Charles Duhigg is a Pulitzer prize-winning journalist and the author of "The Power of Habit", which spent over three years on bestseller lists and has been translated into 40 languages, "Supercommunicators", also a bestseller published in 2024, and "Smarter Faster Better", a third bestseller. Mr. Duhigg writes for The New Yorker magazine and is a graduate of Yale University and the Harvard Business School. He previously wrote for The New York Times, and is a frequent contributor to CNBC, This American Life, NPR, and Frontline. He was also, for one terrifying day in 1999, a bike messenger in San Francisco.
539: Become a Better Communicator (Today)
Charles Duhigg
Are you making these common communication mistakes? In this episode, Hunter Clarke-Fields and Charles Duhigg explore the intricacies of communication, emphasizing the importance of understanding different types of conversations—practical, emotional, and social. They explore the intricacies of communication, particularly in the context of relationships and parenting.
Ep 539- Duhigg
Read the Transcript 🡮
*This is an auto-generated transcript*
[00:00:00] Charles Duhigg: The best investment you can make in your own life, literally the thing that will make you healthier. The Surgeon General has said, being lonely is the equivalent of smoking 15 cigarettes a day. The thing that will make you healthier and happier and more successful 'cause you'll get exposed to other opportunities that you didn't know about, is having close relationships, nurturing close relationships.
[00:00:21] Hunter: You are listening to The Mindful Mama Podcast, episode 539. Today we're talking about how to become a better communicator today with Charles Duhigg.
Welcome to the Mindful Mama Podcast. Here it's about becoming a less irritable, more joyful parent. At Mindful Mama, we know that you cannot give what you do not have, and when you have calm and peace within, then you can give it to your children. I'm your host, Hunter Clark-Fields. I help smart, thoughtful parents stay calm so they can have strong, connected relationships with their children. I've been practicing mindfulness for over 25 years. I'm the creator of the Mindful Parenting Course and Teacher Training, and I'm the author of the International Bestseller ‘Raising Good Humans Every Day”, and the “Raising Good Humans Guided Journal”.
Hey there. Welcome back to the Mindful Mama Podcast. I am obsessed with communication and this is such an awesome episode for you. If you are also obsessed with communication, I'm gonna be talking to Charles Duhigg, Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist, author of “The Power of Habit”, and now his book
“Super Communicators”, which is also a bestseller. Mr. Duhig writes for the New Yorker magazine and is graduate of Yale and the Harvard Business School. He previously wrote for the New York Times and is a frequent contributor to CNBC, this American Life NPR and Frontline.
And I'm so thrilled to have on, we're gonna be talking about common communication mistakes that we make. We'll talk about how to understand what type of conversation you're having. Are you having a practical, emotional, or social conversation? And we're gonna talk about how to communicate well in our relationships and in our parenting. You'll learn some do's and some don't. So this is definitely a do not miss this episode.
Hey, before we dive in, I just want to let you know that you can bring me to your workplace or school as a speaker. I do speaking for groups all around the world, and I love it. I'm known for offering evidence-based learning in a way that's clear, realistic, and humorous, and immediately helpful. And so you can book me for your school, your workplace at MindfulMamaMentor.com/speaking. And now, onto this episode:
[00:03:42] Hunter: Charles Duhigg, thank you so much for coming on the Mindful Mama Podcast.
[00:03:47] Charles Duhigg: Thanks for having me on.
[00:03:48] Hunter: I'm so happy you're here. Like I said, I've been a big fan of your work for so long, “The Power of Habit”. Dear listener, you may be familiar with that book- I was, because all of these people wanted to know how do I start meditation habits, and so I would just consult the power habit.
[00:04:09] Charles Duhigg: That's very kind of you to say,
[00:04:10] Hunter: I've recommended many a many a like gentle, healthy reward for your, you know what? Whatever you're building your we could, we maybe talk about that more later. But I love this new book too because I'm obsessed with communication and Oh, thanks. This is all about communication.
Super communicators, of course. But yeah, so I, I think that. All our best learning comes from our mistakes. And in super communicators. You start off talking about some mistakes you made in your work, but you also talk about some mistakes you made in your family and with your wife. Yeah. That led to some like really frustrated communication.
Can you tell us about that?
[00:04:49] Charles Duhigg: Of course. Yeah. So one of the reasons I wrote Super communicators, actually the origin of super communicators, was that I fell into this bad pattern with my wife. And, I'm a journalist. I used to work for the New York Times, now I work for the New Yorker magazine.
I I thought of myself as a good communicator. Sure. But I would come home from work after a long day and I'd start complaining about my day. Like to my wife, I'd tell her like, my boss doesn't appreciate me, and my coworkers don't realize what a genius I am and she would offer me some really good advice.
She would say something like, why don't you take your boss out to lunch and you can get to know him a little bit better? And instead of being able to hear what she was saying, oh,
[00:05:24] Hunter: that's so frustrating.
[00:05:25] Charles Duhigg: I know. I know this is familiar. I'm sure to everyone listening instead of being able to hear what she was saying, I would get even more upset, right?
I would like, say like, why aren't you supporting me? You're supposed to be on my side. And she would get upset 'cause I was attacking her for giving me good advice. I'm certain this happens in every relationship and what's more, we know that it happens, and yet it still happens again and again.
I went to these researchers and I was like, look, like if I'm such a good communicator, if I'm a journalist, why do I keep screwing this up? Not only at home, but with my kids and at work. And they said it's actually interesting you came by right now because we are living through this golden age of understanding communication because of advances in neural imaging and data collection.
We know what's happening inside people's brains when they're talking to each other like never before. And one of the things that we found is. When you are having a discussion with someone, you usually assume that discussion is about one thing. You're discussing your day or where to go on vacation or a budget at work.
But actually they said, what we've seen is that every discussion is made up of different kinds of conversations. And in general, these conversations tend to fall into one of three buckets. There's these practical conversations where we're making plans or solving problems, but then there's emotional conversations where I tell you what I'm feeling and I don't want you to solve my feelings.
I want you to empathize and I want you to relate. And then there's social conversations, which is about how we relate to each other, how we relate to society, the identities that are important to us every day. And they said, one of the things that we found is. If two people are having different kinds of conversations, it's almost impossible for them to hear each other fully, and it's impossible for them to feel connected.
And that's of course what was happening with me and my wife. I was having an emotional conversation. She was having a practical conversation, and they're both legitimate conversations, but we were like these ships passing in the night. But the researcher said, we've discovered this other thing.
If you can somehow figure out what kind of conversation you're having and if I can match you or invite you to match me. Then even if we don't agree with each other, even if we don't like what the other person is saying, we're gonna feel connected to each other. We're gonna feel like we've got some kind of understanding with each other, and that's gonna create trust and and closeness and affection.
And within psychology, this has become known as the matching principle. It says that, successful communication requires having the same kind of conversation at the same moment.
[00:07:50] Hunter: Yeah. I mean that exper frustration you experience is it happens to so many people. And I'm curious, did you ask the researchers about which thing happens more, right?
Because you are, maybe you might've been open to that. Logical, practical conversation. If your wife had just empathized with you a little first, oh my God, that's so frustrating, that's hard. Whatever. Yeah. And then, I have some ideas are, do you want to, make that transition?
But I'm curious about 'cause in my mind it seems like so many, and I'm not a researcher, I don't do math studies about this. I only have anecdotal evidence. But it seems like we want to have that emotional acknowledgement of the emotions first, right? Like it seems like that seems, and then all these other conversations can happen as 'cause the emotions are like I, the listeners tired of hearing me say this, but I feel like they're like little toddlers.
Standing at our legs, pulling, waiting to be acknowledged like, see me, hear me, and then go on with the rest of your life.
[00:08:51] Charles Duhigg: I think that's exactly right. Yeah. So what's interesting is that. Once we become aligned, once we're having the same kind of conversation at the same moment.
What tends to happen is that we can switch from conversation to conversation together almost seamlessly, and it doesn't take very long to get into alignment.
As you pointed out, like now when I complain, my wife says oh, I'm really sorry that like you had such a hard day. Do you want me just to listen or do you want me to help you solve this problem? And then. Or she'll say d, now you know, I understand how you're feeling.
Can we talk about some solutions? That's all it takes for us to move together from a, an emotional conversation to a practical conversation. But one of the things I think you're asking is which of these conversations is more prevalent? Which of these conversations on and the truth, what we found is that actually about 70% of our conversations are social conversations.
More, more so than practical, more so than emotional. However. Because many of us have been habituated in the language of practicality, we tend to default to that even when we're talking about emotional topics. So I might not realize that I'm, I want to have an emotional conversation with you because I might come into the conversation and say, okay, look I'm upset because we're off budget, so we need to sit down.
We need to figure out like which subscriptions we're gonna cancel. That sounds like a practical conversation. The important part of it is me saying I'm upset because we're off budget. I'm upset. This is an emotional conversation, first and foremost. That until we acknowledge that, then it's gonna be really hard for us to move together to the practical.
[00:10:21] Hunter: Yeah. Yeah. I think that's, this is one you're framing a problem that we have in so many different areas, I think in the family, and that's like a lot of, like our kids coming to us. It feels like most of the things feel like a practical conversation. You don't relate to the emotion behind the problem that your 3-year-old or 14-year-old is having.
'cause you have the big picture. You don't see it as such a big problem, but to them it's a really big problem and. We jump to practical or we jump, we're not in the same conversation. We're not acknowledging that giving each other some of that empathy.
[00:10:58] Charles Duhigg: Yeah, no, I think that's exactly right.
And sometimes it's just a matter of literally just showing empathy.
And then at that moment the emotional conversation can be set aside for something. That's either practical or social or deeper.
[00:11:11] Hunter: Yeah. Yeah. The toddler has been like, I'm seen and heard
[00:11:14] Charles Duhigg: exactly.
[00:11:20] Hunter: Stay tuned for more Mindful Mama podcasts right after this break. I can't control a lot of the pollutants and things that are in the air outside of the house. I want my house to be as nourishing and healthy a place as possible for my kids. And Americans spend 90% of our time indoors, but did you know that indoor air can be up to a hundred times more polluted than outdoor air?
This is why I love and absolutely recommend Air Doctor. Our doctor is the award-winning air purifier that eliminates 99.9% of dangerous contaminants like allergens, viruses, smoke gases, mold spores, and more. Air Doctor was voted best air purifier by Newsweek. So it's no surprise that 98% of air doctor customers agree that their home's air feels cleaner, safer, and healthier.
And I completely agree with that. When you're cooking all of this particulate matter, it goes into the air and we use ventilator that vents it outside, but it's amazing to see. See how air doctor revs up and turns on and pulls out those impurities and contaminants right out of the air so that my kids are not just breathing that in.
Plus, I know that unlike other purifiers, air doctor captures invisible particles a hundred times smaller than standard HEPA filters. A few years ago, something like an air purifier wasn't even on my radar, but now I couldn't live without it. I absolutely recommend it. Head over to Air doctor pro.com and use the promo code Hunter to get up to 300 bucks off today Air Doctor comes with a 30 day money back guarantee, plus a three year warranty, an $84 value free.
Get this exclusive podcast only offer now@airdrpro.com, A-I-R-D-O-C-T-O-R-P-R o.com using promo code Hunter. 70% of our conversations are social. That's and what would be an example of that?
[00:13:31] Charles Duhigg: So really anytime you talk about yourself or you talk about someone else, or you talk about like how you relate to other people.
So for instance me telling a story about my wife is actually a social conversation. Because I'm describing to you a dynamic that exists between these people, or I might say, for instance, as a journalist, this is what I think I'm describing an identity that's important to me.
So a way that I see the world and what's important is that when we hear someone say something like that, when we hear someone tell a story about their relationship with their wife, when they see, when you hear them say as a journalist or as a woman in the workplace. Our instinct might be to do one of two things, either to empathize, right?
Oh, that must be so hard. But that's not actually what you're looking for. When you say as a woman in the workplace, I'm not looking for someone to empathize with me. Yeah. Yeah. It's a social statement. I'm looking for someone to acknowledge I. Who I am.
When I say like I'm having the, I was having this conversation with my wife and she got upset, I'm not looking for you to solve that problem with my wife.
I'm looking for you to acknowledge oh, that sounds like a hard situation, and it sounds like you're coming at it from different places, and I imagine that. That's difficult for you that's a challenge in your relationship. So when it comes to practical conversations, what we're often looking for is we're looking for a solution when it comes to emotional conversations, we're often looking for empathy.
Someone simply to say I hear what you're saying, and I feel for you. But when we're talking, when we're having a social conversation, we're often looking for acknowledgement,
[00:15:00] Hunter: not
[00:15:00] Charles Duhigg: empathy, not a solution, but someone just to say, I see you.
And in fact, in schools, they teach teachers to do this by telling them if a student comes up and they have something important they wanna talk about, this teacher should start the conversation by saying.
Would you like to be helped, hugged or heard in this discussion?
[00:15:18] Hunter: That's brilliant.
[00:15:19] Charles Duhigg: It's, yeah, it's the practical, the emotional, and the social. And if kids know exactly what they want.
[00:15:23] Hunter: Yeah. That's brilliant. I was watching your TED talk, this, Charles did a great TED talk on this and do you wanna be helped, hugged and heard?
I mean that, that's definitely something we could take as parents or in any people, just people in any relationship and use that, maybe not. At the New York Times or whatever, but like at home we could, say, do you wanna be helped, hugged, or heard? These are great questions to ask.
[00:15:51] Charles Duhigg: And you're right it's hard to ask that in a workplace, right? Or it's hard. Or sometimes if we're talking to our spouse, if we're talking to our kids, it's okay. If we're talking to our spouse, we say, do you wanna be held, hugged, or heard? They might be a little offended. You
[00:16:02] Hunter: might get an FU, yeah,
[00:16:03] Charles Duhigg: it might seem a little patronizing but there's actually a solution to this, which is.
The reason why that question works is because it's what's known as a deep question. And a deep question is something that asks us about our values or beliefs or our experiences. And what we found is that the way to figure out what kind of conversation is happening is to ask someone a deep question.
And it can sound intimidating when I put it that way, but it's as simple as if you met someone who was a doctor, instead of asking them like, oh what hospital do you work at? Asking them, oh, what made you decide to go to medical school?
Write that second question that invites them to tell us who they are and inevitably they're gonna tell us what kind of mindset they're in.
[00:16:42] Hunter: Yeah. That's so interesting. And you talk in your, ted talk about a doctor who used this and I want you to share that story, but first I have an experience with these deep conversations. Have you heard of Dave Fleischer, the founder of Deep Canvassing? No. So during the election in Philadelphia, in West Philadelphia, this group, there's this guy, Dave Fletcher, who founded this kind of canvassing called Deep Canvassing, and it's been shown to be the most effective form of canvassing by.
Bleeps and bounds over every other kind of cheming and what they did. And I went and did it once because I got I got so stressed out by the whole experience of it that I could only do it once sadly. But anyway, I went, once I got the training and they train you to ask to, to have a conversation about what do you love?
So you go to a training you dev. Learn to share a story about something, someone you love who's important to you in your life, and you tell a little story about them. And in this deep cheming we would, I would go to these. These houses in West Philadelphia real deeply impoverished neighborhood, knock on the doors.
And I got to have a couple of these conversations. I got to talk about. I talked about my daughter and, her challenges with her medical condition and how I'm voting I'm voting for her, the people I love. And I would ask them, tell me about someone you love. And I got to hear about somebody's, this person's mother and how she was so important and strong.
She did all these things and it was so interesting because it really cut through all the bs. I felt so connected to the two people I ended up having these conversations with and apparently it's very effective for canvassing, but it's really scary.
[00:18:31] Charles Duhigg: Yeah. Okay so it's really interesting. I'm not familiar with this particular guy.
But what he's doing builds on this research that comes from two researchers one of whom is at Yale and the other is at Penn who basically tried a bunch of different methods and they found that this deep canvassing method is the most effective way to change people's minds.
And so in, in their case, what they would do. They were in California and they were talking about trans rights, and they would go to places where, so they wanted to find basically and they went to really republican areas, really conservative areas in California. And they wanted to find a topic that is like a really tough topic, right?
They did also some work on gay marriage before before it was legalized by the Supreme Court and. What they would, what they found was the most effective thing is exactly what you just said, is to come to someone and you can upfront say, look, I'm here to talk to you about some political issues.
And then just say. Can I tell you a story about my Uncle Ray?
[00:19:25] Hunter: Yeah.
[00:19:25] Charles Duhigg: And the person usually says sure, you can tell me a story about your Uncle Ray. And it's Ray's been in this committed relationship for 15 years and it's with this man and I'm just one, or, and oftentimes you can start it by asking a deep question by saying according to my sheet here you don't you're opposed to gay marriage.
Can you just tell me why? And then just listen. Just listen. Don't try and change their mind. Don't make counterarguments. And inevitably people say things like I think that marriage should be for having children, right? And if you're gay, you can't have children. And so there shouldn't be gay marriage.
At which point you can say, oh, let me tell you about my Uncle Ray. He's been with his partner for 15 years. They actually. They actually adopted a kid, but they're not recognized as his parents because gay marriage isn't legal yet. And I just want Ray to have to be able to be a good parent, like exactly what you just said.
And as long as we do that, as long as we both tell our stories, we engage in what's known as reciprocal authenticity. And we do not judge each other. Then we will feel closer to each other. We'll feel like we understand each other better. That does not mean that we will agree with each other.
So what they found is that on average they could change three to 5% of people's minds on an issue, and three to 5% is not that much. But in politics, it's everything. Oftentimes, races are won or lost based on three to 5%, and, but even if you don't change the person's mind, they walk away feeling like they're connected to you.
That oftentimes gives them a better sense of the issue that you're talking about. Yeah. But you brought up a second issue, which is that can be really tiring. It can be really emotionally exhausting.
[00:21:01] Hunter: Yeah.
[00:21:01] Charles Duhigg: Did, let me ask you, why did it feel so? Why did it feel so exhausting to you?
[00:21:06] Hunter: It.
I do wanna talk about like relationships in the family, but I, for me it was exhausting 'cause it's just very stressful environment. A in general. It's like a little bit of a scary environment for somebody. And then B I actually got hit on by a guy immediately. Really aggressively. And that was made I, it's already felt sorry.
I'm laughing. That's okay. I'm sorry.
[00:21:33] Charles Duhigg: I'm laughing. That's terrible. That is, I felt
[00:21:35] Hunter: a little unsafe and then I felt really unsafe, and so it was just like my nerves were like, yeah. Oh, that's terrible. Just like I was like frizzed out nerves for the whole day after that.
[00:21:46] Charles Duhigg: Totally. I completely understand that.
I, that is completely inappropriate. That should not have happened to you. No. So here's the one thing I will say that we know based on the research, there's not a lot of research on when you get hit on by random strangers. And I apologize. I'm so sorry that happened to you. But we do know that when we have these kinds of conversations.
They get easier. Yeah. The more frequent we have. So yeah, we have practice. So my guess is if you had gone back for a second day you would've found that second day to be a lot easier than the first day. And the reason why is because our brains have evolved to make communication habit to, to latch onto communication habits very quickly.
If we practice something just once or twice in communication our brain will start making it into a habit almost immediately. And there's actually a guy named Nicholas Epley who like has done experiments on this. Once a month, he'll get on a bus in Chicago. He's a professor at the University of Chicago.
His goal is to sit down next to a stranger and get them talking about their hopes and dreams within three questions.
[00:22:46] Hunter: Oh my God.
[00:22:46] Charles Duhigg: And when he told me that, I was like, that sounds impossible and awful. There's no way. The same thing you were saying, like there's no way I wanna sit down next to someone to have some random conversation about their hopes and dreams.
He is no, it's great. It actually only usually takes about two questions. 'cause usually like I introduce myself and I'm like, Hey, what do you do for a living? And they're like, oh, I'm an accountant. And he says, oh, did you always wanna be an accountant? Was that your dream when you were a kid? And they say No.
Who wants to be an accountant when they're a kid? I want her to be an astronaut. But now suddenly you're talking about how life works, right? That they met someone in college and they got married and they have these kids now and they love being an accountant. To their surprise.
[00:23:21] Hunter: Yeah.
[00:23:22] Charles Duhigg: So I would say that, it can sound intimidating, but it just takes a little bit of practice and suddenly we get really good at it.
[00:23:30] Hunter: Okay. In three and a half years I'll practice again. Okay. Okay.
[00:23:34] Charles Duhigg: Hopefully. And like maybe you can be like, keep me away from the creeps. Let's take the creeps off the list
[00:23:39] Hunter: and I walk around with a really large guy.
So you talk about, you talk about all these, you have all these communication tips I think is so great. There's all this, there's all these things to, to realize like whether somebody is, connecting with what you're saying and are they leaning in the body language, which is so important.
'cause I know there's a huge percentage of our communication that is nonverbal from. And I was thinking about this with couples and you talk about this idea of shared goals, so I was wondering how can couples figure out and talk about their shared goals so that they, when they're in a disagreement, they can work together a little bit better?
[00:24:21] Charles Duhigg: Yeah, it's a great question and there's a ton of research and a lot of it in super communicators that I go into of very specific tactics you can use. And the first and most important thing I think you can do. Is, you can just start the conversation by acknowledging that it might be a hard conversation.
If you're gonna sit down and talk about money to say look, I'm, if you don't mind, I would like us to talk about our budget. I know that this is gonna be an awkward conversation. I know it's gonna be hard, and I might say the wrong thing. I like the gap between my brain and my lips sometimes.
Like it, what I mean, comes out wrong. And I hope you'll forgive me. And I promise if you do that, I will forgive you. So that's the first thing to do, and simply acknowledging it makes a huge difference.
[00:25:00] Hunter: So I just wanna say like you are, you're opening yourself up in, in a place of vulnerability way.
Absolutely. Like you're not coming at it, for the listener. I'm holding a fist up and another fist up. With all a bunch of defensiveness, you're opening up with honesty and vulnerability, which is a great way to be because we don't wanna. Hit someone who's deaf.
[00:25:22] Charles Duhigg: Exactly. And equally importantly, we're not saying I have all the answers.
Yeah. Yeah. And you need to listen to me. What we're saying is I wanna do this together. This is gonna be awkward for both of us, but I think it's important and I want us to be a team on that. And that's really powerful. That's the first thing you can do.
The the next thing you can do is it's often really helpful just to identify a goal.
And sometimes the goal can be as simple as I'd like us to walk away from this conversation deciding on three subscriptions that we're gonna quit tonight. Like small goals are really helpful 'cause they help us structure that conversation and they prevent something that's known as kitchen sinking.
So kitchen sinking is literally the single most destructive pattern for a married couple or other relationship couple to get into. And what kitchen sinking is that when we start arguing about one thing. We always end up arguing about everything. So we start arguing about where we're gonna spend Thanksgiving, and then it becomes like, your mom hates me and I don't like her, and we don't earn enough money.
And if you worked harder, we'd have enough money to be able to go on the vacations we want. So suddenly every single problem becomes like a five alarm fire. So how do we avoid kitchen sinking? The number one way is simply to identify a goal is to say look, I'd like us to talk about where we're gonna spend Thanksgiving and my goal is to decide if we're going to your mom's house or my mom's house for Thanksgiving.
And let's not talk about like money or like whether our moms like us or not. We can put that off that, those are legitimate conversations, but let's have that conversation later. Let's just decide right now like what do we need to figure out to. Determine where we should spend Thanksgiving.
When we do that, what we're doing is we're not only making the issue smaller for ourselves, which feels really good, but we're becoming a team.
Now we have a shared purpose. We have a shared question. We're on the same side of the table. We're trying to answer that question or solve that problem together.
And that's really powerful.
[00:27:25] Hunter: I love this. And I wonder if we could I'm trying to think of one of the most challenging questions that the listener has and some of the most challenging conversations that Par listeners have are sometimes when one parent, one partner is not on the same page as the other in how you're gonna parent.
Yeah. So I've been, I was listening to you and trying to translate it in my head too. What that might be, and I was thinking like, might it be something like would, can we sit down and have a conversation about how we respond to Joey? When we have to leave the house in the morning and he gets upset or whatever.
Something like that.
[00:28:07] Charles Duhigg: Totally. Totally. Or how much? How okay, look, I'd like I, I wanna talk about something with you and I know that this is something that's hard to talk about, so I just wanna apologize in advance but I think it's important. I wanna talk about I.
You and I have different standards for how frequently the kids can be using their phones. I feel like we shouldn't use the phones at the dinner table. We shouldn't use the phones when we're together. It seems like you have a diff like you feel differently about this. Can you tell me a little bit about how you feel about it?
[00:28:36] Hunter: Curiosity.
[00:28:36] Charles Duhigg: And my goal is for us to just come up with some rule that we're both really comfortable with. Some rule that we think works for both of us.
[00:28:43] Hunter: Yeah.
[00:28:44] Charles Duhigg: If you start the conversation that way, or if I wanna talk about when we leave in the morning and our kid gets upset my goal is for us to have some behavior that we both think is the right thing to do and that's easy for us.
Here's how I feel. Tell me how you feel like when you do that. That doesn't mean that necessarily oh, suddenly the answer is obvious, but it means that you can find the answer together. And that's gonna make it much, much better.
[00:29:11] Hunter: Yeah. You're saying like, this is where I am on this, this is this is the kind of the need.
This is the need. We need met. We need this thing. Exactly. Met, this is our goal. And, and I love that you had that curiosity question where, I wonder how you feel about this? And also framing it, what Charles did really beautifully is frame it in a very non-judgmental way.
It seems like you feel differently about this rather than whatever unskillful thing. Someone,
[00:29:41] Charles Duhigg: why do you keep screwing this up? Yes. I'm right and you're wrong. Why can't you see that? Yeah. Yeah. That almost never works, that doesn't work
[00:29:48] Hunter: very well.
Stay tuned for more Mindful Mama Podcasts right after this break.
[00:30:30] Hunter: I was wondering, you have there's some strategies. What strategies do you have for persuading a partner to meet you halfway without it feeling like the other one is always giving in? Say if what happens a lot is like one parent has gotten themselves really educated about stuff and is all up on all the information, all the research, and the other partner may feel like.
I always have to do it your way. Any tips or advice for this sort of scenario?
[00:30:59] Charles Duhigg: So I think there's a couple of things. The first is the value of asking permission is really high. So instead of saying, oh look, let me tell you what we should do about phones. 'cause I just read this study and I've read seven studies all about how kids should use phones.
Like suddenly you're Mr. Noit all or Mrs. Noit all, and I'm like the ignoramus, right? But if I start that by saying, I think this phone stuff is really interesting. Is it okay if I tell you like some of the studies I've read and I'm just curious like what you make of them?
When I ask your permission to give you information, when I'm doing these two things, first of all, I'm, instead of forcing you I'm inviting you, but secondly.
What I'm doing is I'm ki framing that information as I would like to hear your thoughts on this. Not I'm the smart one, you're the dumb one. I'm gonna tell you the facts, you're gonna listen. But rather I've been exposed. I just, I read this paper and if you don't mind, I'd love to share it with you, but I wanna hear what you think about it.
Because you are as legitimate an interpreter of this research is I am and we're equals in this conversation. So that's the first thing that I would say. The second thing that I would say is that. When we are in those situations, it's really important to understand what the goal of a conversation is, right?
If I come into a conversation, and I think I already have the answers. That's not actually a conver, I'm not really looking for a conversation. What I'm looking for is for you to like, agree with me and that's probably unlikely if it's a tough subject.
So the goal of a conversation is not to convince you that I'm right and you're wrong, or I know more than you, or I'm smart, or you should like me, or you should be impressed.
The goal of a conversation is to understand how the other person sees this issue. And to speak in such a way that they can understand you. And even if you walk away from that conversation, still disagreeing with each other, even if I say I'm gonna vote for my guy, you're gonna vote for your guy.
And but if I understand why you like your candidate and you understand why I like my candidate, I. We're gonna feel closer to each other, and frankly, we're gonna find a lot of things that we do agree on.
[00:33:06] Hunter: Yeah. Yeah. I'm, I think this would be a great way to also frame like a conversation with the previous generation, about parenting or, the way you're raising your kids or doing things differently.
And Yes. And I have some information here. I wonder what you think about this. Inviting their input. Absolutely. Rather than just completely holding a boundary, which may also be valid too, in certain situations, but like maybe then also considering the idea of inviting their input and their perspective and their experience into it.
[00:33:38] Charles Duhigg: Can you imagine how different it would be if your mother-in-law instead of your mother-in-law saying to you, saying oh, that, that's how you feed the baby. Oh, that. That doesn't, that's not how I did it. That doesn't make that's probably, that's not great. That's suddenly you're like, whatever.
Get outta my house. But if she was to say Hey, I noticed that you're feeding the baby. Can't tell you like about something I did when I was younger and I'm actually I'm not saying that you should do it, I'm just bringing it up 'cause like I'm curious like what you think of it, right?
If it's something that might be helpful, suddenly all I. I am no longer like the person who's telling you how it has to be. I'm the person who's just like offering something that like, here's how I see the world. Like when I was raising your husband, I wouldn't feed him, sugar all the time.
And this is what, like this but maybe I'm wrong, maybe I'm wrong. I and like I know there's, I know you're the mom. Like you've done more research more recently. Tell me what you think of that.
[00:34:28] Hunter: Maybe a hundred percent sugar diet is great for your kid.
[00:34:32] Charles Duhigg: And you know what your daughter-in-law might say, actually, I'm gonna stick with the sugar, but that's okay.
'cause at least she knows how you feel. And maybe she's gonna think about it later.
[00:34:43] Hunter: Yeah. Yeah. And the lines of communication are open.
[00:34:46] Charles Duhigg: Exactly.
[00:34:47] Hunter: And you're preserving that interconnection and that. Value.
[00:34:51] Charles Duhigg: Yes. And you can have that conversation again later on when it's easier to hear alternatives.
[00:34:57] Hunter: Okay, so what are some of the best ways we can respond to our kids or our partner when they are in an emotionally heightened state?
What do we do then?
[00:35:08] Charles Duhigg: So the absolute best thing we can do, not just when they're an emotionally heightened state, but when we're talking about anything that's important, but particularly if they're feeling emotional, is. All the research shows it's not enough to listen to them. You have to prove that you're listening to them.
You have to show them that you're listening because if I'm all riled up I'm all, I'm upset, I'm crying. I'm talking about something that's really meaningful to me, and I'm worried that you're not gonna take it seriously. I. There is part of my brain that suspects that no matter how much I love you, there's part of my brain that suspects you aren't actually listening.
You're waiting your turn to speak, right? Even if you look like you're listening, even if you're nodding with me and you're set going, I wonder, are you actually listening? So there's a technique to prove that we're listening, and it's called looping for understanding and has three steps. Step one is ask a question, preferably a deep question if you can, right?
Something about what do, why is this important to you? How do you make sense of this? Then after the person answers the question, I. Repeat back what you heard them say in your own words.
And what's important here is the goal is not mimicry.
It's not to repeat what they said, it's to show them that you were paying attention and more importantly, to show them that you are thinking about it.
That, oh, what I heard you say was this one thing and that reminds me of something you said last week. I prove to you that I'm listening to you. So most people do steps one and two, somewhat intuitively when we're our best selves. It's step three is the one that I always forget, which is after you repeat back what you heard them say in your own words, ask if you got it right.
Oh,
[00:36:45] Hunter: good.
[00:36:46] Charles Duhigg: Because what we're really doing when we ask, did I hear you correctly? Am I understanding what you're saying? What I'm really doing in that moment? Is I'm asking you for permission to acknowledge that I was listening, and when you acknowledge that I'm listening, then all of a sudden I become much more likely to listen to you.
[00:37:06] Hunter: You.
[00:37:07] Charles Duhigg: It's that proving that we're listening and with kids, this is incredibly important, right? 'cause a kid comes up and they have a problem and they're crying about something and Jimmy just hit me and it's not fair. And I want dessert. And our instinct is to solve the problem. Oh, just don't go play with Jimmy.
Or no, you can't have dessert 'cause you haven't had dinner yet. But if we start by saying, honey, I hear what you're saying. I hear that Jimmy was really mean to you, and that hurts your feelings. And I know that you really wanna be friends with Jimmy. You told me last week how much you like Jimmy it.
Am I understand. Did I get that right? Am I understanding what you're saying? That kid is gonna believe that you are listening to them and at that point they're gonna listen to anything else you say. Yeah.
[00:37:49] Hunter: You're connected. Yeah. That's really interesting. I call that in raising good humans, I call that kind of listening, like reflective listening, like reflecting back.
But I love the idea of the looping with that, the looping for understanding. And I really have a wonderful visual picture of the loop that you're both are in. It's so beautiful. Yeah, and it's it's, the research, right? Like it's really shows to lower the temperature emotionally, for people when they feel so heard and understood that way.
[00:38:17] Charles Duhigg: Yeah, absolutely. And so like conversations with partners, for instance, what are known as conflict conversations within the academic literature where we disagree with each other or we're talking about something that that's just hard to talk about.
Looping for understanding actually changes the tenor of the conversation entirely. It's the single, research at Harvard and elsewhere. I've shown it's the single most effective way to reduce the tension in a conflict conversation, whether it's at home or at work.
[00:38:43] Hunter: Yeah. Yeah. Take that.
Write that down, dear listener. I love I really enjoy super communicators and you end the beautiful story from the Harvard Study of adult development of Jeffrey Camille Godfrey, I'm sorry, I'm not used to saying Godfrey, whose name Godfrey anymore. Godfrey Camille from about a hundred years ago.
Anyway, and I was wondering if you could just tell us the story of. How, if God, how Godfrey developed as an adult and what was most important?
[00:39:15] Charles Duhigg: Sure. Yeah. So the Harvard Study of Adult Development has been going on for almost 80 years now. And it's a fairly famous study because it's so big and it's so long lasting for this whole period.
Researchers have followed around thousands of people. And they've, they, what they do is they send them a survey every two years they do a big intake where they expense three days with them measuring everything. And then every two years they get this huge questionnaire that they have to fill out. And if they don't fill it out, someone goes to their house and actually does it with them.
And the goal of the study was to try and figure out at first what makes us live longer, right? What makes us when we hit age 65, what makes us healthier and happier and more successful? However you define success. And so because this started in the 1930s, they pat a bunch of crazy theories like is at Harvard.
So they figured if you went to Harvard, you're probably gonna be really happy and healthy and successful. It turns out that's not true at all. They figured if you got married and never got divorced, that would help. And that turned out to be much less true than they thought it was gonna be.
They went through all these different things and they found there was actually only one thing that. That predicted if at age 65 you are gonna be happy, healthy, and successful, and that's having a handful of close relationships at age 45. Because if you have close relationships at age 45, you've probably had them for a while and you probably continue to have them.
It's our relationships with other people that matter. And you mentioned Godfrey Camille, which is actually a made up name by the researchers. We don't know what the individual's real name is, so it's fine to mispronounce it.
[00:40:44] Hunter: Okay, good.
[00:40:45] Charles Duhigg: But he came into this study at, when he was at Harvard.
This is pre-World War ii. And he basically was a mess. Like he didn't have any friends. He was really socially awkward. He came from this, at that moment Harvard had a lot of like prominent families. He came from an UNT family. He gets he goes into the war effort like all other Harvard students.
He basically does not distinguish himself at all in the military. Then he leaves the military and he goes to medical school. And he becomes so depressed that he actually attempts suicide. And this is at a time when if you're suicidal, you're basically a pariah, right? So he's allowed to finish medical school, but no one will hire him.
And so he was enrolled in this program and the researchers were like, look, this guy's a mess. We'll continue following him, but we know what the ending of the story is gonna be like. Like he's gonna end up either dead from alcoholism or dead from suicide and alone and lonely. And so they continue serving him and the other people in the project.
And then at some point they actually run out of money, like in the late 19 or the 1960s. And so they they stopped doing the surveys for a couple years, for a decade. They stopped doing it, and then eventually someone remembers that this thing exists and they got more money and they started doing it again.
And they go and they track this guy down and track Godfrey down. And to their surprise. He's incredibly happy and successful. He has a ton of friends. He started his own medical clinic in Boston. He was a national expert on allergies. He was like really involved in his church. He was a deacon in his church and they continue following him.
He lives until I think the age of 72 when he die, right before he dies, he goes on this like epic adventure to Antarctica with a bunch of his friends where they like cross the ice flows and he comes back and he passes away from natural causes and his funeral is huge. Like the archbishop comes and speaks at his funeral, like there's.
Hundreds and hundreds of people who show up. And so researchers are totally bewildered by this. They're trying to figure out, like this guy seemed like he was on the path to total misery. What happened? And it started looking at his, the answers they had, he had given in all the surveys. What had happened was at one point after his suicide attempt.
He had gotten sick with, I think it was tuberculosis or something like that. It was something where you basically have to go and recover for a year and a half. And so he went to this hospital in probably in New Mexico or Colorado in some dry state to recover. And he was so bored that he just decided to start doing things like, there was like a prayer circle.
And so he joined the prayer circle. He wasn't very religious, but he is I'm just bored on a Wednesday, so I'm gonna go do this. And there were guys who played cribbage and he would go and play cribbage with them, and there were guys who took a walk every afternoon. He started taking a walk with him every afternoon, and after about nine months of this, he realized he was happy.
He was happy because he had met all these people 'cause he was enmeshed in this community. 'cause he had conversations with people every single day. And that's what was missing from his previous life, is connecting with other people.
[00:43:59] Hunter: And
[00:43:59] Charles Duhigg: the way he described it is he said he discovered that love is the most important thing on Earth.
Now at that point in time, love doesn't necessarily mean romantic love. It means companionship and closeness. Yeah. And that's what the Harvard Study for Adult Development has found is that. The best investment you can make in your own life. Literally the thing that will make you healthier. The Surgeon General has said, being lonely is the equivalent of smoking 15 cigarettes a day.
The thing that will make you healthier and happier and more successful, 'cause you'll get ex exposed to other opportunities that you didn't know about, is having close relationships, nurturing close relationships. And that doesn't mean you have to talk to someone every day. It doesn't mean you have to talk to them every month, but it does mean that you need to create some time.
To reach out to that friend that you haven't talked to in nine months and call them up and say, Hey, I just wanted to reconnect. I know that this, I know it's gonna be a little uncomfortable at first 'cause we have to get get updated on each other's life, but I really like you and I want us this.
I wanna have a conversation.
[00:44:56] Hunter: Yeah. Yes. I think that's such a, I really wanted to share that. I'd love the stories from the Harvard Study of Adult Development. 'cause I think that's it really highlights that interconnection that we have. We think we're so independent. We think we're these autonomous blobs just floating around in our little wally carts with like our big sippy.
And we, yeah. We, as parents, our happiness is our kids' happiness, our ease, our peace is our kids. And the connections we make with other people, it, it makes them happier, makes us happier. All does. So beautiful.
[00:45:34] Charles Duhigg: And anyone who's listening knows as your kids get older, so my kids are 13 and 16 and one of them is actually away at school, so he doesn't live at home with us.
And we talk to him every single day. He calls every single day. It's hard to talk to your kids, particularly when they're teenagers, right? They're just it's, it's work. It's, how is, how was school good? Did you learn anything? No. But when we make, when we do that work, when we teach them how to have conversations, we are actually investing in our happiness and their happiness in this lifelong relationship.
It's well worth doing even if it's hard.
[00:46:07] Hunter: Yes, and your book, “Super Communicators” can help us do that. ‘Super Communicators”- everywhere books are sold. So I recommend that you go get it, dear listener.
Charles Duhigg, this has been such a pleasure. I really enjoyed talking to you. I'm really gonna be going back to this book again and again to look at it- as I had “The Power of Habit”, which is over my shelf over there. Thank you so much for the thank you coming on the Mindful Mama podcast, and for the work that you do in the world, and practicing to be so good at it. Those editors didn't know what they were thinking.
[00:46:47] Charles Duhigg: It's very kind of you, and thank you for having me on. This is such a treat. I really appreciate it.
[00:46:51] Hunter: Thank you.
I hope you enjoyed this episode. I loved talking to Charles Duhigg. So much fun. I love his nuance about listening and his thing about relationships. I've been really interested in that lately. I think that we are neglecting our relationships because of these devices that are taking up all our attention. So I'm really working on, in my own life, making my relationship stronger, inviting friends to brunch and having different events, keeping in touch with friends. And of course, I've told you I'm obsessed with my Scottish country dancing, and I love that dance community. I think it's so great to be out with a community that does real physical things in life. Dancing is so much fun. You should look for your. Local R-S-C-D-S, Royal Scottish Country Dance Society, because it is so much fun, such a great way to find community and other people who want to go out in the world and do things too. I just think it's so important for us to, stop watching other people live their lives on our phones and live our own lives.
That's my rant for today. Okay, wishing you a great week. Wishing you peace and ease and some hugs. And maybe some spring flowers or wherever you are, some nice warm sunshine on your face, and thank you so much for listening. Namaste.
Support the Podcast
- Leave a review on Apple Podcasts: your kind feedback tells Apple Podcasts that this is a show worth sharing.
- Share an episode on social media: be sure to tag me so I can share it (@mindfulmamamentor).
- Join the Membership: Support the show while learning mindful parenting and enjoying live monthly group coaching and ongoing community discussion and support.
