What to Talk About Example

As a way of illustration, let’s say a boy and a girl have been dating for over two years, and he decides to throw her a surprise birthday party, which includes him giving her what he thinks is a special birthday cake.

• But instead of the result being all fun and celebrations, issues emerge post party.

Let’s walk through each potential topic from Figure 14-10 and see how they can be helpful to guide a resulting difficult conversation around these post party issues.

• It’s helpful to remember there’s no “correct” order for discussing the various topics.
• However, it’s important to understand that thoughts drive feelings and feelings drive fears, which can control behavior.
• Therefore, it’s helpful to either start by discussing thoughts and then the resulting feelings, or start with feelings to expose the influencing thoughts.

Topic #1: What Happened? What are the facts?

The key to discovering what happened is to distinguish true facts from perceptions, assumptions and subjective interpretations: Just the facts, ma’am, just the facts.

In our illustration, some of the facts are:

• He took time and energy to throw her a surprise party.
• She hates surprises.
• He spent time to get what he thought was a great cake.
• She didn’t like the cake he bought her, and
• He doesn’t remember her saying thank you to him for throwing the birthday party for her.

Topic #2: What are you Thinking?

Examine the perceptions, assumptions and interpretations surrounding what happened. Sharing what both of you are thinking is really all about expressing in words what thoughts are swimming around in both of your heads.

• Take care as often people confuse the facts around “what happened,” versus their beliefs in “what are you thinking.”

In expressing your thoughts, here are some points to keep in mind:

• Remember to cut each other slack with unfiltered points of view. A point of view is only one’s perspective in a given point in time. After talking and further consideration, points of view can change.
• Don’t share every single thought to the last drop. This is where your own better judgment comes into play. Share thoughts if they help reveal more about your point of view in the present moment. Don’t go overboard into potential filibuster land.
• Also pay special attention to any judgmental thoughts as they may reveal missed expectations that could be triggering the emotional charge wrapped up in the issue

In our illustration,

• He may be thinking that she’s being ungrateful for not appreciating the party he threw for her.
• On the other hand, she may be thinking that it’s terrible her boyfriend of over two years doesn’t know her well enough to know she doesn’t like surprises, nor what her favorite birthday cake is.

Topic #3: How are you Feeling?

Talking about feelings can be challenging for many of us. That said, here are some points to keep in mind that can help make you a talking-about-feelings champ:

• Don’t be afraid to talk about your feelings. For a variety of reasons, it can feel very unsafe to talk about feelings. Some of us believe that “real men don’t cry” and don’t want to come across as weak. Regardless of why you might feel resistance, have the feelings conversation; ultimately, you’ll feel better that you at least tried.
• An important issue is given urgency by our feelings. If you have a lot of feelings around an issue, then it means a lot to you. Talk about it to uncover why.
• Ignored emotions can make an issue feel even worse. If emotions are not acknowledged, discussed and validated, then they can hijack a discussion as these feelings can begin to dominate and control a person’s behavior.
• Feelings often come out one way or the other. If you two don’t talk about feelings, then pent-up emotions can explode into aggressive or passive anger tactics.
• Emotions can block a person’s ability to listen. Have you ever felt so mad or anxious you couldn’t hear a word the other person was saying? We can get stuck in the cycle of negative feelings flooding negative thoughts which can make it hard to open your mind to really hearing the other person’s thoughts
• Anger and anxiety can bury positive emotions. You can get to a point where all you feel is anger or anxiety and totally forget about the love you have for the person.
• Accept that feelings are normal and natural. You have feelings and your feelings matter. Same with her. The question is what do you do with those feelings? Do you let them ruin your relationship or motivate a path to resolution?
• Don’t confuse expressing and sharing emotions with letting your emotions control you. There’s a big difference between:
  • Sharing your feelings by talking about your present moment experience. As an example, you could say: “I feel really angry right now,” versus
  • Letting your feelings control you by talking negatively about the other person, such as barking angry, contemptuous name-calling like yelling: “You’re a b***ch!”
• Don’t evaluate, criticize, or judge, just share. If she says she’s feeling hurt, don’t respond by saying “here we go again!” Remember, you’re on the same team.
• You can be clueless about how you actually feel. Yes, you live with yourself; however, the truth is that understanding our emotions can be extremely difficult.
• Talk about physical sensations. Scan your body and tell her how each part is doing. Chest feels tight? Maybe it’s anxiety. Heart racing? Maybe it’s anger.
• If you’re not feeling calm inside, then assume you’re either feeling anger and/or anxiety. After all, if you don’t feel at peace internally, something’s troubling you.
• Don’t only talk about your feelings. Give each person a chance to share.

Bringing it back to the illustration,

• She could feel extremely disappointed and unloved that someone she loves doesn’t even know what her favorite birthday cake is.
• He, on the other hand, could feel very unappreciated because he didn’t even get a thank you for his efforts.

Talk about how you feel, and not what you think

Often when asked how we are feeling, we actually answer with what we are thinking.

• For instance, if you say “I feel like you’re being selfish” that’s actually what you’re thinking.
• You might actually feel dismayed to resentful to furious that you believe she’s being selfish.

Figure 12-11 offers a menu of negative emotions one might feel if needs aren’t being met.

• This is not an exhaustive list, but rather provides a list of typical emotions to help answer the question: “How are you feeling?”
• Consider using this list (expanded in Figure 12-19) both in a discussion, as well as by yourself to get a handle on how you’re feeling.
• This list also separates emotions into three levels to demonstrate a person can feel varying intensities of emotions.

Topic #4: What were your intentions?

Intentions were introduced in Comms Basics #5. Now it’s time to put the fundamentals to practice in working through this issue. To make things simpler to get a handle on, there are a few steps to approaching this topic:

Step 1. Separate intentions from impact.

• Just because you feel hurt doesn’t mean that was her intention. For example, she might feel unloved (impact) because he didn’t know her favorite cake. But did he mean to be unloving (intention)? Likewise, he may feel unappreciated (impact), but did she mean to be ungrateful (intention)?
• If two people really care for each other, then it’s hard to believe either of their intentions are ever solely to hurt the other person. For example, would he really go to all the trouble to put on a surprise party because his intention was to be unloving? Probably not.

Step 2. Remember impact is connected to feelings.

• Impact is connected to feelings; therefore, if you’ve already had the feelings conversations, then talking about impact should be easy to do.
• In our illustration, if he has already discussed feeling unappreciated, it’s a fairly easy next step to ask if that was her intention.
• If the feelings conversation hasn’t happened yet, then it’s not much of a stretch to follow the intentions discussion with the how-are-you-feeling topic.

Step 3. Remember intentions can be complex.

• None of us are saints. Sometimes we can be manipulative in an attempt to get our way.
• Likewise, sometimes we can make passive aggressive comments sparked by unresolved anger.
• Therefore, it’s important to keep an open mind to all the potential facets to our intentions.
• If nothing else, remember when you’re triggered you can come across hostile, even though that might not be your desired intention.
• It’s not necessary to discuss every intention. To move a conversation toward resolution, it can be enough to simply say sincerely, “I’m sorry that what I said or did had a hurtful impact on you.”

Topic #5:  What is your gut (also called intuition) telling you?

Our gut can be a powerful early warning ally in guiding our decision process.

• For instance, our gut can also help warn us of the potential that someone is lying to us.

But our gut can also misguide us.

• For instance, your gut could scream in response to a brewing fight: “Run! You don’t want another painful breakup!” However, this current-day relationship could be nothing like the last one. Your gut could not be intuition, but rather a fear you will be hurt again.
• In any case, sharing what’s in your gut allows the other person to hear that particular facet to your point of view that could very well be influencing your story.

In our illustration, he might have thought his gut told him it would be great to throw her a surprise party. When in reality, his thoughts were influenced by the fact that she had thrown him a huge birthday party earlier in the year and he was afraid she’d be disappointed if his present to her was not of the same magnitude as a big party.

Topic #6: How is Your Identity Wrapped Up in the Issue?

Identity turns the conversation around and asks you to think about what the issue says about yourself.

• Conversations can be made more difficult because not only do you have to face your potentially angry partner, but you also have to face yourself.
• In other words, what is the significance of this issue as it relates to your own sense of who you are?
• Does the issue potentially expose any differences between the person you hope and strive to be, versus the person you’re afraid you really are?

Although there are various potential identify topics, three that really stand out include:

• Am I competent?
• Am I a good person?
• Am I worthy of love?

Unfortunately, we can all have identity vulnerabilities (unless you’ve reached complete enlightenment).

All-or-nothing vulnerability

• The all-or-nothing identity vulnerability says I’m either completely competent or incompetent; a completely good person or a completely bad one; completely worthy of love or I’m not worthy of love at all.
• The challenge is that this all-or-nothing approach can leave your identity unstable.
• For instance, if an issue exposes a small area (in the relatively larger picture) where you might want to improve your competency, you might over rotate to a thought that you’re completely incompetent (or the other person is accusing you of this).

Denial vulnerability

• The denial identity vulnerability follows if believe that you’re 100% competent, then you may tell yourself that you never make mistakes.
• This belief then can leave you little room to hear feedback from your partner if she logs a complaint about you. As a result, you may not take any responsibility for your contribution to an issue and end up making a weak (Deny or Blame) ownership play.

Exaggerate vulnerability

• The opposite of denying is to have the exaggerate identity vulnerability. This is when you accept the feedback from your partner as complete truth.
• If she says you’re incompetent about something, then you believe that you’re completely incompetent about everything.

The key is to find a balance

• Accept that you will make mistakes. By being open to the fact that you’re not perfect, leaves you leave room to hear whatever complaint your partner has to say.
• Accept that your intentions are complex. As discussed earlier, you can have many motivations for why you may have acted in a certain way, so be open that you may have multiple intentions behind your action, not of all might be saintly.
• Accept that you have contributed to the issue in one way or another. Have the courage to talk through the issue and take responsibility for your contribution, even if this contribution conflicts with your own sense of who you hope to be.

Going back to our illustration, her complaining that he didn’t know her favorite cake, nor the fact she doesn’t like surprises, might take him down one of these identity vulnerability paths:

• Am I competent? He might not be open to hearing her complaint as he believes he’s 100% competent and never make mistakes.
• Am I a good person? If he maintains the fantasy that he’s 100% altruistic in all of his intentions, and throwing the party was just another example of his being a good person, then he could invalidate her view by thinking she’s being unappreciative.
• Am I worthy of love? He might accept her point of view as 100% right and his 0% right if he doesn’t feel worthy of love, and, therefore, he doesn’t deserve to be with someone who will appreciate his best of efforts – no matter how imperfect.

Topic #7: Discuss Hot Buttons, Expectations, and Triggered Demons

As discussed in Core 1: The Mind, an issue can push a hot button, which triggers an expectation that is not being met by the life situation.

• The level of urgency we feel associated with this is a function of how strongly attached this expectation is to an unhealed wound from the past.
• All this can show up as drama and tension between the two of you.

Therefore, if one or both of you feel a lot of emotional urgency wrapped around an issue, stop and ask yourselves what expectations are not being met by the situation.

• In other words, what “should” or “shouldn’t” the other person have done or said from your point of view?

Once you’ve identified the unmet expectations, figure out the hot button by understanding what caused the expectation to not be met in the first place.

• Identifying the attached Demon can be much more challenging.
• You need to dig deep down into your past and ask what similar triggers and unmet expectations occurred in the past that caused you a lot of pain.

Going back to our illustration, for him:

• He believes she should be more grateful that he went to all the trouble to throw her a surprise party, along with getting her a fancy birthday cake (his unmet expectation).
• He became upset when she was upset at him for throwing the party (his trigger).
• All of which brought up a past, childhood wound; his father had a very short temper and would physically punish him for what he believed was no reason.
• Now he struggles when someone he cares for gets angry at him, especially if his intention was to do something nice for the other person (his Demon).

For her, the illustration might bring up:

• She believes he should have known that she doesn’t like surprises and what her favorite cake is (her unmet expectation).
• She became upset when she walked into the surprise, which was further exacerbated by the fact that he didn’t get the cake right (her trigger).
• All of which brought up a past, childhood wound; her father left the family when she was young, leading her to believe she had to always be perfect, as she had to take on a lot of adult responsibilities to help out her mother.
• As a result, she doesn’t like surprises because she can’t get everything perfect for others to see (her Demon).

It is our Demons that lead us to confuse our expectations for what is factually true.

• Expectations can seem like truth to us because we’ve lived with them since childhood. But our expectations are not truth; they are simply reflections of how we’d like life to evolve around us for us to feel safer, a feeling of safety that was taken from us as children when the wound was formed.
• Our Demons can also make our identities vulnerable. Understanding these Demons can then help us in finding balance to our identities as well.
• Finally, understanding these Demons can also help each person feel empathy for the other person. Caring statements like “it must be hard feeling such anxiety every time you feel unjustly accused” or “it must be difficult feeling like you always have to be perfect” can help form a bridge between your different points of view.

Topic #8: How did you both contribute to the issue?

If one or both of you can’t accept any contribution to an issue, then you might as well stop right there; the conversation will go nowhere.

• Of course, neither of you is perfect and besides misunderstandings happen all the time.
• Therefore, a strong communicator starts the conversation with the premise that both people probably contributed something.
• Both of your stories have value, even if you don’t necessarily agree with each other.
• The goal of communications at this point, then, is to gain deeper understanding of the issue by discovering who contributed what.

Taking ownership is discussed in much more detail in Core 8: Ownership. However, for simplicity, here are two very useful tools a strong communicator can use to spot contribution:

• Role reversal. “What would she say I’m contributing?” By seeing the situation from her vantage point, you’re better able to understand what you’re doing to feed the issue. Feel free to ask her this question directly.
• Impartial Observer’s Point of View. Sit back and look at the situation from an impartial third person’s vantage point. “What would a counselor or impartial friend say if he or she heard both stories?” You might even ask your date/partner/wife to join you in this exploratory question.

Going back to our illustration:

• He can acknowledge that he didn’t know she doesn’t like surprises nor her favorite cake.
• She, on the other hand, can acknowledge that he had positive intentions and in throwing the birthday party and she could have better managed her anger.

As an aside, it’s amazing how much an argument is diffused once both people simply own up to their own mistakes.

• Not only is getting here a mandatory step towards finding a mutually agreeable resolution, but it’s at this point that the rest of the conversation can become much simpler.
• After all, now you two can focus on discussing how you’d like things to be different going forward and creatively finding a mutually agreeable third story.

Topic #9: How would you like things to be different?

In this topic, you both need to express your needs, wants, desires and even fantasies from a place of the present moment looking forward.

• Going back to our illustration, expressing her needs could be as simple as her describing the exact type of chocolate cake she would like and him agreeing that’s what he’ll get in the future.
• Likewise, for him, it could be her expressing more gratitude for his effort, which could result in her giving him a thank-you card or special massage.

That said, when there’s a lot of emotional urgency wrapped around an issue, it normally means the need goes much deeper.

• One way to look deeper into our needs is via Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs, shown as a pyramid in Figure 12-12.
• For instance, she may have a deeper need around love / belonging. She feels more loved if the man she loves knows little intimate details about her like what is her favorite cake and that she hates surprises.
• For him, he may have a need around Esteem and feeling respected. What he wants is for her to treat him with respect and not hostility, even if he made a royal mistake which led to her feeling extremely disappointed.

Finally, you may not really know how you’d like things to go differently until you’ve both talked through the difficult conversation.

This is another reason why it’s a good thing to help the other person feel safe in this exploration, always remembering you’re on the same team.

Topic #10: How is the conversation going?

One potentially tricky aspect to a difficult conversation is there can emerge two different set of issues in need of discussion:

• There’s the original set of issues. In our illustration, this centers around his throwing a surprise birthday party.
• A second set of issues can also emerge, if one or both people respond with weak ownership and anger plays like blaming and aggressive anger. You may not be able to discuss the original issue until this new set of issues is discussed.

To that end, sometimes it’s helpful to keep the simple framework in your mind, as shown in Figure 12-13, which was discussed earlier.

• This framework can help you organize where you are in the conversation.
• For instance, you might want to talk about behavior directly, especially if it’s being extremely harmful. However, you might also decide to take the conversation upstream and discuss driving fears, feelings, or thoughts.
• Ideally, as you have the conversation you’ll make the connections the dots from thoughts that drive feelings that drive fears which influences behavior.
• And as you connect the dots, consider congratulating each other on the progress you’re making having the conversation. Words of acknowledgment can go a long way to fueling a sense of feeling connected with each other.