knowing that I, I can, I can choose to say nothing, and a lot of the times that is far more powerful than anything I could say. If you're gonna say something ugly to me, and then I just let it hang, oh, it's, it's one of the most powerful things you can do-

Speaker 25:16 Mm

Jefferson Fisher 25:16 ... is to look at them as if there's nothing that you said that could ever harm me.

Speaker 25:22 Mm.

Jefferson Fisher 25:22 And then they just don't do it as much.

Speaker 25:24 Mm.

Jefferson Fisher 25:24 You sh- you're telling them it's not gonna be fun for you if you go down this road with me.

Speaker 25:28 Interesting. Where did you learn that?

Jefferson Fisher 25:31 A lot of it is my upbringing. So I, in the book I talk about my... I'm the oldest of four.

Speaker 25:37 Mm-hmm.

Jefferson Fisher 25:37 I'm a fifth generation trial attorney, so I've seen a lot of trials, heard a lot of trials, and I just had a weird childhood where... A g- a wonderful childhood where I'd get pick up from school, like get put in the corner of my dad's deposition while he finishes, or to watch the end of a closing argument. Then as the oldest of four, had a lot of experience just resolving conflict. Uh, plenty of conflict between brothers and sisters. I'm the oldest, have my sister, and then my two younger brothers, and then a lot of it is, um, you'd think it was law school, but it's not.

Speaker 26:09 Mm.

Jefferson Fisher 26:09 You have trials, but it's... Trial is probably one of the most important ones because it's, let's say you're my witness, and let's say you're oppos- you're against me, you're adverse, and I have to cross-examine you, meaning I have to prove that you're wrong on something. Now, as you already know, there's another attorney who's gonna be ready to jump in and object to every question I have.

Speaker 26:33 Mm-hmm.

Jefferson Fisher 26:34 You have a judge that's gonna rule on the evidence of if my question passes. You have a bailiff, court reporter, and then there's probably 12 people, if we're in district court in the state of Texas, that are going to all be listening to everything that I do, and it's not so much the question I'm asking, it's how I'm asking it.

Speaker 26:51 Mm.

Jefferson Fisher 26:51 So I could be saying something, and let's say the other person objects, judge rules against me. If I act like I'm really upset about it, they're gonna think, "Oh, that's bad for his case." If I, if you say something and I act like it really hurts me and I get mad, like, "Oh, that's not true," they're gonna know, "Oh, this is actually bad for his case."

Speaker 27:11 Mm.

Jefferson Fisher 27:11 It's this way of processing information with the understanding that there are other people in the room. Even if you don't know it, even if you're not seeing it, there are other people that are always paying attention to what you're doing.

Speaker 27:23 Wow. So it s- trial almost sounds like it's like communication poker.

Jefferson Fisher 27:27 Oh, that's a good way of putting it. Yeah, yeah, yeah. You have to play the hands that you're dealt.

Speaker 27:31 Mm-hmm.

Jefferson Fisher 27:31 So let's put it at that. Um, you know, I can't, I can't choose better facts.

Speaker 27:35 Mm-hmm.

Jefferson Fisher 27:35 I can't choose the law that I'm wanting to use. And the same way, it's not really winning.

Speaker 27:40 Mm-hmm.

Jefferson Fisher 27:41 I m- you might have a better hand than me-

Speaker 27:43 Mm-hmm

Jefferson Fisher 27:43 ... but it's just how I play it.

Speaker 27:44 Yeah.

Jefferson Fisher 27:45 Mm-hmm.

Speaker 27:45 And can I give it away or not?

Jefferson Fisher 27:47 Yeah.

Speaker 27:47 It's fascinating.

Jefferson Fisher 27:48 Well, and the thing is people think that trial is this whole a gotcha game. It's not. Everybody knows everybody's facts before you go in.

Speaker 27:55 Mm.

Jefferson Fisher 27:55 None of it's a surprise.

Speaker 27:56 Mm.

Jefferson Fisher 27:56 None of it. Uh, every- You... I know all your bad facts, you know all of my bad facts. We all, all know each other's bruises. It's just who can, who can play the fiddle better. And, uh, it's, it's a weird situation in which when I ask you a question, I'm also wanting the jury to hear what you say and how that compares with the facts that I have. So a lot of the tools that I teach about framing conversations, it's the same way of how I would frame a question or h- how I give a big roadmap or how-

Speaker 28:25 Mm-hmm

Jefferson Fisher 28:25 ... I would kind of make you say what I want you to say, or how I, how I open or close any question. It's all kind of the same principles.

Speaker 28:32 Interesting. Do you use the principles with your wife, too?

Jefferson Fisher 28:35 No.

Speaker 28:36 She call you, does she call you out?

Jefferson Fisher 28:37 No. She's also an attorney.

Speaker 28:38 Does she- Oh [laughs] . So you know.

Jefferson Fisher 28:39 Yeah, we went to law school together. Oh, oh my goodness, yeah, and she knows immediately if I'm trying... She'd say, "Don't cross-examine me."

Speaker 28:44 [laughs]

Jefferson Fisher 28:44 Like, it's, like, it's very, very quick. She's very quick to say that. And so, um, it's, there's a certain style of cross-examination where if you start to just steam 'em out, it's like, "Nope, you can't."

Speaker 28:56 What would that sound like?

Jefferson Fisher 28:57 That's not gonna happen. You use short little statements.

Speaker 28:59 Mm.

Jefferson Fisher 28:59 So typically in TV you see the wrong stuff. TV's all so fake when it comes to questions. "Isn't it true whether on, you know, isn't true, Honor, about December 21st, 2024, you were at the Buc-ee's in Bastrop, Texas, yes or no?" They're, you're never gonna get that, that kinda answer-

Speaker 29:18 Mm

Jefferson Fisher 29:18 ... from somebody, and you've seen it like at the Johnny Depp trial.

Speaker 29:21 Yeah.

Jefferson Fisher 29:21 Like, people ask really bad questions. Really, um, the best cross-examination aren't questions, they're very short statements.

Speaker 29:29 Mm.

Jefferson Fisher 29:30 And so maybe I'm wanting to draw out that the car that you saw that weekend was red. And so I'd, I'd say something like, "You were out that weekend?" And you have to say, "Yeah." You see how I haven't, I didn't say yes or no.

Speaker 29:44 Mm.

Jefferson Fisher 29:44 I say, "You were out that weekend?" "Yeah." "You saw a car?"

Speaker 29:48 Yeah.

Jefferson Fisher 29:48 "Car, car was red?" And then sometimes they go, "Well, you know, I don't know. I really don't..." And they start going on and on and on, so the witness is trying to run on you. They're trying to make you look bad, and all you do is just come back, "Red. The car was red." "Uh, yeah." See, it's really easy to do that in, let's say, at the kitchen table-

Speaker 30:04 Mm-hmm

Jefferson Fisher 30:04 ... if you're, like, wanting to make a, a point, but that'll get you in trouble, so.

Speaker 30:08 Yeah, if your wife's an attorney.

Jefferson Fisher 30:09 Mm-hmm. Yeah, yeah, she doesn't, she doesn't allow any of that.

Speaker 30:11 [laughs]

Jefferson Fisher 30:11 She ca- she catches that real quick.

Speaker 30:13 Yeah, my husband does the opposite. He does the CIA method, which is often saying things like, um, oh, um, like I'll be like, "Hey, you know, w-

Jefferson Fisher 30:22 "Did you do X, Y, and Z?" And he'll be like, "X, Y, and Z."

Speaker 30:25 Yeah.

Jefferson Fisher 30:25 And then I'll be like, "Yeah, you know, d- when I said that we were gonna do this?" And eventually he'll just keep asking the question back like, "Oh, did I do that?" And finally I'll, I'll either just get annoyed and walk away-

Speaker 30:35 [laughs]

Jefferson Fisher 30:35 ... 'cause I don't think he's understanding me.

Speaker 30:36 Yeah.

Jefferson Fisher 30:36 And it works beautifully, actually.

Speaker 30:38 Like the mirroring?

Jefferson Fisher 30:39 Yeah, exactly.

Speaker 30:40 Yeah.

Jefferson Fisher 30:40 And except now that I'm onto it.

Speaker 30:42 Yeah.

Jefferson Fisher 30:42 'Cause you got me for years with that.

Speaker 30:44 Years?

Jefferson Fisher 30:45 Yeah, I think I was just slow on the uptick. It was like-

Speaker 30:47 [laughs]

Jefferson Fisher 30:47 ... never mind.

Speaker 30:47 That's funny.

Jefferson Fisher 30:48 I'm just, I'm just not gonna get-

Speaker 30:49 Yeah

Jefferson Fisher 30:49 ... engaged. [laughs]

Speaker 30:50 You have these, um, powerful life lessons, okay, in the book for our communication. I wanna go through some of them. Now, some of them you've, you kinda touched on already, but I, I'd love to go through some of these bit by bit to really give practical take-homes for people.

Jefferson Fisher 31:09 Yeah.

Speaker 31:09 Okay? Now, one of the lessons is that silence is power.

Jefferson Fisher 31:13 Right.

Speaker 31:14 Why?

Jefferson Fisher 31:16 It is the one thing that someone cannot throw back in your face. It, it- silence can never be misquoted. Silence is not something that you can, somebody can create anything out of, so to speak. Silence gives you the power to choose. It gives you options. Is this somebody I wanna talk to? Is this something I want to respond to? Is this something that's worth my time? Is this person worth my time? It, it, the first thing to know about standing up for yourself is knowing, is this person worth getting out of my chair for? It is silence that puts things on pause, because you can't make me say anything I don't want to say. I can physically grab you, and I can physically manipulate you, but I cannot do that with your words. I cannot force you to say something without forcing you physically. Silence is your tool that you can have, and it's wonderful in the sense of you use it for difficult conversations, you use it for meaningful conversations. Let's say you're sharing something with me that's very deep and you've had a very hard day. I don't need to s- fix it. I just need to sit with you.

Speaker 32:32 Yeah.

Jefferson Fisher 32:32 And in that silence, holding that with, the, the therapy world would say holding that space for you, just sitting in here with you. I don't have to say anything, but at the same time, I'm saying everything.

Speaker 32:43 Yeah.

Jefferson Fisher 32:44 Now let's say you're saying something mean to me, and you say something that really hurts, and rather than responding, I just say nothing. Um, that sends another message. That's another option that I get to have, and now you have to hear those words echo back, and you have to do something with it. That's why silence is such a powerful tool.

Speaker 33:05 Could it be deemed as being aggressive if we use silence?

Jefferson Fisher 33:08 You can weaponize it.

Speaker 33:09 Uh-

Jefferson Fisher 33:10 Yeah. So you could... Uh, that turns into stonewalling. That turns into people ghosting-

Speaker 33:13 Yeah

Jefferson Fisher 33:13 ... for no reason. Yeah, uh, stonewalling, in my opinion, is weaponized silence. You are doing it as a, as a punishment. It's punitive. It's a sense of control. If you try to... I'm not talking about the gray rock type of stuff where it's you have to protect yourself. I'm talking you're some- you're dealing with somebody who's a tox- toxic personality, and they just go silent on you and as a term of punishment. They want you to come groveling back. Not until you say, "Oh, I'm so sorry. Can you please come back to me?" will they, you know-

Speaker 33:43 Mm-hmm

Jefferson Fisher 33:43 ... graciously in their mercy go, "Yes, I guess you can talk to me again." So there is absolutely a way to be taking it too far, as with anything.

Speaker 33:54 Yeah. It kind of sort of relates back to a couple of things we've already touched on. One was when you were talking about maybe you're in a difficult conversation.

Jefferson Fisher 34:02 Mm-hmm.

Speaker 34:02 Before you start reacting and just blurting out words-

Jefferson Fisher 34:05 Right

Speaker 34:05 ... you're saying t- that first word is your breath.

Jefferson Fisher 34:08 Right.

Speaker 34:08 Okay? So your, what, is that an inhale?

Jefferson Fisher 34:11 Yeah, so it's, um, you would know this as a physiological sigh. It's where it's a double inhalation, where-

Speaker 34:17 Yeah

Jefferson Fisher 34:17 ... it's about three seconds in through your nose, two seconds in again at the top, and then all out through your nose again. Now, y- we can do that in a sense of very exaggerated. And I'm not, not talking about the sigh of, like, what my five-year-old would do of like, "Ugh." Like, not, not that type of-

Speaker 34:33 Yeah

Jefferson Fisher 34:33 ... [laughs] not that type of breath. But you want to be able to use it, and you can do it silently, any time right before you say something that you need to catch a moment, or if somebody's saying something that's, you can tell you're, it's, you don't like, and you're getting worked up. You ever heard somebody, like, making an opinion or saying something you don't like, and what happens? You, our bodies go , like, we, we, everything we don't like it, we kinda start to-

Speaker 34:57 Yeah

Jefferson Fisher 34:57 ... seize up. We start, we take a big breath. We're like, "Okay, I don't, I'm, I'm, I don't, I gotta, I gotta get ready," 'cause why? We're about ready to unleash all of our, our words.

Speaker 35:06 Mm.

Jefferson Fisher 35:06 And so when you hold your breath, that's why your breath has really nowhere to go except to yell.

Speaker 35:12 Yeah.

Jefferson Fisher 35:13 Often it, it decreases communication. It's the same way of, you know how, uh, at least if you're trying to find directions and you're trying to find a house and you have blaring music, you have to, like, turn down the music so you can... You're like, "Let me turn down this music so I can see." It's kind of that same mentality-

Speaker 35:29 Yeah

Jefferson Fisher 35:29 ... of when somebody's yelling, you can't really listen.

Speaker 35:32 Yeah, it's, it's this whole we see the world through the state of our nervous system, right? That person said that thing that you didn't like, and if you start to react and hold your breath, which may be understandable-

Jefferson Fisher 35:43 Yes

Speaker 35:44 ... right? You're changing the state of your nervous system, so everything is coming inward. Your focus is coming inward. You are getting prepared to fight.

Jefferson Fisher 35:51 Right.

Speaker 35:51 So of course the next words you say are gonna come out with a certain energy.

Jefferson Fisher 35:57 You got it.

Speaker 35:57 So I love that sort of idea that you make it... And you, you know, that whole section that in, in that chapter, you do sort of walk people through how you can practice this breath and get to the point whereby you're doing it naturally in conversation, where the person doesn't even know that you're doing it.

Jefferson Fisher 36:14 Yeah, abs- and I'm happy to do it right now if you wanna go through it.

Speaker 36:16 Okay. All right. Okay.

Jefferson Fisher 36:17 So if you're listening right now, let's, let's, let's practice this. I call this a conversational breath, and it's a breath that you can use, and nobody's really gonna know that you're doing it. It's, there's nothing special. It's just the ch- it's the choice to be intentional with your breath, and let's do it together. So it's all gonna be through your nose, and it's gonna be a double inhale, meaning we're gonna inhale twice. Ready? So if you're listening, we're gonna go three seconds in through your nose. Two more at the top.

36:40 And then all out through your nose. Now, just listening to us right now, your shoulders should have dropped just a little bit.

Speaker 36:47 Mm-hmm.

Jefferson Fisher 36:47 You're gonna feel just a little bit calmer. That's your go-to when somebody's saying something you don't like or, uh, you're about to respond. So right now, I want you, Rangan, to continue to do the conversational breath, and I'm gonna continue to say some things to you. So Rangan, I, yes, I understand you have a podcast, and yeah, it's a health podcast. In fact, it's the number one health podcast in the world. But you know what? I don't know if you're doing as well as you need to. I mean, you could be... These lights, have you seen these cameras? I don't know if I even really like these, these microphones. Now, see, as you're talking to me right now, now, see, I don't even realize that you're breathing any differently than anybody else. And so any time somebody's saying something that's agitating to you in that sense, it's allowing you to see the depth, right? It's allowing you to see the cause rather than getting worked up and holding your breath to fight the symptoms.

Speaker 37:35 Yeah, it's, it's amazing 'cause you're, you're slowing everything down, right? So, you know, using that analogy of being in the car again-

Jefferson Fisher 37:42 Yeah

Speaker 37:42 ... um, if your car is going fast down the street, you're not gonna be able to take everything in, right? Because everything's going by quickly.

Jefferson Fisher 37:51 Yeah, yeah.

Speaker 37:51 If you slow down your car and go down the street, you can suddenly see everything clearly. I saw that number, I saw that number. You know, that's what's going. There's a cat coming. Whatever it might be, right?

Jefferson Fisher 38:00 Right.

Speaker 38:00 So when we slow everything down, our perspective is different. We see more clearly. So clearly in a conversation-

Jefferson Fisher 38:08 Yes

Speaker 38:08 ... especially a conversation that perhaps isn't going the way that you want it to-

Jefferson Fisher 38:12 Right

Speaker 38:13 ... if you're able to slow things down-

Jefferson Fisher 38:15 Yes

Speaker 38:16 ... you're gonna be more present. You're gonna... You know, you're going to have that separation between the stimulus, the words you don't like, and the response you're about to give.

Jefferson Fisher 38:26 Exactly. Time has a way of sifting out priority. We all know we've had these moments in conversations that feel really intense with that friend at the cafe. The next day, you know what?

Speaker 38:40 [laughs]

Jefferson Fisher 38:40 That conversation really didn't matter all that much.

Speaker 38:42 Yeah.

Jefferson Fisher 38:43 Or a week goes by, and you go, "Why did I ever react that way?"

Speaker 38:46 But in the moment, you felt that it did.

Jefferson Fisher 38:48 At, in the moment, it was everything. And then... Or you get that email. You re- read that email at work, and you wanna... It gets you all worked up, and you're ready to send that, that nasty response back, but something happens, and you go, "You, you know what? I'm just gonna, I'm just gonna put this down." You read it again the next day. You go, "That's not even worth my response."

Speaker 39:06 Exactly.

Jefferson Fisher 39:07 Yeah.

Speaker 39:07 That, that's the power of silence-

Jefferson Fisher 39:08 Absolutely

Speaker 39:09 ... and pause, right?

Jefferson Fisher 39:10 Yes.

Speaker 39:10 It's kind of interesting. You are teaching people how to have better conversations, but at the same time, I would imagine, and I think you've hinted at this already, that you've always been pretty good at communicating.

Jefferson Fisher 39:24 Yes.

Speaker 39:25 Yeah. Okay. I would probably say a similar thing about myself. I think as a doctor, I feel that's always been one of my strengths with my patients is my ability to really listen, pay attention, and then communicate effectively with them. I don't think I was taught how to do that.

Jefferson Fisher 39:42 Mm-hmm.

Speaker 39:43 Maybe I picked it up from the people around me. But although I feel I was intuitively quite a good communicator, I feel I've got better over the years, okay? So I feel it's a skill that although I was pretty good at, I think I've got better at it.

Jefferson Fisher 39:59 Mm.

Speaker 40:00 Now, what has helped me get better at it? I think if I think about my marriage, you know, I'm... As we're having this conversation, I'm almost... It's almost 18 years since I was married. Okay?

Jefferson Fisher 40:13 Congratulations.

Speaker 40:13 Since I got married.

Jefferson Fisher 40:14 Yeah.

Speaker 40:15 Yeah, and you know, our marriage is fantastic, and I think one of the things that has made it more fantastic now than maybe in the early days is collectively our ability to communicate as a couple has got better.

Jefferson Fisher 40:30 Mm.

Speaker 40:30 And certainly on a personal level, I feel I've really, um, learnt some new skills about how to communicate better within my relationship, but I also believe that this podcast has helped me become a better communicator. Okay, so, um, as you know, this is a long-form podcast. Okay? It's long-form intentionally. I'm not interested in quick, fancy sound bites. I want deep, meaningful conversations with people that I'm curious about.

Jefferson Fisher 41:00 Yeah.

Speaker 41:01 That's always been the name of the game on this show, and it continues to be today, and every summer, I stop the podcast for six weeks. Okay? It's the children are on summer holidays. My wife is the producer of the podcast. And so for us, it's really important to have some time away from this show even though the whole world is saying, "You can't stop. You need to keep going." That's a separate matter, right?

Jefferson Fisher 41:23 Yeah.

Speaker 41:23 But we take a break every summer, and every summer whilst I'm on break, I reflect on what can I improve? What can I do differently? How can I make the show even better? You know, how can I become a better communicator? And a few years ago, the insight I had over the summer break was to embrace silence more, right? So you talk in your book about how silence can be a superpower, and I would say maybe three or four summers ago, I came back and intentionally started to utilize silence much more, and I think that's enhanced the quality of the conversations. And so my thinking was very much, Rangan, you don't have to rush, right? There's, there's no time pressure here. You've got all the time in the world. In a natural conversation, because I never regard these as interviews, right?

Jefferson Fisher 42:18 Yeah.

Speaker 42:18 If you want an interview, I'm the wrong podcast, right?

Jefferson Fisher 42:20 Mm-hmm.

Speaker 42:21 These are all about conversations. And I realized that, well, in real-life conversation, there are sometimes pauses. Sometimes the next thing to say isn't there at the tip of your tongue. Sometimes you have to kind of pause and reflect and let what was just said land. You also have to trust yourself, right? You go, "Okay, I don't need to think about the next thing I'm gonna say. I can just pay attention to what Jefferson is saying, and then when he finishes, I need to trust-" That the right thing to come next will come out of my mouth, right? So that's rather long-winded of me trying to say that when I read you write about silence being a superpower, I thought, "I love that," because I feel that's one of the things that I've really embraced on this show, and I think it's one of the things that has really improved the quality of conversations on this show.

Jefferson Fisher 43:14 I think that's spot on. For, for your listeners, I w- I would ask two questions. Number one, have you ever really given thought to how you're communicating? H- how, how your voice is representing you? Not just how you sound, that's personal to you, but the words that you choose. More than likely, you've spent some amount of money on a better health. Maybe you've changed a diet. Maybe you've read some books. Maybe you've gone to some conference. Whatever. We invest a lot in a lot of things, but have you ever actually invested in the thing you do every day? And that is getting disciplined about how you communicate, actually asking yourself how do you communicate. That's question number one. Question number two is why are you rushing? Why are you rushing? I feel like we rush all the time. I mean, I know I rush my, my son sometimes. I'm like, "All right, come on. Get your shoes on. Come on, get your shoes on. We gotta go." To what? A kid's birthday party that, uh, y- you don't have to be on time for? I mean, it's, it's not the end of the world. Why do we f- always feel like we have to rush, rush, rush? There is something so beautiful about having a conversation with your best friend that has no time constraints-

Speaker 44:41 Yeah

Jefferson Fisher 44:41 ... that has no rush. And you can say something, and just like you said, you're able to just sit with it, land, let their words sit, and just appreciate the moment that you're able to connect with someone. And beautiful, wonderful things happen when you simply slow down the conversation, and that's exactly... If you wanna have better conversation, you slow it down. If you want to deal with difficult conversation, if you're really worried about a conversation you're about to have, slow it down. I promise you, you're gonna end up having a better outcome.

Speaker 45:16 Yeah.

Jefferson Fisher 45:17 Three things that I want you to know that are going to change the way you communicate. Are you listening? Are you ready? Number one, never win an argument. Whenever your goal is to win an argument, you lose so much more every time. And it gets me frustrated, tell you the truth, of how much I see out in the world, videos to blogs to books and magazines and articles on how to win every argument. Let me tell you right now, it is a lie. It's snake oil. It's clickbait. It is... It's not true. It's, has nothing to do with real world. That's why it does not work. When you've ever seen, like, uh, "Why am I not winning this argument?" Because the idea of winning it does not work. It never has. It never will. People like to say, "Well, Jefferson, aren't you an attorney? Isn't this kind of your day job? You're, this is what you do for a living. You win arguments." Absolutely not. No. That's, that's not how it works. As a trial attorney, any trial attorney who is in the courtroom, you do not choose your client's facts. When a client walks into my door and they have, "Hey, I've been in an accident, and here are my facts," I can't create new facts that will help my case, and I can't get rid of facts or delete facts that hurt my case. I am stuck with the cards that are dealt. Same thing applies with the law. I can't choose. I'm here in Texas. I can't choose what laws I'm gonna follow or not going to follow. They apply to everyone here in this state. Same if the federal level or any state in the US. I can't choose any of that. And so when it comes to arguing as an attorney, it's more about giving the facts and evidence a voice. How can I persuade you based upon my facts and what I have in the law? And then it's ultimately up to the, the finder of fact, is how they call it. You have the judge or you have the jury, and it's gonna be, those are the people who decide what's persuasive and what's not, and are they following the law. At the end of the day, they have to follow the law. Has nothing to do about who's winning an argument. The other attorney might have better facts. The other attorney might have better law. Has nothing to do with me winning it. So it's not even the same thing in the courtroom or as an attorney. You cannot win every argument. When you do, when you set out to say, "I wanna win this argument," you will lose the relationship with this person. It may not be the first time. It may not be the second time. But over time and time and time again, the r- value and quality of that relationship is going to continue to go down. Here's what I mean. When you and I are fighting and we're trying to win an argument, what I've really won is your contempt. You, you're now mad at me most likely. I've, I've won your, uh, ability to have awkward silence now every time we pass each other in the hall. I still have to probably work with this person, probably have to live with this person. What have you, what have you won? You've really probably won the first chance. You're f- now the first person up to have to apologize. Often we win arguments because we said something that was over the top, went too far, below the belt, anything that made the argument stop. Just because you're the last one who speaks does not mean that you're the one who won the argument. It is just not true. So every time you try to see yourself as winning an argument, you're going to lose the relationship. You're gonna lose their respect. You're going to lose their trust, their confidence, and over time, you're going to lose the ability to connect with that person when you always set out to win an argument. So instead of winning an argument, this is what I want you to do. See the argument as something to unravel. See the argument as something to unravel, a- as in a knot. You have one side, I have the other, and when I'm pulling and we're pulling, it just makes the knot tighter and tighter. It doesn't go anywhere. Instead of seeing who's gonna win this tug of war, you have to stop, put it down, and find a way to locate the knot, and when you do, that's where you have the heart of the matter, where you can start to unravel and say, "I'm trying to understand where you're coming from." They're trying to understand where you're coming from. Then you can talk. Then you can connect with the person. It is not winning an argument that is going to change the way you communicate. It is seeing the way that you can unravel the knot. I, I really hope that resonates with you. It's one of the main pillars that I use every day in my communication and how I see things between two people and how we connect with each other. Don't look to win the argument. You want to look to unravel the knot. You just have to be patient enough. Truth number two: have something to learn, not something to prove. Now, this goes beautifully with the first point of never win in an argument. Number two says, have something to learn, not something to prove. Struggle happens, difficulty happens, bad things happen in communication when I'm trying to prove something against you. But here's the, the, the fact of it. The harder I work to push against you, the harder I push to prove my point, the more hardened you'll become that I'm wrong. Because it... What you don't know is that behind everybody, as we're gonna talk here in the third step, is there is a surface and a depth behind everybody. So if I were to say, "You're wrong. Hey, you listening right now? You're wrong. Whatever opinion you have, I'm gonna say that it's wrong." But what I don't know is when I tell you that you're wrong, I could also be saying that your family member is wrong, your grandparent is wrong, y- what you've known your whole life is wrong. We all come into circumstances with different life experiences. So if you've been raised, maybe let's say in a particular religion your entire life, or you've heard, um, only a certain political party your entire life, these are big concepts I'm talking about here. Or maybe you're, you grew up in an area that is culturally a certain way and somebody says that that's wrong, what you're doing is just changing their whole paradigm of saying everything about you is wrong. And we will get so defensive, even to the point of refusing to listen, to be able to preserve that identity that the other person has. They will fight tooth and nail. It doesn't matter. That, that's why logic does not work in these circumstances. Logic doesn't work because it is a, a part of their identity. It is their value in their life of this is who I am. If you're saying that I'm wrong, well, th- that means my dad's wrong, my mom's wrong, my grandparents are wrong, and it, it ties to a whole lot more. When somebody likes, let's say a, a s- a political candidate, it doesn't matter what party, and you say that they're wrong, well, you get... A lot of people that are fans of certain people get very defensive because they've tied their identity to that person. You have to understand that you c- come into it with something to learn, not something to prove in that conversation. I get really worked up about these truths because they hit so much at home for me. Like these, l- the points that I give, they're little quick, rapid things. I'm always gonna be giving you those. I want to start season two a little bit different. That does not mean I'm gonna continue to, to do the bigger concepts. I always give practical takeaways, and I'm gonna give that to you here, is I want you to, to get used to this mindset of when you see struggle, when there's friction in the communication, ask yourself, "Am I trying to prove something or am I trying to learn something?" Here's a, a depiction of this, an illustration I want you to have in your mind. If I'm arguing with you, I cannot pour... Let's say I have a glass of, of water. I cannot pour water into your full pitcher. I, I can't pour new thoughts into a, into a pitcher that's already full. I have to let you get it all out. I have to ask you questions and get curious of, "Well, how long have you, you know, uh... How'd you come to that conclusion? How long have you thought like this? How, how..." Things that you're getting information out of the other person rather than just trying to splash the water in their face and saying, "Take this," and whatever, "Everything I say is right." Instead, you need to ask questions that get it all out, and only then is there space for you to fill it with your new thoughts. Have something to learn, not something to prove. Truth number three. This is one of my favorites. The person you see is not the person you're talking to. The person you see is not the person you're talking to. Like we said in s- in step two, everybody has a surface and a depth. The person who's serving you coffee at the café, maybe they served it a little late. Maybe they had a little bit of attitude. That's the person you see. But the person you're talking to maybe should have been off two hours ago or just got a terribly rude comment from a customer an hour before and now it's weighing on them. Or maybe, uh, their kids are staying with their mom and they're in a bad mood because they don't like where they are in life. There's always a surface and a depth. Uh, people that you're driving behind... Like this is for me, right? I'm talking to myself. When you're driving in the, in the left lane and somebody's in the left lane... Here in the United States, you have the right lane, left lane. Our default is typically in the, the right lane through, uh, single lane passing traffic. But it's two lanes. Left lane is for passing, the right lane is for those that go slow. [laughs] So anytime you wanna... Somebody's going slow in the left lane, ugh, it irritates me to, to no end, but I'm working on that. See, I can work on things, too. Well, anytime you're going slow behind a car that's probably going the speed limit, let's be honest, you just automatically assume they are in your way. Get out of my way. How dare you be in my way? You don't know what in the world's going on with their life. You don't know what kind of news this person is dealing with. Same way when somebody's coming up behind you, like what we call, um, on, on your rear. When they are right up behind you, you think, "I... What do you want? What do you want from me?" And you get aggravated that they're trying to speed you up. So it just goes all into this thing of we like to think about ourselves. It's our, it's our default. It's, it's natural. I want you to see that the person you see is not the person you're talking to. So you have to get really curious about understanding that everybody has something going on that you don't know about. People you're related to, they have struggles they don't share with you. Your kids, there are things that are happening in their life that they may not share with you. Same thing with your work. You have a supervisor, an employee. There are things going in their life that you don't know. They're having conversations in their head that you aren't part of. If... For those that have been in relationships or are in one right now, you've all experienced this, a concept where somebody comes into the house, the room, the apartment, whatever, and you can just tell they're in a bad mood, and it's not until 20 minutes into the conversation, you're like, "Is something wrong with you?" Well, it turns out what happened to them happened six hours before, and they've been living with that w- long before they came in contact with you. So things happen that you have no idea about. So when you go into this thing of exactly who I see with this person is exactly who they are, and you go into stereotypes and you say, "Oh, I'm gonna call a spade a spade," that's fine. Do what you need to do. Understand that's not the real person. I've seen some of the toughest people, meanest looking people be the biggest teddy bears and sweethearts. I've also seen the smallest, may say oldest, weakest, uh, people be the sturdiest, strongest, uh, humans I've ever come across. You cannot judge a book by its cover.

Speaker 57:20 What is your overall approach to communicating with coworkers?

Jefferson Fisher 57:24 I find that people who you're working with, they're not your family, as much as you want them to be, and sometimes they're your person in the, in the storm. Like, you can get really-

Speaker 57:38 It's like in Severance, right? Have you been watching Severance?

Jefferson Fisher 57:39 I have not.

Speaker 57:40 Oh, okay.

Jefferson Fisher 57:40 But-

Speaker 57:40 It's good.

Jefferson Fisher 57:41 Is it? Okay.

Speaker 57:42 Well, I mean, yeah, it's dark-

Jefferson Fisher 57:43 Oh

Speaker 57:43 ... but it's okay.

Jefferson Fisher 57:44 Okay. Oh, all right.

Speaker 57:45 [laughs]

Jefferson Fisher 57:45 I'm learning a lot-

Speaker 57:46 [laughs]

Jefferson Fisher 57:46 ... just about this etiquette life.

Speaker 57:48 Mm-hmm.

Jefferson Fisher 57:49 Um, it's the same thing with any difficult conversation. Whenever you have two people that are going through a common goal, they get closer. When you have a lot... You talk about the same thing, you communicate about the same thing, you are working towards a common objective, you typically talk bad about the same people.

Speaker 58:05 Yeah.

Jefferson Fisher 58:05 Right?

Speaker 58:05 Your boss. Yeah.

Jefferson Fisher 58:06 Yeah, you talk bad. "Can you believe this?" Something like-

Speaker 58:08 Yep

Jefferson Fisher 58:08 ... and you're like, can you s- "Did you see what she's wearing?"

Speaker 58:10 Mm-hmm.

Jefferson Fisher 58:11 Like, you... Yeah, it's like, "Oh, this coffee is really bad in here." You find ways of communicating with the person-

Speaker 58:16 Yeah

Jefferson Fisher 58:16 ... whether it's by complaining.

Speaker 58:18 Mm-hmm.

Jefferson Fisher 58:18 Complaining is often a very... Or gossiping about people is a very-

Speaker 58:23 Mm-hmm

Jefferson Fisher 58:23 ... communal thing.

Speaker 58:24 Yes.

Jefferson Fisher 58:24 It's like it's bonding. Well, how do you handle, let's say, a lot of different topics we could go with coworkers. Let's put it in gossip, 'cause I think that could be a, a-

Speaker 58:33 Okay

Jefferson Fisher 58:33 ... that tends to be a pretty common thing, when somebody is... You're in the office and somebody is gossiping about someone. And let's, mind you, the person you're... This coworker is not, like, your bestie.

Speaker 58:43 Yeah, not your bestie.

Jefferson Fisher 58:44 Not your bestie.

Speaker 58:45 Yep, not to be trusted.

Jefferson Fisher 58:46 And you're, uh... Because if it is your bestie, go for it. Say all the things you wanna say.

Speaker 58:50 Mm-hmm. Yeah.

Jefferson Fisher 58:50 But let's say it's just, it's a very nosy coworker, and they're gossiping about somebody, and you don't know how to handle it 'cause you don't wanna really get into it. Here is what I would suggest, is you go, "I don't know. I'll ask them." So-

Speaker 59:03 Oh, yes

Jefferson Fisher 59:04 ... so anytime-

Speaker 59:04 'Cause then they'll be like, "No, no, no, no, don't gossip."

Jefferson Fisher 59:06 Yeah, exactly.

Speaker 59:07 Yes.

Jefferson Fisher 59:07 Yeah. Uh, or, uh, yeah, so you could, you could say, "I don't know. I'll ask them." [laughs] Like, it's, it has such an immediate effect of like, " [gasps] No, no, no, we're good, we're good, we're good." Or it's you, you could flip it and say, you know, "I don't know. Have you asked them?" And they'll typically go, "No, uh, but..." And they'll-

Speaker 59:24 Mm-hmm

Jefferson Fisher 59:25 ... keep talking about it. As long as you're saying that, or just a simple, "You know, I don't know. Yeah, I don't... I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I don't know," you're not engaging in it. You're not feeding the fire.

Speaker 59:35 Right.

Jefferson Fisher 59:35 They're gonna realize, "I can't go anywhere with this person. I will find someone else to vent to."

Speaker 59:39 Although I do think sometimes it is valuable to be aware of office gossip.

Jefferson Fisher 59:42 Yeah.

Speaker 59:42 'Cause it is like intelligence, right? But I, I did-

Jefferson Fisher 59:45 Sometimes.

Speaker 59:45 [laughs] But I did prepare a couple other scenarios that I just thought of-

Jefferson Fisher 59:51 Okay

Speaker 59:51 ... about how to navigate workplace tension, and one of them is the passive aggressive emailer.

Jefferson Fisher 59:57 Oh.

Speaker 59:57 Right? Where they're sending vague jabs disguised as, disguised as politeness, using phrases like, "Per my last email," and, "Just to clarify," which I find myself using them, too, sometimes.

Jefferson Fisher 1:00:08 I've seen lots of memes about these, of, like, if you... Somebody is saying, "Per my last email" means, like, "Look at my email, you idiot."

Speaker 1:00:16 Yeah, exactly. [laughs]

Jefferson Fisher 1:00:17 Like, there's ways of trying to send that.

Speaker 1:00:19 I mean, what would be a nicer way than to say, "Per my last email"? 'Cause it's over... You- you're typing it, right? So it's... There's some things that are... Like, when you write something, it's different communication than saying something face to face.

Jefferson Fisher 1:00:31 No doubt. I... Well-

Speaker 1:00:32 Is it better to say, like, "Please take a look at my last email, dated March 1st"?

Jefferson Fisher 1:00:36 Well, let's talk about it. Let's etiquette this out. You could, in a sense, um, just forward the email to them.

Speaker 1:00:42 [laughs] Like, "I've attached the email-

Jefferson Fisher 1:00:44 Yeah

Speaker 1:00:44 ... from March 1st." [laughs]

Jefferson Fisher 1:00:45 You could, you could, you could, you... Yeah, instead of the per my last email, just, you could just forward it to them.

Speaker 1:00:49 Yeah, and then say, "Did you see this?"

Jefferson Fisher 1:00:51 Yeah. Um, or it's, you could put this friendly, uh, just putting this at the top, you know, whatever.

Speaker 1:00:56 Yeah. I, I'll do that. Like, you know, just, uh, you know, just, yeah, I'll say- Bumping this up to the top of your inbox

Jefferson Fisher 1:01:02 Yeah, or you could have a simple ... If they're like, "Hey, have you blah, blah, blah, blah," and you've already answered this, you could, you could just forward it to them. Like, to me, I don't find that being too-

Speaker 1:01:12 You wouldn't get offended, right? Great.

Jefferson Fisher 1:01:13 I'm not. Now, there's some people who-

Speaker 1:01:15 I'll email you next time

Jefferson Fisher 1:01:15 ... there's some people who would. Or even if you just give, like, a simple yes or a no and you s- you forward that or attach that last email, great. It's the per my last email type of thing that has become so ... I think the first time people typed it, no problem, but now it's become so part of culture to make it a much more passive thing.

Speaker 1:01:38 [laughs] Right, right.

Jefferson Fisher 1:01:38 But let's say, let's say they don't send all of that. Let's just put it as they send a snarky email.

Speaker 1:01:44 Yeah, which people do.

Jefferson Fisher 1:01:46 Oh, yeah, people do, and they have to-

Speaker 1:01:48 Sometimes I want to, but I stop myself-

Jefferson Fisher 1:01:50 Yeah, I was gonna say sometimes-

Speaker 1:01:51 ... 'cause I'm an etiquette expert

Jefferson Fisher 1:01:51 ... I want to.

Speaker 1:01:51 Yeah. [laughs]

Jefferson Fisher 1:01:52 No, um, I think that there are ways ... Here's how I would handle somebody who gives passive-aggressive comments at work is you ask the question, should I read into that, or did you mean? So let's say I'm talking with you and I'm sitting in your office. Let's just put it in face-to-face real quick. So, and you have a comment that makes me go, huh, I feel like that was a little ... I feel like that was a jab. If you feel that, you can ask the question, should I, should I read into that comment?

Speaker 1:02:25 Mm. Yeah, that's great because w- w- the way you're saying it is, is neutral the way you're saying it.

Jefferson Fisher 1:02:29 Yes.

Speaker 1:02:29 It's, it's from the heart.

Jefferson Fisher 1:02:30 Right.

Speaker 1:02:31 Right? And, and it's more like a confused or curious as opposed to accusatory.

Jefferson Fisher 1:02:35 Exactly, and, or I love this, this, uh, question phrasing because it works with a lot of different things, is asking, beginning with did you mean?

Speaker 1:02:45 Mm.

Jefferson Fisher 1:02:46 Did you mean for that to come across short? Did you, did you mean to sound upset?

Speaker 1:02:50 Did you mean to be passive-aggressive?

Jefferson Fisher 1:02:52 Yeah. Uh.

Speaker 1:02:53 Well, uh, maybe not.

Jefferson Fisher 1:02:54 Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Speaker 1:02:54 Yeah, we'll strike that one out.

Jefferson Fisher 1:02:55 Yeah, yeah, yeah. You know what I-

Speaker 1:02:56 Okay

Jefferson Fisher 1:02:56 ... you, well, you, but if you said, if you, uh, said something as simple as did you mean to sound upset?

Speaker 1:03:03 Yes. That's great.

Jefferson Fisher 1:03:05 Right?

Speaker 1:03:05 'Cause, yeah.

Jefferson Fisher 1:03:05 Most likely the response you're gonna get is, "Oh, no, no, no, no, no. I'm-

Speaker 1:03:09 That's true

Jefferson Fisher 1:03:09 ... I'm gonna ... No, no, no. I was doing this. I was doing this." And they'll-

Speaker 1:03:12 Um

Jefferson Fisher 1:03:12 ... justify or explain more because sometimes, especially in email, we read the negative. In text message, w- we hardly ever read the positive into someone's words. We read the negative.

Speaker 1:03:26 Right.

Jefferson Fisher 1:03:26 We love the negative. So if I just responded to your text, "Okay," you're gonna go, "What kind of okay is that?"

Speaker 1:03:34 Oh, yeah, for Gen Z, that gives them, like, anxiety attacks now.

Jefferson Fisher 1:03:37 Is that right?

Speaker 1:03:38 Yeah.

Jefferson Fisher 1:03:38 I had no clue. Well, i- if you have this just okay, it's usually ... Or k, like, it's just the worst possible thing because you don't, you don't, you can't do anything with it. You don't know how to read into that. So typically we read the negative. Okay, I guess you're upset with me. I guess you hate me.

Speaker 1:03:55 What about the credit stealer, the person who takes credit for group work or reframes your ideas as their own in front of the boss?

Jefferson Fisher 1:04:02 Oh.

Speaker 1:04:02 What should you ... Should you confront them, or should you find a way to get it back to the boss that they're a credit stealer?

Jefferson Fisher 1:04:08 Yeah, so what I would do is ... Huh, I don't think I've ever been asked this. I wouldn't do it right then and there and go, "Uh-uh, that's my idea," in front of the boss.

Speaker 1:04:17 No. Yeah.

Jefferson Fisher 1:04:17 Then that makes you look needy.

Speaker 1:04:18 Bad. Yes, needy and yeah.

Jefferson Fisher 1:04:20 Yeah, so what I would do is talk to that person after the meeting and begin with a did you mean to, to give them my idea?

Speaker 1:04:29 That's great. Did you mean to?

Jefferson Fisher 1:04:30 Yeah.

Speaker 1:04:30 I'm just loving this did you mean to. I need to find-

Jefferson Fisher 1:04:32 It's great

Speaker 1:04:33 ... ways I can use this more. Yes. Did you mean to, yeah, take credit for my idea or to give ... Yes.

Jefferson Fisher 1:04:38 Right. So you ... Did you mean to give, you know, take the credit for, for my idea or not? Or you can say, "Did you mean to not mention my name in that idea?"

Speaker 1:04:47 Right.

Jefferson Fisher 1:04:47 So because you're, now you're really getting strategic. Did you mean not ... Did you mean-

Speaker 1:04:51 Yes

Jefferson Fisher 1:04:51 ... to not bring up my name-

Speaker 1:04:52 Love it

Jefferson Fisher 1:04:53 ... when you mentioned that? The response you're gonna get most likely is the, oh, no, I just, I totally forgot. They're not gonna go, "Yes, I-"

Speaker 1:05:00 Okay, then what would you say to that? We say, "Then can you please tell-"

Jefferson Fisher 1:05:03 Mm-hmm. Do you mind? Yeah.

Speaker 1:05:04 Do you mind telling the boss or, right.

Jefferson Fisher 1:05:06 Yes. Yeah. Then-

Speaker 1:05:07 Do you mind adding my name?

Jefferson Fisher 1:05:08 Exactly. Uh, so then I would make the ask for it. Then would it, um, would it be a bad time for us to do X, Y, and Z, or would us to, um, would you mind raising that the next time we talk about this, or do you mind sending an email? Now, whatever that is, uh, you're saying I, then I would love to have you add the mention, or it would mean a lot to me if you added the mention to-

Speaker 1:05:30 Mm-hmm. And, and then they fix it

Jefferson Fisher 1:05:31 ... X, Y, and Z. Mm-hmm.

Speaker 1:05:32 What about the micromanager, right? Your boss who doesn't trust you to do your job. They hover. They over-correct. They nitpick unnecessarily.

Jefferson Fisher 1:05:41 So that's a symptom of them, not you.

Speaker 1:05:43 Yeah.

Jefferson Fisher 1:05:43 And there's not much you can physically, verbally do to just change somebody's behavior 'cause you can really only control what you can. So how do you manage somebody who's-

Speaker 1:05:56 Yeah. You mana- you're really just managing it.

Jefferson Fisher 1:05:57 Yeah. This is what comes to mind at least right now, is if I can communicate with them to give me one little thing, give me one thing that is my own, and once you complete that task, show them that you can complete another more. And it's best to have these in little bitty conversations to where you have complete autonomy over something, and it's, you never wanna make it ... Like, what I compare micromanaging to is somebody is feeling like they are on the elevator, and they feel like the elevator's gonna burst out from them.

Speaker 1:06:33 Mm.

Jefferson Fisher 1:06:33 So they wanna press every floor. They wanna check every little thing that you're doing because they're afraid something's gonna get dropped, and it's, again, the fear of, it's a fear within themselves, not, not of you. So if you can in conversation try to say, you know, "I would love to have full autonomy over this little thing," or make that suggestion, and if this is gonna ... If I can reach that, then I'd like a little bit more. It depends on context, but that's the mindset you wanna go into.

Speaker 1:07:03 Let's move on to strangers and the art of winning people over. There's the age-old question: Is it better to be liked or to be respected?

Jefferson Fisher 1:07:11 Oh.

Speaker 1:07:12 What's your take?

Jefferson Fisher 1:07:13 Better to be liked Because the person who is liked will naturally get more respect. Uh, and it lasts, it lasts a lot longer. The people who like you are people who want to do things with you, for you, uh, together. It's... I find that if you can make people want to be around you, then you're going to get more people who want to do things willingly rather than out of fear.

Speaker 1:07:41 I agree with you, except maybe in a work setting, right? Because when you have strong relationships and goodwill, people are motivated to work for you. But if you come across as competent, then, like, if, when people respect you for your competence, like, I feel that is also a very lasting influence. I mean, you hear about, like, bosses who are just terrible human beings, but people, everybody wants to work for them.

Jefferson Fisher 1:08:04 And then nobody's, nobody's-

Speaker 1:08:06 Nobody's sad-

Jefferson Fisher 1:08:06 ... sad when they die.

Speaker 1:08:07 Yeah, that's true

Jefferson Fisher 1:08:08 I mean, like, uh, that's like-

Speaker 1:08:08 That's true

Jefferson Fisher 1:08:09 ... I mean, what, what kind of legacy [laughs] do you wanna leave? Like, and I think there's a difference, too, of somebody who's competent and they're resilient and all these under- other wonderful things that you can absolutely be respected.

Speaker 1:08:21 And you can-

Jefferson Fisher 1:08:21 I can be liked and be respected.

Speaker 1:08:22 You absolutely, I mean, the, the ideal is to be both. So if we wanna be liked, in terms of first impressions, how do we gain instant trust?

Jefferson Fisher 1:08:31 One would be smile a lot, more than you think.

Speaker 1:08:33 I always say that, eye contact and smile.

Jefferson Fisher 1:08:35 Yeah. Eye contact and smile. And for people who have trouble with eye contact, a little trick is to end your sentences looking at their eyes rather than feeling like you have to stare at their eyes the whole entire time. Two is pace your conversation, so slow it down. What you're wanting to do is make it very calm and easy for them to be around you and wanna listen to you. So I like to compare it to listening to different types of music. So again, 'cause remember the music thing.

Speaker 1:09:05 Yeah, yeah.

Jefferson Fisher 1:09:05 So think of the people you like to be around and apply a song to their personality.

Speaker 1:09:11 Wow, this is getting-

Jefferson Fisher 1:09:12 Or a band

Speaker 1:09:12 ... like very technical. Okay

Jefferson Fisher 1:09:13 ... like a band to their personality.

Speaker 1:09:14 Apply a song. Okay.

Jefferson Fisher 1:09:15 Yeah. There's some people who are like, make you anxious because everything that they do is, like, a high-energy rock music where it's just always crazy. There are other people who are like easy listening, where it's a lot slower, where you go, "Oh, I kinda like... I could put this on and listen to it all day." Like, there are just different types of wavelengths and frequencies that we just enjoy hearing.

Speaker 1:09:37 Yeah.

Jefferson Fisher 1:09:37 So if you wanna... Uh, it's like those same per- type of people that you go, "Uh, they just feel really warm."

Speaker 1:09:42 Yes.

Jefferson Fisher 1:09:43 How do you, how do you explain that to people that just feel warm?

Speaker 1:09:46 So okay, so tell us about some of your trial tactics, right? Like, what, how does body language and speech affect strangers, and how do you establish yourself as a truth teller? 'Cause I feel like you have to do that in your job every day in front of juries, right? Like, what do juries teach us about human nature?

Jefferson Fisher 1:10:04 What to do, what not to do. Um, I find that trial attorneys, we want to persuade a jury to find in favor for my client. Now, there are limitations because I can only argue the facts that I'm given. I can't choose my facts, and I have to argue within the law. I can't choose what law applies. So when I am getting information, I'm wanting to, uh, make a point to somebody, it's very crucial that I am very concise. So good trial attorneys, you take 40 pages and you turn it into two sentences. And so same thing with, like, my content. I could talk way longer than 47 seconds or 30 seconds. You have to find ways to make it really concise to just the essentials of what matters. And w- how does that translate? It means when you're in conversations, especially difficult conversations, the less you say, the more you mean.

Speaker 1:10:59 Hmm.

Jefferson Fisher 1:11:00 Uh, it's this idea of the more words it takes to tell the truth, the more it sounds like a lie. Or more it's, you say something, the more it sounds like you don't know enough about it. So when you have to give information to somebody or respond, you wanna keep your sentences very short and very concise. It's much, much better... I like to term it as instead of being a waterfall of information, you wanna be a well to where they always find, like, they just want a little bit more at a time.

Speaker 1:11:30 And you know what? I can actually think of people that I know who are, yeah, people who are wells and people who are waterfalls. I'm gonna, I think I'm gonna use that to, like, distinguish between friends now.

Jefferson Fisher 1:11:39 Oh, cool.

Speaker 1:11:39 I love it. Um, and then how about using voice and vulnerability to persuade?

Jefferson Fisher 1:11:44 Voice and vulnerability.

Speaker 1:11:45 Yeah.

Jefferson Fisher 1:11:45 Yeah.

Speaker 1:11:46 'Cause you talk about how you use that in, in your courtroom.

Jefferson Fisher 1:11:49 Mm-hmm. The people who talk fast are the people who are typically not listened to in a courtroom because it's very hard to keep up with them. You have a lot of different people who have different styles, and when I can slow my words down, especially on important points, the more they're going to be remembered. 'Cause at the end of the day, that's what I want these 12 people to do, remember. When they go back to the deliberations and it's been two weeks, three weeks of trial, I'm gonna need them to remember certain things, and other times they won't. So if I can slow my words down, there's, has, they have more-

Speaker 1:12:24 Weight

Jefferson Fisher 1:12:24 ... punch. Like, there's a difference between me saying, "I already told you. I'm, I'm not gonna do that," versus, "I already told you. I'm not going to do that." Like, which one has more weight to it?

Speaker 1:12:37 Mm.

Jefferson Fisher 1:12:37 Which one shows I'm more in control? I have more confidence. I have more weight in the conversation that I'm not going to be moved. It's always the second one.

Speaker 1:12:46 And what about vulnerability?

Jefferson Fisher 1:12:48 Yeah. Vulnerability is wonderful in conversation because it naturally removes people's defenses. If I can tell you before I'm having a conversation that I'm feeling nervous about it, you, you're not gonna get upset or, like, "Nervous? How dare you?" It's like, "Oh, no. It's okay. We can, we can talk. What's going on?"

Speaker 1:13:04 That almost makes the other person wanna protect you.

Jefferson Fisher 1:13:06 Yeah. We now wanna almost kinda take your hand in the conversation.

Speaker 1:13:09 Yeah.

Jefferson Fisher 1:13:09 "No, I'm, I'm listening. I'm listening." So there's a guy who I, I've, I have not had a trial against him, but I've seen him. And he is not a guy who's very tall and or, or big. He's, he's a smaller guy, and in trial he gets very nervous in front of other people, which is very weird as a trial attorney, but it happens. And he tells them-

Speaker 1:13:30 Why did he choose to go into this profession?

Jefferson Fisher 1:13:32 Because he's, he's passionate about advocating for people.

Speaker 1:13:34 Mm.

Jefferson Fisher 1:13:34 I mean, it's, it's the justice element. It's wanting to help-

Speaker 1:13:37 Yeah

Jefferson Fisher 1:13:37 ... people for the right reasons, and he does such a masterful job. When he's in the courtroom, he'll tell the jury, he'll go, "I... Now, just, just so you know, I, I, I get a little nervous in, in front of people talking."

Speaker 1:13:47 Oh, that is so cute. [laughs]

Jefferson Fisher 1:13:48 And that's what every person in the jury thinks right there, okay? And you know what they do? They go, "I love this person. Forget the case. I don't care."

Speaker 1:13:57 [laughs]

Jefferson Fisher 1:13:57 "Your client wins." Like, that's what happens. If they don't like the attorney, they're not going to like the client.

Speaker 1:14:05 Mm.

Jefferson Fisher 1:14:05 If they don't like the attorney, you're going to lose. They're not gonna find in favor of somebody that they don't like, and they will find reasons for that. But when he, when he starts to kinda stutter and say, "I, I, I get nervous, but I'm, I'm gonna, I'm gonna represent my client"-

Speaker 1:14:19 [laughs]

Jefferson Fisher 1:14:19 ... like, everybody in the courtroom just goes-

Speaker 1:14:21 Like a hero, yeah

Jefferson Fisher 1:14:21 ... "G- just take the money."

Speaker 1:14:23 Yeah. [laughs]

Jefferson Fisher 1:14:23 Like, everybody just loves the guy. And so but that's what happens every day. Somebody who's nervous in conversation, we root for them. We, we want, we want to see them succeed. And so being vulnerable is very much a strength.

Speaker 1:14:36 Mm-hmm.

Jefferson Fisher 1:14:36 When you can tell someone how you're feeling in that moment, or you're telling someone, you know, o- of-

Speaker 1:14:43 I'm not perfect.

Jefferson Fisher 1:14:43 Exactly, because perfection's not relatable.

Speaker 1:14:45 Yeah.

Jefferson Fisher 1:14:46 Vulnerability struggles are. So when you can tell someone what you're struggling with... So the takeaway here, if I tell somebody, "I'm struggling to find the words to say this"-

Speaker 1:14:55 Mm

Jefferson Fisher 1:14:55 ... or, "I'm, I'm struggling to control my nerves right now"-

Speaker 1:14:59 Yeah

Jefferson Fisher 1:15:00 ... you are just showing a little bit of yourself to make them feel, "Oh, yeah, I, I know that feeling."

Speaker 1:15:04 Yeah.

Jefferson Fisher 1:15:04 And they're gonna wanna take your hand in that conversation, and it's gonna go better.

Speaker 1:15:07 And you can apply this to anything, to, to love, to career, to-

Jefferson Fisher 1:15:11 Yeah

Speaker 1:15:11 ... friends, to strangers.

Jefferson Fisher 1:15:13 As long as you're not doing it passively of like, "I, I struggle to understand how-

Speaker 1:15:17 Yeah. [laughs]

Jefferson Fisher 1:15:17 ... you could possibly..." Like, you don't wanna use that. That's, that's not the kinda struggle we're after.

Speaker 1:15:22 So my, my favorite quote of yours is that, "Smart people never win arguments, because you lose the relationship."

Jefferson Fisher 1:15:27 Yeah. Uh, if... When you set out to win an argument, you will often lose the relationship. It is this idea that you can... If you set out to win every argument, y- all you do is win their contempt. You, you've won to be the first to apologize most likely, and you lose their confidence. You lose their trust. You lose their respect, the connection. It's this idea that you can still win an argument and still be wrong. It, it, it, it does nothing.

Speaker 1:15:55 Yeah.

Jefferson Fisher 1:15:55 It does nothing. And so when you start to pull your way and I start to pull mine, all we do is make the knot tighter. It makes it harder to undo, and it takes longer for us to undo the knot. So instead of seeing arguments as something to win, I want you to see them as something to unravel, because it's... All that it is, uh, arguments are just a window into somebody's struggle in that, in that moment. What are they truly struggling with? And if you just keep tugging and I just keep tugging, it takes a very long time to undo that knot. If I can be quick to apologize, well, it's very easy to loosen that knot.

Speaker 1:16:30 Mm. Yeah, yeah, again, the de-escalation.

Jefferson Fisher 1:16:31 But, yeah. But the, the harder I squeeze onto that-

Speaker 1:16:34 Hang on. Oh, it's tight

Jefferson Fisher 1:16:34 ... apology and I'm never gonna give it from you, we're just... It's... It, it, it'll take two weeks, it'll take six months, it'll take a year before we undo that knot to have an actual conversation again.

Speaker 1:16:45 Yeah, I love that analogy. And, and I feel that when we think of them as difficult conversations instead of arguments, if we know how to handle them well, it actually is an opportunity to deepen a relationship.

Jefferson Fisher 1:16:56 Yeah.

Speaker 1:16:56 Like, when I think about the relationships I've been in, usually after you have that difficult conversation, then you, you come away thinking, "Oh, I have more of a connection-

Jefferson Fisher 1:17:03 Absolutely

Speaker 1:17:04 ... to that other person."

Jefferson Fisher 1:17:04 Because you've been through the difficult with them.

Speaker 1:17:06 Yeah.

Jefferson Fisher 1:17:06 Like, you, you've been through the hard stuff.

Speaker 1:17:07 Yes.

Jefferson Fisher 1:17:07 The ones you are-

Speaker 1:17:08 And that's meaningful.

Jefferson Fisher 1:17:09 It's super meaningful, because you, you created bonding in, in that, in the struggle together. It's this idea that the deeper connection you wanna have some- with somebody, then the deeper tolerance you must have for difficult conversation. It's... If you've only had surface level conversations, you're gonna have a surface level-

Speaker 1:17:26 Exactly

Jefferson Fisher 1:17:27 ... relationship.

Speaker 1:17:28 Yeah.

Jefferson Fisher 1:17:28 And, uh, the people that are able to go deep with you on something, es- even when it's hard, even when you're tearing up, and sometimes you yell, and you've experienced that, because that means I'm still here even when you're showing me all of your flaws. It means I'm still here, and I still wanna be here with you, and that's, that, that means something to people.

Speaker 1:17:48 That is beautiful.

Speaker 1:17:49 With what's happening with the offering you're putting out in the world of teaching people how to communicate, I'm curious for you, Jefferson, like, what are some of the traits that you admire most-

Jefferson Fisher 1:18:00 Mm

Speaker 1:18:00 ... in people who you feel are the best communicators in the world?

Jefferson Fisher 1:18:03 Mm. Probably number one would be warmth.

Speaker 1:18:06 Mm.

Jefferson Fisher 1:18:07 In people that you just, you don't even have to talk to them, you can sit in a room and just feel it.

Speaker 1:18:13 Mm-hmm.

Jefferson Fisher 1:18:14 And, um, maybe it's their energy, maybe the, their vibe. Maybe it's their spirit. Just whatever it is, the frequency that they're putting out into the world calms you.

Speaker 1:18:25 Mm.

Jefferson Fisher 1:18:26 And I find that to be, uh, very... It, it makes you attracted to them, because you like that, that warmth and that comfort, that when you talk to them, you feel just a little bit calmer.

Speaker 1:18:37 Mm.

Jefferson Fisher 1:18:38 And so people who communicate very well are not only good at being clear, and direct, and assertive, but they're also emotionally intelligent enough to know when to slow down.

Speaker 1:18:49 Mm.

Jefferson Fisher 1:18:50 'Cause things are so busy and we ramp up, but they know that good communication happens in the, in the smallest of words, the shortest of sentences.

Speaker 1:18:59 Mm. When someone's w- allows their warmth to just be, do you feel like it's easier to listen to them and be around them? 'Cause I think a lot of people, especially women, um, feel like, "Oh, I've gotta... You know, if I'm, if I show my warmth, I'm weak."

Jefferson Fisher 1:19:14 Mm-hmm.

Speaker 1:19:15 "And I need to..." You know, all the things. And- And I just think that's kind of powerful and insightful what you just shared-

Jefferson Fisher 1:19:21 Yeah

Speaker 1:19:21 ... is that when you think of the best communicators, that there's a warmth.

Jefferson Fisher 1:19:24 Yeah. Well, I, I think you'd agree, you never wanna hide your light. And I mean, there are so many opportunities that we have to, to do that, and it's leaning into it. If people feel like, "Oh, I, I, I'm gonna be weak if I'm perceived this way," just if you go by the, how you listen to music, s- things that are very fast, um, affect you, makes your mind race. When somebody's talking really, really quickly, and then you can't even hardly understand what they're saying, and they're getting r- uh, ramp up and ramp up, that kinda gets you and your anxiety up. But people who slow down, they show more control. It's not the opposite. They show more control, more confidence. When you're adding distance to your communication, you are showing them that you are comfortable exactly where you are, and that also shines onto them to, to show that and where you are is okay, too.

Speaker 1:20:18 Mm. One thing that you, uh, seem so masterful at that I feel like I need to work on more is, is this idea of pausing-

Jefferson Fisher 1:20:29 Mm

Speaker 1:20:29 ... and of giving space. And this is gonna be a big thing for everyone listening because when we dive into all the different topics-

Jefferson Fisher 1:20:36 Yeah

Speaker 1:20:36 ... that are gonna affect our lives in so many different ways, when we start applying the tools that you share, um, there's this consistent theme of, of pause-

Jefferson Fisher 1:20:46 Yeah

Speaker 1:20:46 ... and of space. And I'll never forget, um, the first time I ever gave even a, a keynote speech, right? It was, like, a room of it was, like, 10,000 people, and all this stuff was g- it was for, um, Brendon Burchard event actually.

Jefferson Fisher 1:20:58 Okay.

Speaker 1:20:58 And it was the, it was the first time outside of IT Cosmetics. And it was a long story, but he's like, "I have an opening." And I'm like, "I'm in." And it was this hour spot, and it was the most phenomenal hour, but every time people cheered or even stood up and cheered or any of the things 'cause it was really fun-

Jefferson Fisher 1:21:17 Yeah

Speaker 1:21:17 ... um, and I was just, like, pouring into them, I didn't know how to pause.

Jefferson Fisher 1:21:21 Mm.

Speaker 1:21:21 I, the second they started clapping, I didn't know, and I just kept talking. And I remember afterwards, he came up to me and he says, um, "First of all," like he s- he said a, a million great things, which I'm so grateful for, and then he's like, "You need to learn how to pause and let the audience, like, have their moment."

Jefferson Fisher 1:21:38 Yeah.

Speaker 1:21:38 Like, "They're excited. They're cheering for you. They're into it. They're so excited that you overcame this huge obstacle." And I was like, "Huh, I didn't know how to let the pause happen."

Jefferson Fisher 1:21:47 Yeah.

Speaker 1:21:47 And what I love is you guys, you give so many examples in your book, um, of ways the pause is so powerful. Uh, but just really high level, this is for everyone listening. I want you to think right now as you're hearing me and Jefferson talk about this. When you're talking with someone, do you ever just pause and, like, let there be space, and maybe you're looking at them in the eye, or do you start to feel uncomfortable and wanna fill the space with words? Can you talk about the power, the power of the pause-

Jefferson Fisher 1:22:16 Yeah

Speaker 1:22:16 ... and how right now, everyone at home, like, different ways you can use just pausing in your communication and how it actually literally helps change your life.

Jefferson Fisher 1:22:25 Yeah.

Speaker 1:22:25 Yeah.

Jefferson Fisher 1:22:26 The pausing is the most powerful tool you can use in communication because it gives you time to choose things.

Speaker 1:22:36 Mm.

Jefferson Fisher 1:22:36 It gives you time to choose, is this worth my words?

Speaker 1:22:41 Mm.

Jefferson Fisher 1:22:41 Is this worth my attention? It also gives you a chance to calm your own emotions, to regulate your emotions. It gives you time to think. And when you're able to pause in conversation, it allows you to show control. If you were to ask me, Jamie, if you said, "Jefferson, how was your day?" And I immediately said, "Good. I mean, my day was fine. It was good. It was good," that tells you one thing. If you asked me again, "Jefferson, how was your day?" And I said, " [inhales] It was good. It was good," very different connotation.

Speaker 1:23:14 Mm-hmm.

Jefferson Fisher 1:23:14 What you're telling in the first one is, "I didn't really listen to your question."

Speaker 1:23:17 Mm.

Jefferson Fisher 1:23:18 The second pause is kind of clarifying of I, I listened to you. When somebody even gives you one second, two seconds of a pause after a question, it tells you that they're thinking about it.

Speaker 1:23:30 Mm.

Jefferson Fisher 1:23:31 And it's allowing you to show that you're actually acknowledging taking it in before, before you just spit out a response right away because we're such in a world of immediacy of-

Speaker 1:23:41 Yeah

Jefferson Fisher 1:23:41 ... texting back right away, saying that, having that clap back r- as soon as you get it out. And where the real power in communication is, is slowing things down. It's the pause because it allows the other people, like, just like you said, when you're speaking at people and they, maybe they clap or they cheer, it's allowing them to contribute to the conversation.

Speaker 1:24:02 Mm-hmm. I just had a big aha moment, like, a big aha moment-

Jefferson Fisher 1:24:06 I'm ready

Speaker 1:24:06 ... because at, at our core, we all just wanna be seen and understood and, and, and also feel connection-

Jefferson Fisher 1:24:14 Mm-hmm

Speaker 1:24:15 ... and belonging, and so many people feel so lonely right now. And often, you know, social media can be great in so many ways, but we're lonelier than ever. And one tip you just gave, I think this is so big, and I wanna, I wanna say it in the way where it really hit me, is, is, is that example you gave-

Jefferson Fisher 1:24:32 Mm

Speaker 1:24:32 ... 'cause we all have this happen every day, right? "How are you?" You know, we go and grab a coffee, and, you know, we might ask the person ringing us up, "How are you?" Or they might ask us, "How are you?"

Jefferson Fisher 1:24:40 Yeah.

Speaker 1:24:41 And we just default, "Oh, I'm great, thanks. How are you?" You know, whatever. Boom, boom.

Jefferson Fisher 1:24:44 Yeah.

Speaker 1:24:44 And we don't even know what we're saying. It's just like autopilot. And, and, and yet we're all lonely, and we all want more connection.

Jefferson Fisher 1:24:51 Yeah.

Speaker 1:24:51 And we're like, "Why is my husband and I sitting here scrolling our phone-

Jefferson Fisher 1:24:55 [laughs]

Speaker 1:24:55 ... and I don't even know how he is. I told him how I was, but I don't think he care." Like, whatever our scenario is or, uh, you know, moms at school drop-off or whatever it might be, that example you just gave is so powerful, and it's so relatable because, you know, when someone says, "How are you?"

Jefferson Fisher 1:25:12 Yeah.

Speaker 1:25:12 And, and you're like, "Oh, I'm good, thanks," there's pretty much no connection happening, right?

Jefferson Fisher 1:25:18 Right.

Speaker 1:25:18 And when someone says, "How are you?" And you just pause And you're like, you think about it, and then you say your answer.

Jefferson Fisher 1:25:26 Yeah.

Speaker 1:25:26 Maybe it's like, "I'm good," or-

Jefferson Fisher 1:25:28 Yeah

Speaker 1:25:28 ... "I've had..." Whatever it is, that pause instantly tells that other person, "I see you."

Jefferson Fisher 1:25:34 Yes.

Speaker 1:25:34 "You matter to me. I'm giving you my energy and consideration-

Jefferson Fisher 1:25:39 You got it

Speaker 1:25:39 ... 'cause I care to connect with you over the question you asked me."

Jefferson Fisher 1:25:42 Yeah, you got it.

Speaker 1:25:43 Holy moly.

Jefferson Fisher 1:25:44 Yeah.

Speaker 1:25:44 That is, like, instant hack to connection-

Jefferson Fisher 1:25:48 Yes

Speaker 1:25:48 ... with humans, and we're all... So many of us are just feeling like we're missing that in our lives-

Jefferson Fisher 1:25:54 Mm

Speaker 1:25:54 ... more and more. I have heard you use the pause in so many different ways, and this is the first time I'm having this big aha over this.

Jefferson Fisher 1:26:04 [laughs]

Speaker 1:26:04 Because right now, every person listening, every person watching us, right now today-

Jefferson Fisher 1:26:09 Yeah

Speaker 1:26:09 ... they can watch it, walk into a coffee shop, they can look at the person sitting next to them in the room right now, right? They can, whatever, next time they're interacting with people, and someone asks them this, or they ask someone else something-

Jefferson Fisher 1:26:20 Mm-hmm

Speaker 1:26:21 ... add this pause in it.

Jefferson Fisher 1:26:23 Yes.

Speaker 1:26:23 Because then it almost catches someone off-guard, too, and they realize you are, you're connecting with them.

Jefferson Fisher 1:26:29 Right.

Speaker 1:26:29 You're connecting with them.

Jefferson Fisher 1:26:30 Yes.

Speaker 1:26:31 Woo!

Jefferson Fisher 1:26:31 When you're able to ask that question-

Speaker 1:26:32 I'm gonna do this with my husband tonight.

Jefferson Fisher 1:26:34 You should do it.

Speaker 1:26:34 I'm doing it tonight.

Jefferson Fisher 1:26:35 You should.

Speaker 1:26:35 I'm doing it tonight, and I'm gonna do it with my kids, actually.

Jefferson Fisher 1:26:38 Ah, that's great.

Speaker 1:26:38 I'm gonna do it with my kids, too.

Jefferson Fisher 1:26:39 Well, it's so-

Speaker 1:26:41 Yeah

Jefferson Fisher 1:26:41 ... um, what, what we fall into is instead of living in it, we just, we're just pressing the buttons.

Speaker 1:26:46 Yes.

Jefferson Fisher 1:26:46 You know?

Speaker 1:26:47 Yes.

Jefferson Fisher 1:26:47 They, barista asks, "How's your day?" "Oh, it's good. I'm fine." "How are you?" "Oh, I'm good. I'm fi-" Uh, just, we're just pressing buttons.

Speaker 1:26:52 Yes.

Jefferson Fisher 1:26:52 And we're not, we're not really living in it. Let me tell you the one trick to making sure that it does work with your kids and with your husband.

Speaker 1:27:00 We want the trick.

Jefferson Fisher 1:27:00 And that's it.

Speaker 1:27:01 We want the trick.

Jefferson Fisher 1:27:01 This is, this is what I, I, I live by, and it, I teach this to every one of my clients.

Speaker 1:27:06 Mm-hmm.

Jefferson Fisher 1:27:07 And it is this: Let your breath be the first word that you say. So where your first word would be of going, "No, I'm good, I'm good," you put a breath in its place. And so when you have the mindset of a breath being the word-

Speaker 1:27:23 Mm

Jefferson Fisher 1:27:23 ... I mean, it's, 'cause you're saying something. Even in that pause, in that breath, in that silence, it might be the absence of words. It's not the absence of communication.

Speaker 1:27:34 Mm.

Jefferson Fisher 1:27:34 So if you ask me how my day was, and I go... [sighs] I conveyed something right there.

Speaker 1:27:42 Mm.

Jefferson Fisher 1:27:42 That's a sigh. I'm, I'm sending the message to you. Without words, it was heavy. It was a load. It was a lot.

Speaker 1:27:49 Mm-hmm.

Jefferson Fisher 1:27:50 I mean, yeah, and when you have that pause, it's the invitation to connect.

Speaker 1:27:54 Hmm. So good.

Jefferson Fisher 1:27:56 Yeah. [laughs]

Speaker 1:27:57 So good. Oh, my gosh. Okay, I'm already excited for the way everyone is gonna share how this impacts their life.

Jefferson Fisher 1:28:04 Yes.

Speaker 1:28:04 Like, the DMs are c- gonna come in-

Jefferson Fisher 1:28:06 [laughs]

Speaker 1:28:06 ... the comments, the messages, and we're just getting started.

Jefferson Fisher 1:28:10 Yeah.

Speaker 1:28:10 But that one tool, that one tool. I'm just thinking about, and the ripple effect of that.

Jefferson Fisher 1:28:17 Yeah.

Speaker 1:28:18 'Cause as a society, we're really close to bankrupt when it comes to, like, true just connection with each other.

Jefferson Fisher 1:28:25 It really is. And, and the thing with communication, what it makes it so important, um, on top of just the pause and the ability to take a moment and express how you really feel, is that what you say f- for the vast majority of your life is who you are.

Speaker 1:28:44 Mm.

Jefferson Fisher 1:28:45 That, that's how people will experience you. That's how people will experience Jamie.

Speaker 1:28:49 Mm-hmm.

Jefferson Fisher 1:28:49 That's how people will experience Jefferson. It's not by really what you do, though they might see that, that act of kindness. It's what you say. When you say, "I like that person," you just met them. You say, "I like that person. They were nice." What you really mean is they said nice things.

Speaker 1:29:05 Mm.

Jefferson Fisher 1:29:05 Somebody's rude, and you don't like them. You go, "Oh, that person's rude." Just means that what you heard is, you didn't like. It sounded rude to you. So for the vast majority, it is your words is what describes who you are to those people. That's what's gonna describe and, and, um, evaluate your legacy. That's the ripple effect.

Speaker 1:29:23 Hmm.

Jefferson Fisher 1:29:24 If you enjoyed that clip and wanna see the rest of the conversation, you can click right here, or if you wanna see the latest episode of The Jefferson Fisher Podcast, click right here, and I'll meet you there.