Stop Defending Yourself — Start Listening and Win Any Negotiation

What if the biggest threat to your relationship isn’t conflict — it’s the way you communicate during it? In this thought-provoking conversation, negotiation expert and mediator Alice Shikina joins Kwame Christian to reveal why so many successful professionals excel at communication in the boardroom but struggle to connect with the people they love most. Drawing from years of mediation experience, Alice shares a powerful perspective: every relationship is a negotiation, and learning how to negotiate well can transform the way we handle conflict at home. Together, they unpack the hidden communication patterns that fuel arguments, including interruptions, defensiveness, emotional escalation, and the common misconception that listening simply means hearing someone speak. You'll discover why acknowledgment is often the missing ingredient in difficult conversations, how unspoken emotions drive seemingly unrelated conflicts, and why de-escalation begins long before an argument starts. Whether you're navigating challenges with a spouse, partner, child, colleague, or friend, this episode offers practical tools to help you listen more deeply, communicate more effectively, and strengthen your most important relationships. Key topics include: * Why every relationship is a negotiation * The real reason people feel unheard * How to prevent conversations from escalating * The role of emotional intelligence in conflict resolution * Why "I hear you" isn't enough * Practical techniques for active listening and acknowledgment * Creating relationship ground rules that actually work If you've ever walked away from a conversation feeling misunderstood—or struggled to understand someone else—this episode will change the way you think about communication forever. Connect with Alice: 🎙️ Podcast: Negotiation with Alice 📖 Don't Sleep on the Couch: Winning More Arguments Without Losing Your Marriage — coming soon 📖 Influenceable — also forthcoming 🌐 https://www.shikinamediation.com/

• 0:00Speaker 00

  You might be excellent at your job. You might negotiate deals, manage teams, and communicate with precision in every professional setting you walk into. But what happens when you come home?

• 0:11Speaker 01

  So you can communicate and negotiate really well at work, but you're failing at home to the point that it causes a divorce. Not always, right? There's other things. But very, very frequently, it is broken communication.

• 0:28Speaker 00

  Today's guest is Alice Shikina, mediator, arbitrator, trained actor, and author of the upcoming book, Don't Sleep on the Couch: Winning More Arguments Without Losing Your Marriage. Alice has spent her entire career inside the most emotionally charged conversations people have: divorce mediations, workplace disputes, and relationship breakdowns. And she has seen the same pattern play out over and over again.

• 0:55Speaker 01

  The reason why your kids are walking all over you is because you need to be a better negotiator.

• 1:02Speaker 00

  In this conversation, Alice breaks down why the skills that make us effective at work seem to disappear the moment we walk through the front door and what we can actually do about it. And one of my favorite parts of the episode is when she explains why de-escalation does not start during the conflict. It actually starts long before one ever happens.

• 1:24Speaker 01

  The de-escalation does not start at the point of conflict. It starts prior to there being any kind of a conflict. That is critical.

• 1:34Speaker 00

  She makes the case that most relationship fights aren't actually about what they appear to be about. If you've ever felt unheard at home or been told that you weren't listening, this episode is for you. Today's episode is brought to you by Shopify, Granola AI, Quince, and the Anxious Achiever Podcast. Stay present in your meetings. Get three months of granola free at granola.ai/kwami. For your gift list, shop quince.com for free shipping and 365-day returns. And make sure to tell them that Kwami with Big Swings Only sent you. Subscribe to the Anxious Achiever today on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you listen to podcasts. Do you have an idea that you want live for the holidays? Launch before Black Friday at Shopify.com/kwami.

• 2:21Speaker 00

  When you think about everything that you have in the book, what is the part of the book that gives you the most energy? That you're most excited about?

• 2:31Speaker 01

  Um, I mean, I think I just love the fact that the paradigm that you can actually negotiate in your relationship. Because I feel like people don't think of it that way. Anytime you use the word negotiation, people think of business. They think of sales. No one ever thinks about, let me go negotiate with my wife. Or my husband. Just that concept alone is to me very exciting.

• 2:56Speaker 00

  I love it. I agree with you 100%. And it's funny, because when I talk to people about this and I mention it, one thing that they often say is, well, wouldn't it be annoying to negotiate? Everything? Or wouldn't it like make everything transactional? So there's a fear that people have that using negotiation skills might make things worse. Or, you know, kill the flame, steal the love, whatever it happens to be. What would you say to a person who responds in that type of way?

• 3:26Speaker 01

  Well, I would say that anytime you want to get on the same page about anything, that would be a negotiation. Like if I were to say, where should we go eat for dinner? And I say, let's go have Thai and they go, ah, I just had Thai yesterday. Can we go have Italian? And I'm like, ah, it's too heavy in pasta. Let's not do that. That's a negotiation, right?

• 3:45Speaker 00

  Yes. Yeah, and you know what's funny, Alice? So whenever I present one of the slides I love to have and I, I, the way that I present, you use an app. So you could actually engage. So you could engage in polls, ask questions and the answers show up on the screen. So I define negotiation. And then I say, give me examples of your personal and professional negotiations. When are you having them? And then the thing that comes up most frequently is dinner. It's not breakfast, it's not lunch. It is, no matter where I am in the world, everybody says dinner. And so I say, look at the screen. The majority of the negotiations are with the people who are closest to you. Your boyfriend, girlfriend, wife, husband, whoever it happens to be. Kids come up a lot too. And so we're negotiating all the time.

• 4:29Speaker 00

  It's just a question of whether or not we're doing it well. And I think the, one of the things that holds people back is their perception of what a negotiation is. They always think about it as something transactional and focused on just value extraction. And that perspective holds people back.

• 4:44Speaker 01

  Right. And I also like to tell people, you know, they're like, oh, my kids are the worst because they're like, you know, constantly asking for everything. And I feel like I'm, you know, getting trod on. And I always say to people, the reason why your kids are walking all over you is because you need to be a better negotiator.

• 5:03Speaker 00

  So right. You're so right. And so for you, because you've, this is a space that you have been in for a while as a, as an advocate, as, as somebody who's done countless mediations now as an arbitrator too. So you've seen this from so many different angles and you could have written so many different types of books. So what made you feel so called to write this one on that topic?

• 5:29Speaker 01

  Because of exactly what you said, which is that people can negotiate really, really well and very effectively when it comes to business negotiations. And yet, when they walk through the front door and someone is hangry and you, I don't know, like things are going sideways, all of a sudden your business acumen, your ability to come and negotiate and get what you want, like that is somehow left at the office. And all of a sudden you're at home and having arguments and having fights. And as a divorce mediator, I did a lot of divorce mediations.

• 6:08Speaker 01

  There are met so many people who are super successful in business and they are still getting a divorce. And many times it's due to communication. But explain that disconnect. So you can communicate and negotiate really well at work, but you're failing at home to the point that it causes a divorce. Not always, right? There's other things, but very, very frequently it is broken communication.

• 6:37Speaker 00

  Hmm. Let's explore this because this is something that so many people have experienced and I bet the person listening can say, oh yeah. Um, sometimes it feels like I have the best version of myself for everybody that is outside of my home. So let's, let's try to dig into what that is because the deeper we can understand it, perhaps the, the better we could be with circumventing that problem.

• 7:01Speaker 01

  Yes, absolutely. So, you know, I think that the closer someone is to you, the more emotions there, there are. And the more emotional something is to you, the The more handicapped you are, like with your intellect, in the moment of upset. Right? Because, I mean, it could happen even at work. If something at work is really triggering for you and you feel super passionate about it and someone is just, you know, putting you down for it, you might find yourself in the same position, but very, very frequently at home with your intimate partners, with your children, even sometimes with your parents if they live with you, right? You're grown, you're adult, they're getting older, now they live with you,

• 7:44Speaker 01

  and now they continue to treat you as if you're 18 years old, when you might be 60, right? And so that just really triggers people. And so that, that emotion where they go, where, where they're flooded with either irritability, frustration, anger, that is going to basically stop your ability to communicate because it is stopping you from listening to the other side, and you can't have an effective negotiation once listening stops.

• 8:15Speaker 00

  Yes, it's critical, it's critical. And I think when it comes to these conversations, it can be kind of scary sometimes when you recognize that disconnect where you say, "Okay, I have skills at work when it comes to communication. Soon as I walk through the door, I lose those skills." And the point that you made is so, is true, it's critical. It's the emotionality, because your skills will be, will be hampered by your inability to manage your emotions. And what I like about this is that we are not running away from the fact that there are emotions. We're saying, "Hey, they exist, we have to wrestle with them." And I think that's really scary, because a lot of people go into these conversations hoping that they can eliminate the emotions. And sometimes they even convince themselves

• 8:59Speaker 00

  that they are not being emotional when it is clear to everybody watching them that they are emotional. And then it's that denial of the emotionality that leads to the inability to manage it, because you cannot manage that which you deny exists. So I think just acknowledging it and owning it is important. But again, let's explore why that is so much easier said than done. Why is it so hard for us to just accept the fact that we get more emotional at home with our loved ones?

• 9:29Speaker 01

  Well, first, I want to back up for one second because I want to talk about how we can manage those emotions better. So at work, there's a framework, right? Like, there's professional conduct. You know, certain ways of behavior are not acceptable. But guess what we do not do? We do not bring that piece, a very small piece of formality, into our own intimate relationships. Whereas, we can say, hey, Kwame, can we make rules such as, when I'm talking, you won't interrupt me? And when you're talking, I agree that I won't interrupt you? Or can we make some agreements that if I'm not feeling okay, that I can actually decline the conversation until I re-center myself,

• 10:12Speaker 01

  kind of go do my breathing and re-ground myself until I feel better? And then come back into the conversation when I feel a little bit like better, right? Emotionally better and calmer. Usually, those things are not given to a lot of people. You know, you might say, Alice, I don't have time to talk about this. I don't want to talk about this. And I'm like, no, we have to talk about this right now. And then I'm just charging after you, not giving you the space to try to re-center yourself, right? So without sort of like guardrails put in place at home, and they don't have to be heavy guardrails, really light guardrails, it does help you re-center, re-ground, and remain calm.

• 10:53Speaker 01

  But without those guardrails, all it takes is for one person to just come charging at you, whether it's by raising my voice at you, whether it's by calling names, whether it's belittling you, right? There are many, many ways to escalate. And if you don't put in rules, that emotion that you're asking about earlier, like how can we manage the emotion at home? It's really by giving us ground rules that allows each of us to take that break to say, I'm being flooded right now. I am not my best self right now. I need to take a break. And to be able to allow the other person that break. But when we don't allow that, that is when the emotions escalate. And like many, many couples recognize that someone is usually escalating.

• 11:38Speaker 01

  Even stonewalling is considered escalating, right? If I want to talk to someone and they're saying, sorry, not now, and they just walk away from me, it can make my blood boil if that is a repetitive type of behavior.

• 11:51Speaker 00

  Hmm. Okay, let's focus on this word escalation. Because I was in a difficult conversation about seventeen minutes ago, where the person on the other side just kept on trying to escalate. And I was trying my hardest to keep calm. Her name, what was her name? Oh, Alice, Alice Shikina. That was her name. So, everybody, that's a little Easter egg. So, at the end of this episode, we have a bonus episode of my guest appearance on Alice's podcast. So, check that out. We did a live role play. The one thing that you might not know about Alice is that she is a trained actor, and she used all of that to trigger the hell out of me.

• 12:30Speaker 01

  I tried, I tried.

• 12:32Speaker 00

  You tried. So, so let's talk about escalation. Because I think this will be great foreshadowing for the, the role play that we have coming down, down the pike. But tell us what it looks like, the impact that it has. And then also, what do we do about it? Because we recognize that there might be a pattern of escalation. But how do we get off of that pattern and get the conversation into a better trajectory?

• 12:55Speaker 01

  Yeah, so I think like, like what I mentioned earlier, which is setting the ground rules really helps set that up. Because without the ground, here's a really critical thing. You cannot set up ground rules in the midst of the conflict. Never, ever, ever, it's never going to happen. Right? If you start interrupting me and I go, hey, stop interrupting me. And we haven't made any agreements prior to this. There's like little to zero percent chance of you saying, oh, I'm sorry, I didn't mean to interrupt. Right? And so, really, people escalate because there isn't any agreement not to escalate. And as common sense as that sounds,

• 13:37Speaker 01

  as long as there's no rule in place, everything is fair game. That is how people act, right? I'm not saying it's fair game. People act in relationships. If there aren't any rules, they just continue to have bad behavior. And so if you want to de-escalate it, the de-escalation does not start at the time of the conflict. It starts when there is no conflict. That is when you start the de-escalation. Because you set ground rules to say, when this happens, let's do this. When that happens, let's and create like a roadmap. On how do we get beyond the moment when either of us is feeling escalated?

• 14:17Speaker 01

  So that we are not like pushing those emotions higher and higher. Until it eventually years down the road. Your relationship is eroded. There's no more respect for either party because you have done so much damage. And then it eventually leads to the demise of that marriage in a divorce. Right? So it's not the de-escalation does not start at the point of conflict. It starts prior to there being any kind of a conflict. That is critical.

• 14:47Speaker 00

  This is so good because we've we're at over 1800 episodes of the podcast. We've been doing this for 10 years and nobody has described it in that way. I think that is prob that is without a doubt the most powerful framing of de-escalation. Because we are beginning the de-escalation process at the point where de-escalation doesn't work really anymore. The the idea that de-escalation begins before the conversation is is notable. It is very unique. And that's where all the conversations fail. If you started without agreeing to those ground rules, then you're already at a disadvantage. And it seems like, tell me if this is a fair way of conceptualizing this.

• 15:28Speaker 00

  It sounds like when the other person is doing behaviors or engaging in behaviors that are escalatory. A lot of times it is not necessarily intentional, but the effect is escalation. And we escalate emotionally within ourselves. Because another person is breaking rules that were unspoken and they never agreed to.

• 15:50Speaker 01

  Correct. And it's not even that there's rules, right? Sometimes there were no rules. And while societally, we know that interruption is not good etiquette.

• 16:02Speaker 01

  If there isn't anything spoken about, hey Kwame, in our relationship, let's both agree that we think this is a bad thing and let's not interrupt one another. That's never been said. People do it. Even if it's bad etiquette, even if they've been taught as a kindergartner, hey, by the way, interrupting someone is not nice. You're probably teaching your kids, because they're still young, these rules. But once you go into an adult relationship, very frequently, people do not follow anything that looks like normal etiquette when people are feeling emotional.

• 16:40Speaker 00

  What, based on your experience, especially with divorce mediations, when you think about the conversational mistakes that people make that lead to escalation and lead to feelings of disrespect, what would you say are the most frequently mentioned things and the most damaging things that you see? Every year, I swear that I'm going to get ahead of holiday shopping. This year, it started with a Quince cashmere sweater that I bought for myself. It was so soft, so well-made, and my first thought was, who else on my list needs one? Quince makes high-quality staples with 100% Mongolian cashmere and Italian leather, and their cashmere sweaters start at just $60. All of it is 50% to 80% less than similar brands

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• 18:10Speaker 00

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• 19:00Speaker 01

  I would say the most important thing that I see not happening is acknowledging what has been said. And you talk a lot about how to do that, right? It's not about saying, "Oh yeah, I understand what you're saying." And it's not about, "I hear you." Right? It's literally saying, "Okay, let me make sure that I understand your perspective." And repeating it all back. And so people don't do that. And so can you imagine if you're in a relationship for decades where I say something to my spouse, they don't hear me, not really. They're not really hearing my message and then they respond. But their response is not addressing anything that I said. Now I'm going to respond to what they said, right? But there's also not listening going on with me as well.

• 19:46Speaker 01

  So there's a lot of, where people can have lots and lots of very long, drawn-out conversations, where no one is actually listening. And when I say "listening," I mean processing the information that you're getting from the other person. Listening is not just hearing words. It is processing it, understanding it, and then responding. So there is normally two steps. You say something, I respond, right? But in between, there's a very important step that most people miss, and that is the acknowledgement of the message. To say, "Let me understand your perspective. This is what you're saying." Or "This is how I'm understanding what you're saying." And when I do that...

• 20:30Speaker 01

  That gives you space and room to say, actually, you got 90% of it right, Alice, but you missed this one critical piece. Let me reiterate it so that you catch it. And that is where real communication happens, and that is where people can deescalate.

• 20:47Speaker 00

  Yes. Oh, this is so good. And it reminds I, Simone, maybe you could look this person up because I want to give proper attribution. But one of my favorite quotes about communication is the biggest challenge in communication is the assumption that it has occurred. And what often happens is we have two people talking about vastly different things on somewhat related topics, getting increasingly emotional about the process. And what we have to really break this down, because even though you said it and you've articulated it perfectly, I know people aren't going to get it because of the, because it's, it's so counterintuitive and so different from how everyday conversations happen. Because we have been, become so acclimated

• 21:33Speaker 00

  to, to poor communication skills that we don't recognize that it is poor communication. So let's break down. We have what somebody says, we have the response, and then we have the acknowledgement. And now there's somebody who's listening to this podcast who says, okay, Alice said we have to acknowledge it. Let me do that in my next conversation. Your partner goes on this 90 second, this 90, says something for about 90 seconds, 90 seconds to two minutes, which feels like forever, but is not really that long of a time in, in objective terms. And then what you say is, I hear you. And then respond. Tell me what you think about that.

• 22:15Speaker 01

  Yeah. So I always tell people, please put these two phrases in the garbage can. I hear you and I understand. Because you don't know if you've actually heard them and you don't know that you actually understand unless you get confirmation. The person who was speaking is the only person who can verify that as you as the listener understands and has heard. And so that is just not a sufficient, like you're not showing that you heard me when you say, I hear you. That is literally a throwaway phrase, right? And so to say, okay, what I'm hearing you say is, and you say the whole thing, that is the point I'm going to say, Kwame heard me. He totally understands what I'm saying.

• 22:58Speaker 01

  You don't have to say it verbatim. You can paraphrase it. You can say it from your own perspective, but I just want to understand that you understand, right? But you cannot tell me, I understand. That is not sufficient because we have no proof. Maybe you don't understand and you just say the phrase, I understand. And then we move on. And so here we are continuing a conversation where potentially you have not understood me at all and we're continuing a conversation. So you can see how that gets derailed as we go 15, 20 minutes in where you have not fully grasped what I said at the very beginning of the conversation. And now we're 20 minutes deep into the conversation where you're not fully grasping my perspective. Yep. And you can see how that's frustrating for people, right?

• 23:43Speaker 01

  Because they're talking and thinking, okay, you said, I understand, but you're still not understanding and I have to repeat myself. And then you, you mentioned, you know, in my podcast, how people repeat themselves when they feel like they're not being heard. And so that piece of it is really acknowledging what they've said is really to help them be seen, help them feel understood, help them be acknowledged, right? And without that piece, which most people do not do, and mind you, this is usually doing difficult conversations. It's not about like, oh, where are we going to go for our Hawaii trip or what do we want to eat for dinner today? It's mainly when it's getting really testy and somebody's really upset about something. Oh Kwame, how many times have I told you, like on Mondays and Wednesdays, it's your

• 24:26Speaker 01

  turn to make dinner and I come home and dinner's not ready and it's really upsetting and this and this and that, right? In those times, you want to slow it down and say, let me, let me make sure I'm understanding. Like you're not happy with me because we made a previous agreement that I was supposed to make dinner on Mondays and Wednesdays, but then you came home, you're expecting dinner. I'm here, clearly there's no dinner and that is upsetting to you. Is that correct? Yes. Now we're on the same page. Now we understand what's happening.

• 24:55Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 24:55Speaker 01

  Right? But if you jump in and go, hey, what's the problem here? Like, I'm finishing watching a movie. It can wait. We're no longer communicating.

• 25:06Speaker 00

  Yes. This is, this is so powerful because that last example is how normal humans talk. And that's also why normal humans have trouble with relationships. Right? That's, that, that is exactly the problem. And now this is, this is big because as you were talking, tell me if this is fair, because this is a thought that I've had, that I, that I've never had before. And I'm thinking that when you're in a conversation and you're actually saying something, there is no such thing as neutrality. So the assumption is either the thing that you say either moves us forward in some direction or moves us backward.

• 25:48Speaker 00

  And even if you're saying something and it doesn't really move us in a direction, the opportunity cost is negative, right? So it's, it's either positive or negative. So I think what people often miss is this, because the person goes and they speak, they speak for a while, and then you just respond to what they said, and then the person says, you're not listening to me. And then the person will respond and say, of course, I'm listening to you. How would I, how else would I have responded to what you're saying?

• 26:20Speaker 01

  This happens frequently. I feel like that example is a very good example of how marital strife happens, where someone says, you're not listening to me, and you feel like I am listening. Right? And you say, I have responded. But the issue is that the thing that you're responding to is not addressing their message. And that is why they're feeling like, hey, you're not listening to me, because you didn't catch that message. Right? Because you were so busy defending yourself, you didn't hear. Like, in the first example where I talked about where I said, like, you know, you're supposed to make dinner on Mondays and Wednesdays. The core messaging there is probably how it's making your spouse feel

• 27:02Speaker 01

  that you're not owning up to the agreement that you made. It's not about the fact that dinner's not on the table at that moment. It sounds like it, right? If you were to just take the words verbatim, you'd be like, oh, well, I'll be, I'll be finishing this movie in a second and dinner will be there in an hour. You haven't heard the message. Which is, I don't feel special, I don't feel valued, or I don't feel respected.

• 27:26Speaker 01

  Right? But you have to like read between the lines.

• 27:31Speaker 01

  Because I may not have said any of those words, but you have to have the emotional IQ to understand. Okay, she's kind of upset about something, and it's clearly not just about the fact that dinner wasn't on the table. There's something deeper. So if you can articulate it for them to say, this is what I'm perceiving and articulate it. Then you can move forward, like you said, but you remain going backwards. If you simply defend the fact that, hey, I was just gonna put a pizza on and it's gonna take thirty minutes. So stop yelling and screaming, it'll be ready in thirty minutes. That's not gonna resolve the problem, right? Because you're not addressing the real problem, which is, I'm not feeling emotionally okay.

• 28:11Speaker 00

  Yes, and that's, that's part of the thing that people miss because it's like, okay. Obviously, the problem is that there's not food on the table, but what she doesn't know is that food is coming in thirty minutes. So calm down. Yeah, say calm down, calm down, the problem's being solved, but you don't know what the problem is because you didn't listen. And so when we listen, we also have to recognize that there we need to listen for what is said and for what is unsaid. We have to listen to what the person actually said, but then also dig deeper into what it means. And sometimes with that summarization that you're giving where you're demonstrating your understanding, you need to speak to what was actually said. And then give a humble disclaimer and say, hey, and Alice, I might be wrong, but it seems like there's something deeper in this.

• 28:54Speaker 00

  And tell me if this guess is correct, you probably don't feel respected in this process or something to that effect. And then they'll clarify, and that's how you get your deeper understanding. But I, I hear the concerns of somebody listening and they're saying, okay, Alice, so what I'm supposed to do is somebody attacks me. And instead of defending myself, I'm supposed to listen and empathize. So I'm just gonna sit back and let the person attack me. When do I get a chance to correct the record? Because it seems like I'm just supposed to sit here and take it indefinitely. And that doesn't make me feel good. So what say you to that, Alice?

• 29:30Speaker 01

  So what I would say to that is that if you can address what you are hearing, what's basically nonverbal communication, right? The things that was not said, it will literally calm the other person down. So number one, you're not going to have a rabid dog coming at you because your emotions will come down. So at least you will not feel like you're being attacked. You'll visibly and energetically notice that they're like relaxing a little bit the more you see them. And then the next step is you get to respond, right? So it's not about, oh, I get to get kicked and beaten and bruised and then I don't have my say. After you acknowledge what's been said, then you can say, okay, here's my response. I'd like to respond to that, right?

• 30:14Speaker 01

  And, and you want to make sure that you're responding to the thing that you articulated, right? Which is, hey, it seems like you, you're upset because I'm not respecting our agreement. Maybe you don't feel like you're valued, so that's what I need to respond to. I should not be responding to. Dinner's gonna be on the table. It's gonna take me five minutes to make mac and cheese, so don't freak out about it because it's only gonna happen in 10 minutes, right? Because once you realize what the real issue is by acknowledging it, you can now respond more accurately.

• 30:49Speaker 00

  Yes, yes. Oh, this is so good because to this point, Alice, I think you're giving words and understanding to a lot of dysfunctional conversations where people don't understand where the dysfunction is coming from, which leads people to just say, and I know as a mediator, you've heard this a ton because I know I've heard it a ton. These are always my favorite ones by this, by the way. When they're, when the person gives their side of the story and then they end it with, the, the other side, they're just crazy, you know? They, they are completely irrational, they're just crazy. I'm like, oh, this is going to be juicy. Because in the mind of the person, let's go back to this dinner example. Because in the mind of the person who's going to throw on mac and cheese, it'll be ready in five minutes. They're like, to this person on the other side, they're, they don't even,

• 31:34Speaker 00

  they are so incoherent right now that they don't even realize that there is not a problem. Let me give them the Answer so they can realize there's not a problem. And then the person says, you're not listening to to me. And then you think this person is off the rocker. Because I just they came to with a problem. I just solved the problem. But you didn't take the time to hear what the problem was. You're responding to something that isn't the true issue. And this, what I love about this is that you're you've given them permission to, yeah, you will get a chance to defend yourself. You need to defend yourself about about the right thing. Because otherwise, you're defending yourself around shadows, wondering why your defenses aren't working.

• 32:14Speaker 00

  Because you you assume that you understand, but you don't understand. So you need to clarify. And it's like taking a test where the other, the the person who's grading you is the other person. You can't grade yourself on your own understanding of them. It just doesn't make sense.

• 32:30Speaker 01

  Right, exactly. And so, yeah, so what you want to do is when you listen, it's more for listening for the message. Because if you're in defense mode, you're just gonna hear words and you're gonna respond to the words, right? But what you're trying to do is you're trying to listen deeper because you're trying to listen to what's the real emotion happening? And what is the underlying message? In theater, that underlying message is called subtext. And whenever you read a script, you always, as an actor, have to consider what is the character's subtext? What are they trying to say with the words that are on the paper? So it's the same thing in real life. If you're yelling at me about something, Kwame, I need to figure out real quick. What is Kwame's subtext right now?

• 33:13Speaker 01

  Because I gotta figure it out because it clearly can't be about dinner because he seems very, very upset. And so there's something else going on. What is that? So that type of presence, like just being present in the moment and being open and being curious, really takes discipline.

• 33:31Speaker 01

  And it's not about just hearing your words and responding to your words.

• 33:35Speaker 00

  If you were going to take a big swing this holiday season and start a business, what would you build? Maybe it's that one idea that you can't stop thinking about. I've built a business from the ground up and I can tell you that the hard part isn't the idea, it's getting it live. That's where Shopify comes in. You can sell everywhere people shop, online, in person, across social media, even in AI chats. And Shopify checkout with Shop Pay converts up to 36% higher than the competition. So more of the people who show up actually buy. Plus, Black Friday is when more people are already shopping and ready to buy. So the sooner you're live, the better. If you're ready to launch your business before Black Friday, go to Shopify.com/Quami to start your free trial.

• 34:19Speaker 00

  That's Shopify.com/Quami. Go to Shopify.com/Quami to hear your first.

• 34:27Speaker 00

  Try this. Pull up your notes from a meeting last week. Do they still make sense? Or do they just seem like random notes that only the old version of you could decode? That used to be me. And as a negotiator, that's a real problem because my job is to listen, not type or write notes. That's why Granola has been one of my favorite tools, period. It's an AI-powered notepad. I jot my usual rough notes and then Granola securely transcribes the meeting in the background. And when it ends, I get clean, structured notes that still make sense a week later. Decisions, owners, next steps, everything that I would need to feel good about going forward. And it works through your device's audio too. So there's no additional setup or any annoying AI joining your call. Just your normal meeting, but with superpowers.

• 35:12Speaker 00

  If meetings are eating up your day, Granola is a no-brainer. You can try it totally free for three months. Just go to granola.ai/Quami. That's granola.ai/Quami to get your time back. Get three months free at granola.ai/Quami.

• 35:28Speaker 01

  It's hearing more deeply. What's not being said? And like you're trying to express it using these other words. Sometimes it's about a different issue. People, you know, like in um, in mediations about inheritances? And they're arguing about money. But really, what's it about?

• 35:47Speaker 01

  About how their parent, how their parents treated each one of them, right?

• 35:51Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 35:52Speaker 01

  Listen, like, oh, well, I was always the one that was, like, treated poorly. Mom and dad never really gave, you got everything, they loved you, you're the favorite. That's what we're really fighting about, but we're fighting about money. You see what I mean? Like, people argue very frequently about some other thing when the core, the core thing is something over in left field. It's not the thing that they're talking about.

• 36:17Speaker 00

  Wow. So essentially, these are proxy wars, more or less.

• 36:21Speaker 01

  Basically, yes.

• 36:22Speaker 00

  Yeah. Yeah, so we pick a field of battle that we feel comfortable with. And so it's, it sounds like a lot of times, there is a deep need to be understood, a deep-seated issue, and you don't feel comfortable talking about that. Maybe it makes you feel too vulnerable. And then you, you just, you subconsciously, you're essentially lying in wait. It's like, you know what? Alice, at some point, is going to make a mistake, and then I'm really pissed off about the way she made me feel before, but now dinner's late. Ha ha! Now, this is why you're terrible. It's about the dinner. It's like, hmm, the level of emotionality that came seems like it's a little bit bigger than, than mac and cheese. Maybe we could explore this.

• 37:03Speaker 01

  Yeah, so I think the way to de-escalate in those situations, first of all, is really to try to hear the, the emotions that, that's coming out, right? To say, and, and I always caution people, don't use the words angry or mad or pissed off, because those are things that no one likes to be labeled as, and you're just going to cause a dumpster fire to become a bigger dumpster fire. And so you want to really use, you know, emotions where it's like, it sounds like you're frustrated, it sounds like, um, you're feeling unhappy, um, you're feeling like I'm, I'm, you know, you're, you're not satisfied with my actions, right? So think of other emotional words. Don't just go up and be like, Kwame, it sounds like you're mad at me, because that is really going to make you angrier.

• 37:49Speaker 01

  It's not gonna do much good, right? So I don't want people thinking like, okay, Alison Kwame said, I need to go label the emotion that I'm sensing. And then all of a sudden, it turns into like this really huge fight. I'm not mad. That's not what I'm arguing about this for, right? That's gonna come out. That's what's gonna come back at you, right? Or something like that. So you wanna be very careful about labeling the emotion to say very specific emotional thing that is something beneath anger. It's going to be, I'm feeling devalued. I'm feeling unloved. I'm feeling unseen. I'm feeling unheard. I'm feeling frustrated. I'm feeling sad. These are the types of things that people are feeling and it comes out and looks like rage. It looks like rage. It looks like anger, but it's something deeper.

• 38:34Speaker 01

  And like you said, it feels too vulnerable to name it.

• 38:40Speaker 00

  Yes.

• 38:40Speaker 01

  Right? So you hide it with a blanket called anger.

• 38:46Speaker 01

  So you wanna be able to peel that layer off, but peel it off gently and say, I'm sensing like, you know, you're not feeling heard by me. Yes, that's exactly how I'm feeling. I feel like you're not listening at all, right? And now we have a real conversation because now not only have you acknowledged them, you see them. Everyone wants to be seen Kwame. Like that is the basic thing, human need, emotional need. Everyone wants to be seen and conflicts come up because people do not feel like they are seen. Most of the time in workplace conflict litigation, it has nothing to do with the law. It has nothing to do with the company broke a law.

• 39:26Speaker 01

  It's because the employee or the ex-employee feels like they were never seen or heard by the company, that no one would listen to them. HR wouldn't listen to them. And so they had no choice but to go to a lawyer because the lawyer offered them the only voice that they could have because they wanted to be seen and they wanted to be heard. They may not have a legal case, but it's the emotional need to be seen that is driving a lot of people to go seek out lawyers because they're like, I need to be seen. I want them to hear my side.

• 40:04Speaker 00

  Yes.

• 40:05Speaker 01

  You know.

• 40:06Speaker 00

  This is powerful because everybody in the conversation wants to be seen and wants to be heard. And sometimes it seems as though the biggest challenge is sequencing. Well, who gets seen and heard first? And so, so let's break this down because it's important to understand how you're feeling in the moment and how those feelings will make it difficult for you to listen and hear. Because, and we talked about it in the episode we're going to share later on my guest appearance on your podcast, how just the, the more emotional you are, the less available your skills are under duress. So everything that we're saying kind of seems easy to do in terms of what is required, but it's the emotionality that makes it more difficult.

• 40:48Speaker 00

  So I want people to be able to read those emotional signals here really well. So what is it in the moment that makes it hard for us to listen? When that is exactly what our partner needs the most in that moment?

• 41:01Speaker 01

  Well, you know, whenever you're feeling attacked, you're immediately going to go into defensive mode. And then when you start to feel defensive, you go into fight, flight or freeze mode, which then shuts your executive functioning down. So it's sort of like a domino effect or you push one domino down and several of them just fall down. And so, you know, if you're at least able to, at least, this is very difficult in a moment when you're upset or defensive, to at least be able to repeat back everything that you heard the other person say. It does help your brain go back into like functioning mode. Right? You can start to have more access, but the more emotional you are, because maybe I'm feeling defensive, you're attacking me. I'm like, oh my gosh, I can't believe he's attacking me.

• 41:46Speaker 01

  All this stuff is going on in my brain, right? How rude, I can't believe it. I was just sitting here and now Kwame is just giving me insults, right? All of that stuff is making me, making it so I can't think. I can't think straight. I can't figure out what I want to say. So if I can at least try to repeat back what it is that I heard you say in its entirety, it will help restore my executive functioning of my brain so that I can listen, like going forward in the conversation. So you want to try to restore your listening capability, because that listening capability gets interrupted every single time you get defensive.

• 42:25Speaker 01

  So if your spouse is coming at you, you're going to be defensive. You might even say, oh, here we go again. Same thing every single week. You know, he or she is coming after me with the same thing and you're already feeling defensive. Now you're already losing your ability to hear and listen. So you have to try to re-regulate yourself. So the two ways to re-regulate is to either do what I just said, which is to repeat back. And but if you feel like I can't even do that right now, I can't even repeat it back because I can't even hear it. That's when the previous rule, the ground rules that we talked about earlier. Had you set the ground rules to say, hey, if I call for a timeout, I need that timeout, you take the timeout. But that timeout needs to be

• 43:07Speaker 01

  prior to any kind of conflict. Remember we talked about that? So agree to it before, then I can say, Kwame, I need a timeout. Let me come back to you in 10 minutes. And I I go away and I can re-regulate myself, take some deep breaths and come back. If however, I did not make any ground rules beforehand. If I say to you, Kwame, right now is not a good time. I need to go take a break. Chances are you're gonna be like, why? Answer my question. Like, why are you walking away from me every single time? Every time I want to have a serious conversation with you, you just walk away. Right? So this is again, that dance. So you want to interrupt the dance by setting the ground rules. And the ground rules will help you like really de-escalate.

• 43:50Speaker 01

  Like I said, all conflict resolution gets de-escalated prior to the conflict. And it's in the same sense.

• 43:58Speaker 00

  Brilliant. This is so helpful. And one, one thing that I've done, and I'm again, I think I mentioned it in your episode coming up too. When I don't know what to say next, the next thing I say comes in the form of the question. But following that, as it applies to this situation. When I have a quick response, like the person said something and I feel like I need to clap back. Oh, I need to set the record straight. Oh, I need to say something. That is a sign that I'm not thinking clearly.

• 44:25Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 44:26Speaker 00

  That's, that is what I take that as. The faster the response, especially if the response comes as they're still talking, I am immediately skeptical of that response. Cause there's a difference between an emotional thought and a strategic thought. The emotional thoughts will always come first. So my, my habit that I do is whenever I feel like I need to respond very quickly, and that's when I trigger the listening, where I say, okay, my goal right now is to listen very, very, very thoroughly and deeply. That's what I need to do in this moment. And so it just creates a new reflex. And I want to revisit, going back to the original question, because this was a great answer, because I was talking about what are the things that lead to the biggest challenges in these relationship conversations?

• 45:11Speaker 00

  And you talked about the, the need for acknowledgement or the failing to acknowledge what was said. And we've spoken for like 20 minutes on that topic, which demonstrates the fact that it is not a surface level thing. There's so much depth to this, and it is the lack of understanding that holds us back from actually leaning into acknowledgement and really what it means and why it's so difficult to do. And if I were to push you to give something else, like a number two, so it's the failing to acknowledge what was said, what is another thing that causes struggles in these relationship conversations?

• 45:45Speaker 01

  Well, I like to do a one A, because even if you don't agree with what the person is accusing you of, just acknowledge it. If I say, Kwame, you lied to me. Let's say your first instinct is be like, I do not lie. Like, I can't believe she's accusing me of lying. And then all of a sudden, right? But just be like, wait a minute. Okay, so you think that I lied to you? You don't have to agree.

• 46:13Speaker 01

  So that's really, really important. I want to stress that because people feel like, I need to defend my honor. I am not a liar. I never lie, right? It doesn't matter, does not matter, does not matter. Just be like, what I'm hearing you say is you feel like I've lied to you. That is not, that is not saying that you agree.

• 46:33Speaker 01

  Right? All you're saying is, "This is what I'm understanding." Now, oddly enough, people will interpret that as, "Oh, yes, I'm so glad that you agree with me." Like, people will think that, right? When you say, "Hey, Alice, you've said, I think you, you know, you think I've lied to you." And I'll be like, "Yeah, I'm glad you, I'm glad you agree. I'm glad you admit it." That's literally how people will hear it, but it's important to acknowledge, right? So that's my one A. Um, so the other thing that people need to do, I think they just really need to notice, and this is what I like to do, I, I like to tell people, if, when, the next time you're upset, I want you to do a body scan and notice where is that upset showing up?

• 47:16Speaker 01

  Is your chest tightening, or your temples throbbing? Do you clench your jaws? Try to figure out what's happening. And you can even do it by yourself. Start, imagine something that makes you really, really angry, and get yourself sort of like physically angry by imagining that thing, and notice where is it going in your body? So that's really important step, okay, to do by yourself. That's like personal work. And then, it's much easier when you actually start to get angry, you will notice the physical sensation. That is what's going to clue you in, that you're upset. Like, your, your body will give you the first hint. Before you notice the emotion itself, you're going to notice, "Oh, my gosh, my temples are throbbing."

• 47:59Speaker 01

  And then you're going to be able to say, "Oh, I've got to take a minute. I have to go to the..." And I tell people, you can just say, "Let me run to the restroom. Let me go get a drink of water." You can use those moments to try to re-center yourself. Do your box breathing, where you breathe in, hold and exhale, right? Whatever technique you want to use, you can just excuse yourself and be like, "Hey, I'll be right back. Let me just run and get some water." Or, "I forgot something," or, "The mailman is here." Right? These small things to like, make a little bit of time, but it's important to recognize that you're getting emotional. And a lot of times, people don't necessarily recognize it. So I teach people how to recognize the emotions in their body. How does it feel somatically?

• 48:44Speaker 01

  So that when it happens, you'll immediately be like, "Oh, this is the sign I'm getting upset."

• 48:52Speaker 00

  Yes. Hmm, that is good.

• 48:56Speaker 00

  That's so important. And I think one of the things that we have to recognize is, and this is a critical part of emotional intelligence, is realizing that we won't always know without paying attention to these clues. And I think there's always, there's, there's an assumption that we will know when we're off track, when we're not feeling good, and of those type of things. But it is the assumption that we are emotionally stable when we're not, that really, who can really mess us up sometimes. That's really good. Um, one thing that I've heard when it comes to interrupting people, where the person interrupts frequently, they would say something to the effect of, well, the way that I talk is that when you say something, and then I have a thought, I want to jump in and let you know that I'm listening

• 49:41Speaker 00

  by saying my thought. Or sometimes you say something, and then it reminds me, or I want to address that thing that you said. And so I'm afraid that I'll forget if I don't interrupt you right there. So what would you say to the person who says the interruptions are necessary?

• 50:00Speaker 01

  Take a note. I say, take a note.

• 50:05Speaker 00

  If you were going to take a big swing this holiday season and start a business, what would you build? Maybe it's that one idea that you can't stop thinking about. I've built a business from the ground up, and I can tell you that the hard part isn't the idea, it's getting it live. That's where Shopify comes in. You can sell everywhere people shop, online, in person, across social media, even in AI chats. And Shopify checkout with shop pay converts up to 36% higher than the competition. So more of the people who show up actually buy. Plus, Black Friday is when more people are already shopping and ready to buy. So the sooner you're live, the better. If you're ready to launch your

• 50:44Speaker 00

  business before Black Friday, go to Shopify.com/Quami to start your free trial. That's Shopify.com/Quami. Go to Shopify.com/Quami to hear your first.

• 50:57Speaker 00

  Try this. Pull up your notes from a meeting last week. Do they still make sense? Or do they just seem like random notes that only the old version of you could decode? That used to be me. And as a negotiator, that's a real problem. Because my job is to listen, not type or write notes. That's why Granola has been one of my favorite tools, period. It's an AI-powered notepad. I jot my usual rough notes, and then Granola securely transcribes the meeting in the background. And when it ends, I get clean, structured notes that still make sense a week later. Decisions, owners, next steps, everything that I would need to feel good about going forward. And it works through your device's audio too, so there's no additional setup or any annoying AI joining your call. Just your normal meeting, but with superpowers.

• 51:42Speaker 00

  If meetings are eating up your day, Granola is a no-brainer. You can try it totally free for three months. Just go to granola.ai/Quami. That's granola.ai/Quami to get your time back. Get three months free at granola.ai/Quami.

• 51:58Speaker 01

  So in my mediations, I do address that. And I say, if you get the urge to interrupt, jot down a note. Because you will have time when it's your turn to address it. So it's totally fine to just jot down the notes and say, okay, I need to, I need to address this, right? It's better than interrupting someone. And so, yeah, so I don't think that interruptions are necessary. You can always like, if you forget, you can put notes down, and then you can address it when it comes. They're not necessary. And you know what's interesting, Quami? Is that when I do my mediations and I set the ground rules, I cannot tell you, it happens almost every single time. Once I set the ground rules, people abide by them. Like couples who've been fighting, they will be like, oh, and then this and this.

• 52:43Speaker 01

  And then they go, oh, I'm sorry, I interrupted. Right? Because they agreed. I said, is everyone in agreement? Yes, yes. So when they break it, they're very cognizant about it. And they're very conscientious about addressing the fact that they accidentally interrupted. And they apologize for it, which probably doesn't happen as often if they're not in a mediation. But it's because the rule itself is guiding their behavior. If they agree to the rule, they're gonna be like, oh, oops. I'm sorry. I agreed. I agreed to not interrupt and I'm doing it. I apologize, right? But if there isn't that rule, it goes back to the rules, right? Without the rules, I have nothing to apologize for. Okay, I'm showing bad behavior. Who cares?

• 53:28Speaker 01

  I never said that I wasn't gonna do it. You never said you weren't gonna do it. So we just continued the bad behavior. But if we agree to not do it, people like are like, oh, oops. I'm sorry. Go ahead. You go ahead, Kwame. Go ahead and finish. Right? That kind of dialogue happens almost every single time we mediate. Because those rules are guiding the conversation and the behavior of everyone in the room.

• 53:51Speaker 00

  Yep. Oh, that's good. Okay, let me push you on this. I'm sharing things that I've heard in the past. And so they, what if they don't think interruption is a big deal? They, it's not a big deal. It doesn't cause that much damage. Based on your experience as a mediator, especially divorce mediations, what's the impact of interruption?

• 54:12Speaker 01

  The impact of interruption, number one, it signals to me that you are probably not listening and you're waiting to speak your turn and you kind of jumped the gun. So you're already waiting. You're like, I have this thing I want to say and I couldn't wait till they finished, so I'm gonna say it. So it signals you probably were not even comprehending the information coming your way. Because you were just sort of like so anxious about saying your piece that you just jumped in early. Right? So then what happens is I usually say to someone who interrupts, okay, if you're gonna interrupt me, at least let me know what it is that you heard me say. And I guarantee you, they will not get an A plus on that assignment. They will be able to say like maybe 50%, maybe less.

• 54:58Speaker 01

  And then what will happen is they will start to realize I'm not actually listening as well as I thought I was.

• 55:05Speaker 00

  Yep.

• 55:07Speaker 01

  Because listening takes a lot of mental activity. And if you are waiting to say your piece and you're rehearsing what you're about to say, you are not able to process the information coming from the other person at all. And I see this all the time because I will say, oh, you know what? Kwame, can you just let me know what it is the other person had to say? And if you were sitting there rehearsing what you're about to say, you're suddenly going to be caught like a deer in the headlights and you're going to say, you know what? I'm really sorry. I'm, I have no idea what was just said. This happens. This actually happens and people are shocked every time when they realize they've been talking for three minutes.

• 55:46Speaker 01

  And the other person who looks like they're listening does not remember a single thing that was just said in the last three minutes. Cause they were rehearsing their own script.

• 55:58Speaker 00

  Yep. One of, one of the things that I've been seeing, I'd love to get your thoughts on this is let's say there's a mediation and the person, a person is talking and they've talked for about, let's say, 20 to 40 seconds. And then the person interrupts and then the person who was interrupted says, how are you responding to what I'm saying? If you don't understand the point that I'm making and the person tries to prove that they're understanding by rehearsing what was just said for the first 40 seconds. And then the person says, you didn't understand my point. And they say, how did I not understand your point? Because I just told you what you said. I said,

• 56:37Speaker 00

  the person would respond by saying, you heard 30%. There was more that was going to be said. How can you understand that which was yet to be articulated? Can you, can you break down what's happening? Because I recognize this is a bizarre disconnect that happens a lot of times in these conversations.

• 56:53Speaker 01

  And you're asking for a friend, right Kwame?

• 56:55Speaker 00

  I'm, I'm asking for a friend. I hope that Freudian slip can be edited out.

• 57:02Speaker 00

  Help me, Alice, help me, okay?

• 57:08Speaker 01

  Okay, so which side, so are you the side, or is this, is your friend on the side where they don't, they're not being able to finish everything?

• 57:16Speaker 00

  Correct.

• 57:17Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 57:19Speaker 01

  So basically, I would just ask the permission, because a lot of times when you ask the permission, when someone gives you the permission, like, this is a psychological thing that's used in sales, right? In sales, someone will say, hey, Kwame, I'm calling you up, I'm doing a cold call, and I say, hey Kwame, is it okay if I like, share with you, like, for one minute, sort of what we do? And once you say yes, you're going to listen much more deeply than if I never asked you for permission. So in the same way, you want to use that same psychological tool, and say, hey spouse, I understand you think you know what I'm going to say, and you want to just respond to it earlier, would you please give me the opportunity to just say all of it first?

• 58:04Speaker 01

  You can tell me what it is that you heard, and then you can respond. So you kind of like, set up the little guideposts, and you're going to ask for the permission. And that permission is not so, oh, there's a power dynamic, that's not about that. It's that when someone says yes, saying, okay, yes, I will let you finish, now they're going to abide by the thing that you just asked them, because they said yes, they will allow you to speak the whole thing. Does that make sense? So you're doing a psychological thing, where you're getting them to agree that they will shut up until you finish, and now they have to shut up, because they said that they will shut up. Does that make sense?

• 58:41Speaker 00

  Yes, this is so interesting, so it's like a meta-negotiation, a negotiation within the negotiation. So, we have an issue, and now we have an issue within the issue. Let me negotiate the ability to complete my thought, and then we could go back to the larger negotiation once we have.

• 58:57Speaker 01

  Yes, because especially if you're finding that while you're trying to negotiate, you're getting cut off, and then there's negotiations about why it's okay to cut you off, right? Then yes, it is a, it is a negotiation within a negotiation to say, okay, I understand that you know what I'm going to say, but can I just, it makes me feel better if I just can get everything out, can you just wait until I finish? I would really appreciate it, right? That's that mini-negotiation. And once you win that, then you can finish everything. And more than likely, the other person will say, are you done? And then you can say, I'm done. If you can let me know what it is you understood and then respond, I would appreciate it. Now you've set it up. You've set it up so that they have to say everything back to you. And if they weren't listening, guess what's going to happen?

• 59:40Speaker 01

  They will not succeed at telling you what it is that you said. So I do that frequently in my own relationship where I say, I don't think you're listening. I was listening. I'm like, okay, can you tell me what it is that I was just saying to the last few minutes? And usually it's like, ah, it was something about this play. And I'm like, that's all you got? Something about this play? And he was like, yeah, I'm really sorry. I was not listening.

• 1:00:04Speaker 00

  Yep.

• 1:00:04Speaker 01

  So it's important to catch it because if there's no communication, you want to be able to remedy that, right? You want to like fix it so that there is communication. And very frequently, we live in households where there is no communication. Like, we're all talking. And there isn't a communication. There's no like, there's no messages that are that are actually being received by one another.

• 1:00:28Speaker 00

  Right. Exactly.

• 1:00:30Speaker 01

  Yeah. I think it's important to do that mini negotiation inside the conversation to say, can I just, if you let me finish everything, that that will be helpful. And then win that one. And then you can say the whole thing. And then have them repeat it back. Because for all you know, if the other person's rehearsing their script, even if you finish, they will not have heard anything you had to say. So that's important. That's important information to know, that that's going on in someone else's head.

• 1:00:59Speaker 00

  For sure. Yeah. Yeah. And I think the all of this that we're talking about is simple, but not easy. Right? It's, it's, we can understand it. Everybody listening to this can understand it. But executing under pressure, under the weight of emotionality, that's where it becomes difficult. And one of the things that I've, I've, I've focused on, especially if the person says that they're not, that you're not listening, if you become, if you're the person who's accused of not listening, that makes, often makes us feel defensive and we want to say, yes, I am listening. Because the accusation of not listening kind of comes across as a value judgment. It's not just. You're not listening, you're a bad person because you weren't listening. That's how it's perceived. So they defend themselves instead of demonstrating listening.

• 1:01:44Speaker 00

  So for me, when I'm on the receiving end, if somebody says they're not listening, that I'm not listening. I say, first of all, I apologize because whatever the truth is, I've done a poor job of making the person feel heard. It's not just about the biological effect of the the sound waves reverberating through the ear, hitting our tympanic membrane and going into our brain. That's not what listening really is. It is about the ability to then reflect back the understanding to make the person feel heard in the process. So the immediate response is an apology and then I say, great. So now this in my mind, obviously not allowed, that would be psychotic. Then in my mind, I say, let's play a game. Cool. You're not feeling heard? I am going to listen to you better than you've ever been heard before.

• 1:02:24Speaker 00

  And so there is just no way if that if that is the barrier, not being heard or not feeling heard is the barrier. That's easy to solve for because I'm just going to listen so well that there I completely eliminate that from a point of contention. And so I think that is a mindset that we could utilize when we realize that in a lot of these cases, even beyond the substantive issue, the bigger problem is the lack of being heard. And if you solve that problem, sometimes miraculously, the substantive issue seems to disappear or become not as big of a deal.

• 1:02:59Speaker 01

  Yeah, and you know, sometimes it's just fine to say if someone's like, hey, you know what? You're not listening to me just to like, give them a hundred percent undivided attention. It could be that you were texting very briefly, someone texting, you're like, oh, yes. And someone's gonna be like, you're not listening, right? Because there's always a distraction, right? Or maybe your kids are doing something, you're watching them or you're picking something up or whatever, whatever it is. So it's a good space to just say, okay, let me, let me just reset. Let me give you my undivided attention and let me listen. And then after you listen to acknowledge the those messages that you received. And then it'll probably lower the emotional emotionality of the situation. So instead of being defensive, just as just to say, you know what? If I didn't seem like I was listening, let me listen now.

• 1:03:45Speaker 00

  Yep.

• 1:03:45Speaker 01

  As opposed to let me prove to you that I was listening in the past. It's more like, let's do a reset. And I'm gonna go ahead and listen now. If I wasn't listening, whatever I was doing, I am changing my behavior. Whether it's checking a text message or whatever it is, right? You're changing the behavior going forward. So I think the most important thing for conflict resolution is always looking forward to how can we fix it? And very frequently, couples rely on arguing about the past. You always do this, yesterday you did this, you know, last week you did this, last month you did this. And I'm always like, can we just focus on fixing it? Let's fix it. We don't do that with our cars, right? We don't like complain about how the car wasn't working last week.

• 1:04:28Speaker 01

  No, we go to the shop and we get it fixed. So everyone treats their relationship like you've, like a broken car. We don't argue about like, why the car's not working? It's still not working for days on end. We just go and we get it fixed. So in the same way, if the communication is broken, don't argue about how it was broken in the past. Just fix it, fix it going forward. And so I think that if you can have a forward-thinking mindset when it comes to conflict in relationships, to say, okay, if something wasn't working, how can we actually fix it? Or if you're not happy, how can I fix it? Or if you don't like my behavior, how can I fix my behavior? Or whatever it is, right?

• 1:05:09Speaker 01

  Let's look forward as opposed to in the past, in the past, in the past. That is what drives a lot of conflict that's repetitive in relationships.

• 1:05:18Speaker 00

  Hmm, it's powerful. And Simone, I know you've been waiting patiently. Um, what are your thoughts? What questions you have?

• 1:05:26Speaker 02

  Well, well, as Komi told you, I have a podcast in Spanish. I invited a guy that was an expert at listening. He said, I asked him, what is actually listening? And he said, listening is helping the other person make their point. And then another guy told me, I asked him, because I like to ask that question. Um, and the other guy told me, uh, listening is avoid, uh, thinking about an answer before listening to the last word of the other person. So I would like to ask you both, what is listening for you?

• 1:06:05Speaker 01

  Do I go first? So for me, listening is really deeply understanding the other person's perspective. So in whatever, listening to me is not just about with your ears. It's with your heart, it's with your mind, it's with your soul, right? To really deeply say, you know what? Let me put myself in your position and let me understand what it feels like to be you. That to me is really, really good listening. It's profound listening.

• 1:06:39Speaker 00

  Yep, and let me go deeper on that too, because I believe the exact same thing. And I try to take it to the most logical extreme I possibly can, while still having the humility to recognize that despite my best efforts, it is not possible for me to fully understand, but I'm going to do the best I can. So I'll give a story. When Kai was much younger, like two or three, when we were, we would have conversations and things like that. And I recognize especially in situations of discipline, I wouldn't raise my voice or anything, but there would be a stern voice saying, "Hey Kai, you can't do that, that's wrong, that's right," whatever it happens to be. And I realized, okay, let me actually look at this from his perspective,

• 1:07:19Speaker 00

  so I can communicate in the way that would be appreciated or understood at a deeper level. And so I tried to literally put myself in his perspective. You know, he's two or three feet tall at this time. He's tiny and I'm larger. And so I realized, oh, I can't, my message will be missed because of just the intimidation of being a larger human at this time. So going forward, when I would discipline, I would get down on his level so he could be more the same size, so there wouldn't be an intimidation factor. And so for me, when I'm listening, I'm asking myself, what do I physically look like to the other person? What is their lived experience? They had this background, I have this background.

• 1:08:04Speaker 00

  Oh, okay. So when, so think about for me, coaching people or training people, I lived this, studied psychology, was in law school, studied law.

• 1:08:14Speaker 00

  Practiced law in mediation. Conflict is fun for me. Like, I'm at the point where the skills are exciting for me. And if I come in and I I'm like clicking my heels in front of an organization like, isn't this conflict? Great. They're like, no, it's like the worst thing that's ever happened to me. So I have to understand where they're coming from in order to really listen effectively. Because the thing is, we often, not often, we always listen from our own perspective. So as I'm absorbing the message, I'm trying to listen from their perspective as wholly as I possibly can.

• 1:08:53Speaker 00

  And then that allows me to get a better sentiment of what the message means to them beyond what it is that they're saying. So it's stepping into their shoes, but really trying to figure out what that really means. Are we on Zoom? Are we in person? Is it a phone call? All these things, I'm trying to perceive it in the realist sense from their perspective. And that helps me to to to listen effectively. It's like, how can I make my brain their brain for a moment? So we're trying to share a brain that that for me is listening. That's the depth of understanding I'm trying to go for when I'm listening to somebody.

• 1:09:30Speaker 02

  Wow, thank you so much.

• 1:09:32Speaker 00

  Yeah, this is great. And it's listening sounds so easy. Acknowledgement sounds so easy. But then you you listen to a master at her craft like Alice describe it. And you're saying, I I did not understand what understanding was. So Alice, we appreciate it. And if there was somebody who said to themselves, I'm looking for new podcasts on negotiation, or I want another book to read on how to improve my relationships, or maybe I'm having a mediation. Who who could they call? And what resources should they turn to for such problems?

• 1:10:07Speaker 01

  Thank you, Kwame. So I have a podcast called Negotiation with Alice. And Kwame was just a guest on there. So definitely check out that episode. And people can just go to my website, shikina mediation dot com. S H I K I N A. It's an Okinawan last name. shikina mediation dot com. And they can see all of my mediation services there. And I've got an upcoming couple of books, actually. So the first one coming out is called Influencible. That will come out next year. And then the other one, the one that's for all the listeners who are wanting some negotiation help in their marriages, it's called Don't Sleep on the Couch. Winning more arguments without losing your marriage.

• 1:10:47Speaker 00

  Brilliant. Alice, thank you so much for joining us. Really appreciate it.

• 1:10:51Speaker 01

  Thank you so much. It was my pleasure.

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