Are you tired of getting stuck in endless arguments, feeling misunderstood, or struggling with negative self-talk?
In this episode, we dive deep into the topic of language and explore the critical distinction between assessments and assertions.
Join me as I share insights on how understanding this difference can dramatically transform the way you communicate with others and yourself. We'll discuss the dangers of the "I'm right, you're wrong" mindset, the importance of being selective about whose opinions you give authority to, and how the stories we tell ourselves shape our lives.
Whether you're looking to improve your relationships, boost your self-confidence, or simply communicate more effectively, this episode is packed with valuable insights and actionable advice.
You’ll discover practical tips for breaking free from linguistic traps, updating disempowering narratives, and harnessing the power of language to create a more authentic and empowering life.
By gaining a deeper understanding of assessments and assertions, you'll be better equipped to navigate the complexities of communication in your relationships, work, and personal growth journey.
- Mark
Let’s connect:
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/markrobertsonpcc
Email: mark@coachmark.com
Website: www.coachmark.com
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
Welcome to Wake Up And PayAttention, the podcast fueling
(00:03):
positive change from the insideout. I'm Mark Robertson, your
host. With over 25 years as aprofessional coach, I'm thrilled
to explore the personal growthtools that have helped me and
hundreds of people just like youdesign and awaken to their best
life. If you've ever feltoverwhelmed and unfulfilled,
like you're just going throughthe motions day after day, maybe
(00:24):
you're afraid one day all theballs are going to drop, you're
in the right place. Together,let's expand our self awareness
and make sustainable shifts thatimprove our communication
skills, relationships, andoverall wellbeing. This is a
judgment free zone whereopenness, understanding and
support rule. So grab yourheadphones and get ready, it's
(00:46):
time to wake up and payattention.
Hello, and welcome back to WakeUp And Pay Attention. I'm really
excited for episode 7 today.It's gonna be a really deep rich
episode actually going to be oneof multiple episodes around the
(01:06):
same concept. And so reallyexcited to bring it to you today
and continue our conversationwith one another. A few things
as I open one is with regard tomy voice. It's springtime here
in Nashville, and that usuallymeans allergies and I've kind of
had the head and chest cred overthe last week and so if my
voice sounds different, Iapologize for that. But I really
(01:29):
want to get this particularepisode out to you.
Also, want to touch on thedelay, at least has been a delay
for me and maybe for you ifyou've been waiting on this
episode. I've had a couple ofweeks where work was really
busy, devoted some full days toconference with Newfield
network, which was reallypowerful. And then last week, I
was sick, as I mentioned withthis stuff and so just now
(01:52):
getting to it. But I'm excitedto finally get here. And
probably even more so if I'mbeing authentic with you and
being honest with you is thatthis is a topic that I've really
been wrestling with a lot overthe last few weeks, really. A
lot of thoughts swirling aroundin my head as to how to present
this one to you.
What's the best way to lay itout, how do we build upon it as
(02:16):
we lay this out? And so it'sbeen tricky and the reason is,
it's such a deep and rich andmeaty topic. You will see once
we get into it today that thisone can go in so many different
directions, it's gonna have somany different aspects to it
that it's hard to get startedand hard to really figure out
what I want to focus on. But Ithink I've figured that out
(02:38):
today and so I'm excited. As Imentioned, this will be a multi
episode topic that we're goingto be covering and I'm really
excited to get to it today.Finally, as we open I got some
timely feedback, actually todayon the podcast. And by the way,
for everyone that's offeredfeedback.
Thank you so much. It's beenhumbling, again, incredibly
(02:58):
powerful. I'm just wild, but Igot some timely feedback from my
old college buddy Scott. Today,and he said this I wanted to
share it with you and tie it towhat we've been talking about.
He said, the podcast reallymakes me think and then want to
take action. So keep assigningthe homework and keep bringing
the practical examples because Ireally liked those. And so it
(03:21):
made me think about this is theessence of what I'm trying to do
with the podcast is I want tomake you think. So, I want to
share new concepts and newframework that has you stop and
reflect and generate some newthinking for you. And then out
of that, it will likely expandhow you see your world your
reality.
And then you're going to beinspired usually to take a new
(03:44):
action, literally a new actionwill show up for you that
probably wasn't there before.Then it's up to you to put that
into practice. And as we talkedabout, learning is time in
practice. So practicing thatwill be important if you want to
create growth. I loved Scott'sfeedback because it really
helped me realize I'm hittingthe mark. That's the mark I'm
(04:05):
looking for with us to provokenew thinking and inspire you to
take new action. So it's alwaysvalidating to get feedback like
that and actually, that kind ofmoves us into our topic today
because it's at the core offeedback.
But not only that, it's at thecore of so much more of what's
going on, I think in our worldtoday. And I would say so much
(04:25):
of what we're suffering with somuch of the drama and so on.
I'll talk about that a littlemore here in a second. So, to
begin today's conversation. Iwant to remind you of the three
circles we talked about in aprevious episode. Human beings
we are bundles of language,emotion and body. That's what
I've been calling our way ofbeing the observer that we are.
(04:46):
So today we're going to take adeeper dive back into language
and the way that I'm going to dothat is I'm going to introduce
you to. Two of the most powerfulspeech acts, that I mentioned
before these are calledAssessments and Assertions, and
I want to begin sharing ideasabout how the these play out in
our lives.
Both in ways that I think arereally helpful and empowering
(05:09):
and work really well and thenoftentimes in ways where we
suffer and that aredisempowering, causes a lot of
challenges. So today, what Iwant to do is I want to cover
first is just the basicfundamental distinction by
giving you a couple sentencesand contrasting those two. And
then, if we have time, I want tothen explore what I think are
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three key aspects in terms ofthe way that we apply this or
use this in our lives, and in away that often will create
suffering for us. Which is a lotof what I'm trying to do here in
this podcast is help eliminatethe unnecessary suffering in
your lives.
And so again, I said, if we havetime because this conversation
is going to stretch aboutAssessments and Assertions over
(05:54):
multiple episodes. So, I'm gonnamonitor the title we'll see
where we get today, and as Imentioned before, and I want to
reiterate, the challenge withtalking about this topic is I
think it has so many tentaclesinto our day to day lives it's
underneath, so much of oursuffering in life. I think are
upset for ourselves and areupset and challenges in our
(06:17):
relationships. The drama, Ithink in our culture is deeply
rooted in this concept whichyou'll get here in a minute. I
think the fundamental tensionsbetween people. This concept is
rooted in that so it's has somany tentacles into our day to
day lives, that I think it'sjust time we launch into this.
I want to equip you with newlanguage tools to start noticing
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what's happening here andhopefully, more importantly, to
begin to ship this so let'sbegin. The way that I introduced
this language distinction isbetween these two speech acts is
to give you two sentences. Okay,here they are, I am a man, I am
stupid and then to ask thequestion, what's the difference
between these two statements?And historically, if I have any
(07:02):
women in the audience of aworkshop when I show these two
sentences, I'm a man, I'mstupid, what's the difference?
They often will start laughingand saying there is no
difference, we won. It'sobvious, right? Which is, let's
bring some levity which I thinkis kind of nice. But when I
really ask people so really,what is the difference?
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Grammatically, they're the same,they start with I am but then
they branch out with just a keyword but it's hugely different
and we need to understand thatwe need to begin to hold them
separate in our thinking and inour conversations. So again, the
sentences are, I'm a man, I'mstupid. The difference is many
people will say is the ones offact once an opinion. Sometimes
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they'll say one subjective, onesobjective, sometimes they'll say
one's reality, and the other isperception, that kind of thing.
So all those words are correct.For today's conversation, let's
go with this. Probably the mostunderstandable way to talk about
it is, I am a man is a fact. Iam stupid is an opinion or a judgement.
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So,I want to also say right now,I'm mindful of the time in which
I'm introducing this with youknow, we have conversations
about gender identification andthat sort of thing. But I wanted
to introduce it in the way thatI learned it 30 years ago, and I
don't wanna get caught up inthat notion and missed the
point. So the point here Ithink, is understanding the
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difference between factualstatements and opinions. So,
let's talk about the firststatement. I'm a man, it's
called a fact, we call theseassertions. So what are some
other assertions? I am five foot11 and a half inches tall.
What's the nature of assertion?So let's talk about that right
now. Things like I am five feet11 inches tall, I weighed 206
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pounds, I live at this address,I drive this car, I own my own
business, could be an assertion.
It's 74 degrees outside, I livein Nashville, Tennessee. There
are men there are women in theroom sometimes, so these are
assertion statements. So what'sthe nature of an assertion? That
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can be proven true or false byall observers. So these kinds of
statements we're calling facts,stripped out the difference in
the way that we see things.Which is something we
fundamentally talked about inone of the other episodes is
that we're all unique observers.I see what I see, based on my
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history, my background, all thefactors that have shaped my
life, and it's not 100%. I'llnever find another observer on
the planet that's 100% likey,like myself. So, this is what I
talked about when I say thesimple expression if you're ever
in a relationship, you realizewe don't see things the same
way.
Assertion strip that out, we canall measure the assertion. When
I'll talk about that a littlemore when we transition over to
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I make an assertion in life, Ishould be able to provide
evidence that it's true, or itsfalse and so it is the objective
the other statement. So, thoseare assertions factual
statements of our life. Theseare factual statements,
statements. Let's shift gears tothe other senates, I'm stupid
hopefully that makes sense. Sowhen we talk about the power of
because this is the morepowerful one, this is the one
language, like we did the firstepisode. I said language is
that we're using that we oftendon't see how we're using it,
generative and creative, notjust passive and descriptive.
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This really is the passive anddescriptive element of language.
We'd make an assertion aboutsomething and it's describing it
and it just kind of sits therereally doesn't affect the
future.
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that's creating a lot of messes.So, I am stupid, or I'm smart,
these are opinions, these arejudgments, these are
perceptions, these areinterpretations. So, the fact
might be it's 74 degrees inNashville. The assessment is it
a good day or is it a bad day?Is it beautiful weather or is it
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nasty whether? Those areassessment. Words like stupid,
smart, is this person fat? Arethey skinny, are they an
extrovert, are they anintrovert? Do they have
confidence or did they lackconfidence? Are they arrogant,
are they assertive, are they toolaid back and are they a
pushover?
All of these are assessmentwords and so, I want to contrast
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these with assertions in acouple of different ways.
Remember, we said thatassertions, always provable true
false assessments are never trueor false. They can't be, they
always depend upon the personmaking them they always depend
upon the person that'sobserving. You and your friend
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might be listening to thispodcast in your car, and you
finish the episode and you go,man, that was fantastic. That
was the best episode ever andyour friend goes, that was
terrible. I liked episode two,much better. This one was awful.
What's the truth? The truth is,it was just episode 7.
One observer sees it isfantastic, one sees it is awful.
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There's a truth about it's justtwo different observers drawing
two different assessments, whereassertions are measurable and
objective assessments are notmeasurable, they are subjective.
This is the gray area in life.Again, they're never true or
false, they always depend uponthe observer making them.
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However, what's one of the keyaspects to assessments is where
assertions are descriptive andkind of sit there, assessments
could be regarded as one of ourmost generative aspects,
creative aspects of language,because they move us into the
future with others.
They move us into the futurewith ourselves, the way you
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assess yourself and othersstarts to, bring forth an
identity or a way of looking atsomeone that generates a future
with them and often we sort oftunnel into that way of
assessing ourselves or othersand we miss a whole lot of other
evidence, a whole lot of otherbehavior and I'll try to explain
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this more as we go. But for now,a few other thoughts about
assessment. Human beings areassessment machines, we're
judgment machines, that's whatwe do. We judge. And I'm not
saying that we can stop doingthis, I'm not offering that.
It's really kind of constitutiveof who we are. As human beings,
we're language beings, we willalways assess, in fact, that
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would say, you have to assess inorder to do life. It's just
begin to notice how we'reassessing and in a way it's like
is that working for you are notworking for you in the way that
I'm assessing myself and others.
For example, if you're married,you had to assess all the people
that you didn't marry up to thispoint as that's not the person.
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And then you assess this one isthis is the person other
assessments, you have to assesson a simplistic level, is it
safe for me to cross the streetright now? And we assess and
away we go. If it is or itisn't, you had to assess to take
the job that you took the careeryou're taking. It we're
constantly assessing it juststart to notice how we, how you,
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assess and that there's a lot tobe learned in that.
I think as we move through theworld day in day out, we're
assessing. Sometimes it'snegative, which is an assessment
in and of itself, sometimes it'spositive. You start to notice
the assessor that you are. Doyou tend to make lots of
negative critical assessmentsand judgments about yourself and
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other people? Or do you tend tohave a different flavor, more of
an assessment of the positive? Isee the positive and things
that's fundamentally about theobserver that you are. Human
beings or assessment machines,we can't stop.
But we need to start noticing,because they have power to shape
the future. That's the key piecethat I want you to understand.
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They have huge power, and in forus, one of the ways I was
trained, and one of the mostpowerful aspects of assessments
is what we call a linguistictrap. So what does that mean?
That means we assess, we assess,we assess, and then the moment
you begin to collapse these twoassessments and assertions, and
you hold your assessments as ifthey're an assertion, as if
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they're the truth, you're stuckor the other person is stuck. We
often put other people in a boxthey can't get out of because we
begin assessing them early on,we assess them similarly often
in a negative way, sometimespositive and negative.
And we put them in a box theycan't get out of because it
starts to funnel the way we lookat them. In every encounter we
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have with them, now we want tovalidate our previous
assessment. And y'all listen, wedo the same thing with ourselves
and the dangerous ones I'll justsay to you right now are the
negative assessments we holdabout ourselves, and over time
begin to think they are thetruth, or the negative ones we
hold about other importantpeople in our lives and begin to
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believe they are the truth aswell. It literally orient us to
the world in a different way. SoI call this, a linguistic trap.
It's one of the powerful thingswe do is collapsing assessments
and assertions, so there areways to characterize the kind of
person that does that.
And so they're expressions likethis, that I've often use, how
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many of you know the personthat's my way or the highway?
The way I see it is the way itis, and the way you see it,
unfortunately, is wrong. I oftenbring my father back into the
conversation that reallydefining relationship, I often
have spoken and assessed him andspoken about him as one of the
most self righteous human beingsI've met on the planet. And I
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say that, not as strongly as Iused to but, it's a
characterization. I assess himthat way because my father's
primary commitment, I believe inlife was to be right. And so,
self righteous people, I think,are doing this collapsing a lot
holding their assessments, theirview of things as if it's the
(17:20):
truth or the facts. I remember Iwould have a conversation with
him, and he might listen.
And they'd say, well Mark, look,the reality of the situation is
this. And he would present hisassessment as if it were the
truth. And there's somethingthat happens or something that's
generated there in relationshipswith other human beings, when
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you have a tendency to do thatall the time. You think your way
is the right way and others arewrong. It's a huge cost to this,
okay? And so I'm going to expandon that a little more later but,
I want you to start to get thisidea, and I want to paint a
picture for, like how ourassertions just sitting there
not really impacting the future,but assessment heavily impact
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the future. I'll give you acouple examples.
One, let's imagine you meetsomeone new, and you meet them,
you come into a meeting withthem. Let's imagine you're at
work, or you're in a socialsetting, and you get introduced
someone and you meet them, guesswhat we do we start assessing,
that's what we do. Or sometimeswe're so worried about how
they're assessing us. We'rehaving a private conversation
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with ourselves assessingourselves negatively, and we're
not even present in theconversation. But let's imagine
we're able to do that and westart assessing the other person
and I meet, let's say Susie, andI think wow, she's nice, and she
seems friendly.
But wow, few times there, sheseemed a little bit hard headed
and stubborn and a little bitrude in terms of our
(18:46):
interaction. And I go away inthe social setting, and I'd meet
other people or I hang out withmy friends or I leave the
meeting. And then a few dayslater, let's say I run into
Susie again at work or at homeand have interactions with her
and all of a sudden there it is,again, there's that kind of
stubbornness, that hardheaded usand there she was being rude
again. What starts to happen isbecause we're patterning our
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assessments is now I'm going tostart looking at Susy a certain
way and in every futureencounter, I'm going to start
looking to validate thatassessment that I've made, and I
might miss other evidence.
And maybe more dangerously, whatI was talking about, is if I do
the linguistic trap. I put herin a box, is I hold my
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assessments now after a coupleencounters as if they are the
truth about her. And then maybemore dangerously, if anybody
ever stopped and asked me whatdo you think of Suzy, I say this
is who she is, and this is theway that she is. So I'm speaking
my assessments and telling thisperson this is a fact about her,
this is the way she is and it'snot. So that's what I meant
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about. How often have youassessed people in your life?
Similarly, over a couple ofencounters, or maybe just the
first encounter, and you putthem now in a box, that they
can't get out of because youhold that as the truth about
them. That's your picture ofthem, and then more dangerously,
you might go start sharing thatwith other people as if that's
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the way they are.
And you preload the other personto assess them that way when
they meet them. That's at theheart of prejudice and we'll
talk about that, at some pointin the future as well. So I'm
branching into a few differentareas. But I think you get the
sense, I want you to startnoticing, am I assessing here
judging? Or am I asserting isthat a fact and start holding
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them separate? That's the veryfirst step here is we've got to
see the difference. Nevercollapse them and hold them as
separate. It can dramaticallychange the way we have
conversations with others in theway we have conversations in our
head with ourselves. Because ifyou think about it, to build on
this, who's the person we oftenassess the most? Ourselves, and
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who's the person we oftennegatively assess the most,
ourselves, we're often harder onourselves, and speak to
ourselves in ways that we wouldnever allow other people to.
And there's a cost to this,y'all. We suffer because of
this. So give me anotherexample, relating to others
assessing us but also how weassess ourselves. It's a story I
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heard when I learned this. It'scalled The Little Johnny Story.
So imagine you're little Johnny,and you're in third grade math
class. And you're sitting,you've had a rough night, you're
tired, and you're rambunctiousgot a lot of energy trying to
burn off, so you're making a lotof noise, talking out loud,
interrupting thing, and finally,the teacher says little Johnny,
you always need to do this.You're always behaving stupidly,
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that's enough. I've had it. Goto the principal's office.
That's it. I'm done. sent you tothe principal's office, and you
moped down to the principal'soffice. You walk in a little
Johnny, you walk in as littleJohnny and the principal
sequences, little Johnny, whatstupid thing have you done now?
Why are you sitting here in myoffice yet again? And you tell
your story, and they've alreadytalked to the teacher and like,
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look, I've had it, can't handlethis stupidness you got to go
home, so you get sent home. Thisis a makeup scenario, obviously,
but stay with me. You get senthome and you're at home, and
you're, you have an oldersister, she's not home yet. And
you think ah you know, I want togo in there and get her iPod and
play some music.
So you go get it and you'replaying music and she comes home
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and she looking for iPods, shecan't find it just comes in your
room, little Johnny. She seesthat you have the iPad. You
stupid little kid, give me theiPad get out of here. Wow, tough
day. The day continues your momand dad get home and and they're
preparing dinner and you thinkwow, it's been a rough day, I'm
gonna try to help. So you'rehelping in the kitchen, and then
(22:44):
all of a sudden, you happen tobe carrying a plate from the
kitchen to the dining room tableand you drop it. Plate shatters
food spills everywhere. Yourmom's had a rough, little
Johnny, how could you dosomething so stupid? Clean it
up.
And we'll figure out what we'regonna do for dinner. Maybe your
dad chimes in, here we go, yetagain, doing that thing, you do
that stupid thing. I'm beingdramatic here, but there are
(23:06):
different versions of this, butyou get where I'm going. Now,
let's imagine you actuallyhappen to graduate from high
school, but you've been hearingthat same message or some
version of that for years andyears. Now you're, you graduated
from high school, you go towork, let's say, get a job and
you decide, I'm going to do thebest I can. You're working hard.
And you are working hard, andyou realize that, hey, your
(23:29):
supervisor of your departmentleft, and they're going to hire
a new supervisor. And they saywe want to promote from within.
If you think you're qualified,put in your application. Will
you ever put in yourapplication? Nope. Why? Because
you're stupid. Because you'reholding an assessment, like it's
the truth because it's a messageyou heard over and over again in
(23:49):
life. And it went from maybeothers saying that to you to now
you're saying it to yourself.Holding the assessment of I'm
stupid, I can't possibly applyfor the leadership position
because I'm stupid and if I do,everyone will find out. Okay.
And so that's the cost, that'sthe danger of this is it plays
(24:11):
out into the future. So wordslike assessment where it's like
stupid or smart, are you shy?Are you extroverted? All these,
are beliefs we have in our headassessments we make about
ourselves, and then we hold themto be the truth.
And they get in the way of ourtaking action in life that we
may want to take because we nowcontinually self assess, and we
(24:33):
trap ourselves and we don't takethe action we want in our life.
We suffer with it. I think thatexample makes sense. So, what am
I saying about assessments andassertions. We have to be
willing to keep and start tokeep them separate from what
they're not the same. We have tonotice how we've been talking to
ourselves and those negativethings you've thought were the
(24:53):
truth about you that can't bechanged, have never been the
truth. And you can change, youcan grow. And then we'll talk
about ways to do this in futureepisodes.
don't collapse them? Well,here's the relationship. They
actually can marry together,quite helpfully, where we say,
(25:18):
assertions are always provable,true or false assessments are
never true or false. They'reeither grounded or ungrounded.
So what does that mean? A wellgrounded assessment means you
notice how you assess yourselfand you have facts, assertions,
to support that you canliterally give me measurable
provable actions or behaviors,or data that supports either a
(25:41):
positive or a negativeassessment, that's considered a
well grounded assessment.
An ungrounded assessment oftenis what we'll find, especially
in our negative assessmentsabout ourselves. Because we just
assessed it somewhere along theway, we held it to be the truth,
and we, there's often, one datapoint, one factual event in our
life, or maybe none. But it's anassessment we've made, and we're
(26:02):
holding on to it like, it's thetruth, that's called an
ungrounded assessment. A lot oftimes as a coach, my role with
my clients is personally andprofessionally, is to help them
examine their assessments andrealize which ones are really
ungrounded and it loosens thingsup, it gives them a freedom to
start to hold.
way it is, and it'll neverchange. They begin to realize
(26:29):
there's possibility for growthhere, because they realize it's
an ungrounded assessment. So,another key point. Be willing to
update your assessments aboutyourself or others at any time,
especially about others, buteven yourself. When given
evidence of new behavior andothers, which requires you to
(26:52):
step back and expand how you'reviewing the other important
people in your life, be willingto get off your assessment and
loosen its hold, and update itwhen it's warranted.
And many of us struggle. Weliterally don't know how to
update our pattern, habitual wayof thinking about others and
ourselves. Our pattern habitualway of assessing, because we
(27:13):
haven't had this distinction upuntil now. So, I think it's just
can be incredibly freeing to seethe difference and understand,
there is opportunity here tohold them separate, I can update
my assessment at any time aboutothers of myself and help
generate literally a new realityor a new future. So, I hope that
(27:34):
way of painting the picturemakes sense. There's so much
more I'll say about it in otherepisodes, but let me touch on,
what I think are three keyaspects of this, that I want to
talk with you first about.Probably because they've been
really powerful and impactful inmy life.
They're not necessarily theright order, again, not an
assertion, but, I just thinkthey're powerful to introduce
(27:55):
now. So the first one is,related to this piece up and
talking about with the languagetrap, the moment we look at
things we assess, we assess, weassess, and we hold it to be the
truth. There's something biggerthan just that instance, going
on in our culture and I think insome other cultures, but it's
very characteristic of theAmerican culture. And it's like
(28:15):
a larger, we call it abackground conversation. A
background soup of languagethat's going on for Americans,
some just like we grew up in it.
We may not have even been taughtit but it just gets in our bones
by virtue of the fact that weare Americans. We grew up in it
and it's called this, it'scalled the, I'm right.
(28:37):
Background conversation. Oranother version of it you may
have heard before, it's I'drather be right than happy. It's
the classic case of where wehold our assessments as if
they're right, and if othershave a different one than us, we
make them wrong. They are wrong.Okay. And so literally the way I
(28:57):
was taught this, it's this is akiller conversation. We
literally are killing eachother. We go to war and we kill
people. It's been going on forcenturies. Give you plenty of
examples, but it's alsohappening today, I think, and
then most likely in the IsraeliPalestinian issue, is both sides
are convinced they're right andthe other is wrong.
(29:17):
And they're willing to kill oneanother for it. I think it's
almost at the root of any timewe've ever ward with one another
we kill other human beings isoften there's this I'm right,
you're wrong. So it's a hugebackground conversation,
particularly Americans andprobably other cultures are
rooted in and we may talk moreabout why it is, but, it's a
(29:37):
killer conversation. It'sdangerous. Even we hold it this
way about ourselves. This is theright way to think or the wrong
way to think. This is the rightway to act or the wrong way to
act. Again, it's making anassessment about a gray area,
gray territory, not factualterritory, but subjective
(29:57):
territory and putting the rightrules old template on it.
And it traps us. I'll talk aboutthat a little more in a second.
So, here's a catchy saying Iheard. So, as it relates to this
concept and relationships, youcan be right, or you can be in
relationship, but you can't haveboth. That was the cost with my
father is he was, in myexperience a very righteous
(30:20):
person, he and I were verydifferent observers of the
world, we saw things verydifferently, which is fine, it
happens. But his commitment tobeing right all the time, made
me wrong constantly, when Iwould offer my perspective on
things, and eventually I juststopped offering, I shut down, I
got quiet, because that didn'twant to be made wrong anymore.
(30:41):
And I think most of us don'twant to hang out with other
people that make us wrong allthe time. We just don't. So talk
about it these days, if our goalin relationship is to connect
with others, feel close orunderstanding or get along with
others this, I'm right, you'rewrong, conversation won't work.
(31:01):
It's a killer conversation,didn't work with me and my
father. And so I'm especiallyattuned to that these days, I do
my best not to be righteous orbe right about things but I also
get trapped in it from time totime. I got trapped in it in my
marriage, with my ex wife, attimes, because it just that's
the soup, I grew up in myfamily.
And it got on me, I think manyof us have realized, in some
(31:24):
ways, we become our parents overtime, and we start doing some of
the very thing, same things, wecouldn't stand about them,
because it's in us if we don'tpay attention. So, the another
piece that I touched on, as itrelates to this piece is just
this, right? Rakaat the rightwrong template. What I've
noticed in our culture is, whenI work with my clients,
(31:45):
especially often theirhesitation, their struggles,
their challenges or issues isaround, I don't want to do the
wrong thing.
Or, I want to do the rightthing, I don't want to do the
wrong thing, or they're inrelationships, and they're
getting made wrong, or they'remaking other people wrong. And
usually what I'll discover isthat the territory we're talking
(32:06):
about, it's all gray area, it'ssubjective. And so, in a way,
what I'm saying is, anyassessments you have, are legit
and valid, they come from theobserver that you are. I'm not
saying that they're the best, orother people don't have better
ones in you, I'm just saying,they are legit and valid
assessments. But they are neverright or wrong. They're never
(32:30):
the truth and so to have yourthinking, or your speaking or
the way you interact withothers.
When you put the right roletemplate on top of assessments,
it kills things, it creates atrap. It creates a lot of
suffering, so often will say tomy clients, I think you're using
a template that won't work tohelp you get out of this
(32:51):
situation. It won't help us inour coaching conversation to
help you come up with an answer,that you want, and an action you
want to take to solve this orpotentially solve it. And it
won'thelp you in your thinkingbut because it'll just trap you
it's we're using a template andapplying it to an area where it
doesn't apply. Right wrong canbe applied to assertions,
(33:12):
factual stuff, right? And weoften say notice these days,
Americans we are quick to say,right?
That's our way of validating.But like two plus two equals
four, that's an assertion. It'sa true assertion, and it's
right. Two plus two equals five.It's a false assertion. It's
wrong. So right, wrong appliesthere. But it doesn't apply in
(33:33):
what's the best way to behavehere. What's the best way to
treat someone? What's the bestproduct to buy? What's the best
way to do this thing or thatthing? I think you get what I'm
talking about. It doesn't applyto that situation. It's all
assessment land.
The last thing I'll say aboutthis one is just if you look at
what's going on our culture, Ithink about TV shows that I've
(33:56):
watched at times or debate showsor talk shows, in my view, my
assessment is they typicallywill get two very different
observers to come on and talkabout a controversial topic.
Both being righteous about theirperspective, and they'll turn
them loose, and they'll justprompt them with something
triggering and let them go.
And the conversation justdevolves into I'm right. You're
(34:19):
wrong. No, I'm right, you'rewrong. And that conversation
takes us nowhere. I think thisis at the heart of our inability
in our culture, probablypolitically and in other arenas
to solve some of our deeplyentrenched issues that are
around gray territory, isbecause both sides are dug in
(34:39):
and more committed to beingright than they are to resolving
things connecting comingtogether and working things out.
And we could talk about manydifferent arenas where this
shows up but for now, I justwant you to see the power of
this first aspect of thisbackground conversation and
super swimming in that I thinkcauses a lot of suffering.
(35:00):
So I invite you to look at, areyou that person. are you doing
that in your own life withothers, and maybe it's time to
stop? Maybe it's time tounderstand, wait a minute, I've
got my view, they've got theirs.This hasn't worked for me to
make them wrong, it's time forme to start asking better
questions and start deeplylistening. And maybe most
(35:20):
importantly, is time to noticehow critically you are assessing
yourself, and begin to separatethese and begin to change the
conversation you're having withyourself. Okay, so that's the
first of the three key pieces.The second one is this
assessments, as I said, arenever true or false.
They have an aspect of themabout authority. What do I mean
(35:42):
by that? Who do you giveauthority to assess you in your
life? Now, another more commonway to say that is whose
opinions judgments about you, doyou give weight? Do you grant
weight and then how do you actbased on that? So, we talk about
in terms of whose opinions doyou grant authority. So, when I
talk about this, I like to painta visual picture, imagine a
(36:05):
horizontal line to a shorthorizontal line, and on the left
end of the line is 0%. And onthe right end of the line is
100%. So meaning, on the leftside, if you're 0%, all the way
on a spectrum to 100%, all thepercentages in between.
So start on the left side, ifyou give 0% of people's
(36:28):
assessments authority. It meansbasically, you don't give a shit
what anybody else thinks. Yougive nobody's opinion, any way
you will consider it, you'regonna do what you're gonna do,
and that's it. So, we mightassess or characterize that
person is self absorbed,narcissistic, arrogant, or a lot
of different assessment words wecan make about that. Someone who
(36:50):
gives nobody else's opinionanyway, we go all the way the
other end, which is dangerous, Ibelieve my assessment. I think
we've seen examples of this, wego all the way to the other end,
someone who gives 100% of otherpeople's authorities,
assessments authority.
Now, what's happening there,here, I am moving through my
day, and I encounter my friendand they say, your hair looks
(37:12):
ridiculous. And I go, oh mygosh, I better go back to the
house and change my hair. Andthen I'm back out in the day and
someone says, that's the wrongsoft drink to drink and I'm
having lunch with somebody,that's clearly the wrong soft
drink. And so, I throw it awayand I go get a different one. Or
I run into someone later andthey say, you know, that's
absurd the way that you're doingthat, or the way that you said
(37:35):
that, and I'm giving them fullauthority, their opinion has all
the weight.
Now I've got to go change, I'vegot to go, immediately stopped
doing what I was doing could dosomething different. I hope this
makes sense because like you'regiving everyone's opinion, wait.
So as you move through your day,because everybody's a different
observer, and you're gonna getdifferent opinions, you're gonna
(37:56):
be swaying in the wind. We mightcharacterize this person as a
doormat a pushover, someone whogives everybody else's opinion
weight and then acts upon it.They have no sense of their own
self and their own assessmentsand stand in their own
assessments about themselves andit's okay to stand strongly in
your opinions.
It's just make sure as I saidbefore, that you've examined and
So I asked the question, I thinkboth ends are dangerous. Where
(38:18):
they have some grounding, youhave facts to back them up. You
can have some conversations toshare your assessments, support
do you want to be? Whose opiniondo you want to let matter? And
him with your perspective,invite and listen to other
people's assessments, ask themto ground theirs. And then we
so many people will initially goright in the middle? I would say
can have a healthy productiveconversation, hopefully to reach
a resolution. But as it relatesto who you grant authority, if
I don't think so. By experienceand life has been I want to
(38:39):
you're all the way 100%, you'rescrewed, truly, I mean, it's
going to be a rough lifetime.
actually be further down to theleft side closer to zero. I
think maybe granting 10 to 15%of the people in your life
assessments, inviting them andgranting them authority, people
(39:07):
you trust that you think aregood observers, and you want to
know their opinion.
So you're choosy about who youinvite feedback from? Not
everybody, because look, we livein a culture of tons of
assessments, everybody's gonnahave their opinion, their
(39:28):
judgment and it's just that it'snever the truth. So, it's like
be choosy. So what am I sayingabout what I've discovered for
myself, and the very confidentpeople I've met in life. They're
well grounded in their ownassessments, their old self
assessments about themselves,they have very well grounded
assessments, lots of facts toback them up about who they are,
(39:50):
who they are not.
They have a confidence aboutthemselves what they can do,
what they can't do. The kind ofperson they are what they bring
to themselves and relationshipsand the kind of person they're
not, and they're usually open totalking about it. They're often
very transparent and authentic.So they're choosy, they don't
disregard anybody's feedback,but they are choosy about the
(40:12):
feedback they invite, and whenthey do, they seriously consider
it. Okay, in terms of howthey're showing up to other
people, and especiallysignificant people and it might
be time to make a change.
So that's the second key piece Iwanted to talk with you about,
maybe it's time to look at whoyou've been granting authority
and change that up. I literallyhave met people who are in their
40s, and 50s and they're stillgranting their 70 and 80 year
(40:39):
old parents authority to assessthem in areas that they're not
qualified and so they'regenerating drama, upset, they're
suffering, they're changingtheir lives, there's just a lot
of upset, because they're givingtoo much authority to people in
their lives. Maybe it's time foryou to take back some of that
(41:00):
authority, so to speak. And thelast piece, I know we're getting
a little lengthy here, but Iwant to finish this up.
We have more time to discussthis later. But the third piece
is the idea of stories. So whatdo I mean by that? Human beings
are assessment machines, as Isaid, we constantly assess you
won't stop doing that. But whatwe tend to do is over time we
assess ourselves or others. Andwe start to weave those
(41:23):
assessments together into astory about ourselves, or other
people, we just do it, it's ourway of making sense, putting
things in certain places. But westart to make up a story about
ourselves and others. And thatagain, that story, because it's
mostly assessment will have afuture impact, it will shape
things it will affect things. Sowe're storytelling beings.
(41:46):
We make up stories, it'simportant. Talking about leaders
are really good storytellers.They create powerful stories in
which people can follow them andthrive and create great action.
But stories are at the heart ofwhether we thrive or we suffer,
so start noticing again. Whatare the story? What's the story
you're living in about yourself?What's possible in your life?
(42:09):
What is it possible, who youare, who you're not? Another way
to think of a story is yournarrative, that's a common word
people use well, what's thenarrative you have about
yourself or other people? Andagain, one of the most dangerous
things we can ever do is weavetogether assessments into a
story to make sense of thingsand then hold that like it's the
truth about that person orourselves because then we're
(42:33):
stuck, then change is notpossible.
So, I invite you to look, haveyou been telling powerful
stories about yourself, othersin your life? Your life, what's
possible? What's so in thepresent or have you been living
in some disempowering stories?Some stories that you've trapped
yourself and closedpossibilities? Is it time to
(42:56):
examine the story you've beentelling and update that story to
a more grounded, and poweringstories so you can move forward
in life take more effectiveaction. Okay, and so I'll kind
of wrap this piece up with thisnotion I've often thought of
when I'm talking about storiesand how we tell stories that in
a way, our life is a blank sheetof paper.
(43:17):
You've got the pin, you'rewriting the story, you're
writing the assessments.Do youwant to write? You are the age
you are you have a past, youcan't change it. But what's the
story you want to tell aboutyour past up till now and your
future? You're writing it, youget to decide what you write on
that piece of paper, that's howlanguage comes into play. So how
(43:38):
about writing a grounded,authentic, and empowering story
doesn't mean bad things haven'thappened, as opposed to a
disempowering story that willcause you to suffer. That's my
point, and I think I mentionedit earlier. I'm not sure but in
many ways, I think of coaching.Really good coaches are story
busters. We invite our clientsto talk about their challenges,
(44:02):
issues.
We listen to their stories, wedraw out their stories and then
we parse them, we have them takea look at them and see which
part of the story are youcreating that is helpful and
which part do we want? Updateand let go of, so, I like the
notion that in many aspects,coaches are story busters. And
(44:22):
that's often where the growth isin our coaching is in helping
clients change their story, to amore empowering story but also
stories that are grounded infacts. This isn't rose colored
glasses, this isn't dismissingthe facts of your life. It's
blending them with theassessments and stories of your
life in an authentic way thatyou can grab a hold of and
(44:45):
embrace, so that it has you bemore powerful in your life.
So I think I want to stop there.We're well into the episode
today. So, let me give you justa quick summary of key points.
We make the distinction of anassessment, a judgment, opinion
and an assertion of fact,assertions are always true,
false kind of sit there don't domuch for the future. Assessments
(45:09):
never true false, always dependupon the observer making them,
but have huge impact on thefuture are incredibly powerful.
Humans are assessment machines,so maybe it's time to be willing
to examine and update yourassessments.
We also talked about a versionof that when we hold our
assessments as if theirassertions with the larger
(45:31):
background conversation,particularly in America but
other countries, I'm right orI'd rather be right than happy.
It's a killer conversation toremember what I said, you can be
right or you can be inrelationship, but you can't have
both and I know that's a cliche,but I think it lands for people.
We then talked about who do yougive the authority to assess you
(45:52):
or judge you? Look, people aregoing to assess you, they always
have, and they always will.
Don't be afraid of theirassessments because they're
never the truth. Do not beafraid of anybody else's
assessment about you, becauseit's not speaking to your truth
or the truth of who you are.It's just their experience of
you and the way they've assessedor judged you. Just be choosy
(46:14):
about whose assessments youinvite about you and be more
well grounded in your own selfassessments, that's where I
found I've been more confidentin my life, and others that I
think are confident are reallywell grounded in who they are
And the last piece is, stories,the weaving of assessments
and who they're not.
(46:35):
together into a story, is ittime to examine your story and
alter part of it, or a lot of it? In a way that would be more
empowering for you. Are someaspects of it disempowering and
not working for you and holdingyou back in life are getting in
your way, or you're suffering?Is it time to shift it, it's
time to rewrite the story. Sothat's it, those are the key
(46:57):
points. So your homework, what'syour homework? I like to offer
homework is, step one. Now youhave the distinction of an
assessment, versus an assertion,start to notice how these show
up in your thinking, in yourspeaking, and even probably more
so in how others are using them.
And don't do the language trap.Like hold them separately. My
(47:20):
clients talk sometimes aboutliterally using the lingo of the
go from not saying anything,when they offer their opinion or
being righteous about it tousing the words in my
assessment. This is what I thinkabout this thing. In my view,
this is what I think about thisthing, but you may have a
different one, I'd love to hearyours. So, literally just using
(47:43):
the wording, the language of inmy assessment, they have
remarked for years how thatchanges their conversations with
themselves and more importantlywith others loosens a hold and
it opens up an ability tocommunicate, that's much better.
Another piece of homework mightbe, here's an assignment for
you. Reflect and write down whatare your top three assessments
(48:04):
you have about yourself? Wemight call those your strengths?
What are your top three negativeassessments, we might call those
your weaknesses? And now can yousee that none of those are the
truth about you, they never havebeen. Maybe someone negatively
assessed you along the way,frequently, and you gave it
great authority and now youbelieve it's your biggest
(48:25):
weakness and it's true, and itnever has been.
So it's time to loosen the holdof it, you can actually start to
shift these in the future.Another thing I'll offer you as
homework is maybe now that youknow this is practice talking to
yourself more positively day inand day out. See if you can't
both notice how you've beenassessing but then start
(48:47):
assessing yourself more caringwith more grace, over these next
few weeks. Be more positive withyour language. I want to close
with this idea of look, humanbeings aren't broken and they
don't need to be fixed. They'renot, we aren't like things that
break and need to be fixed.Those are linguistic terms we've
used that I think trap us interms of what's possible in our
(49:11):
life.
We just need to learn to uselanguage more responsibly,
understanding assessments,assertions, working with that
more powerfully. So, we can seeour greatness actually, that I
believe is in everybody. We canwipe off some of the stories,
the mud of the stories thatwe've layered on over our
lifetime and open up some newpossibilities for our lives. And
(49:35):
there may be areas where weassess and we realize, that's
not who I want to be and so wego about making change. So we
thrive. Okay, so that's it fortoday. We will build on this
with more in future episodes,but I'm just gonna wrap with the
thought that I often will wrapwith and then a closing sort of
(49:55):
thought be well, over the nextcouple of weeks practice In
whatever way fits for you, begentle with yourself.
Be gentle with your assessmentsof yourself. Maybe be willing to
update your assessments aboutothers in your life, you have
relationships where they're notwhere you want them to be. Maybe
it's time to reassess and gohave some new conversations with
(50:17):
them. And the final thought,I'll close with this, this kind
of like this idea. We live hars,but we live in a sea of
assessments about things we knownothing about. We are constantly
assessing often about peopleareas, things, that we aren't
even a part of that are notoccurring that are not happening
(50:38):
in our day to day life.
But that doesn't stop us frommaking assessments about it, and
more dangerously holding ourassessments like they're the
truth, like we're right. Okay,it doesn't stop us from having
opinions and often holding themas facts. And you know, what
they say about everybody has anopinion. So, be well, take good
(50:58):
care of yourself. Assess gently,yourself and others and I look
forward to talking with youagain in future episodes.
Well, my friends, that's a wrapfor today. I'm so grateful you
join me and hope you feelenergized by the insights we
took a deeper look at together.If anything resonated with you
or inspired new thinking, dropme a note. I'd love to hear your
(51:20):
biggest takeaway. Please join menext time, as we dive deeper
into this never ending journeyof self discovery. Until then,
be well be present, live fullyand authentically. Wake up and
pay attention.
Welcome to Wake Up And PayAttention, the podcast fueling
(00:03):
positive change from the insideout. I'm Mark Robertson, your
host. With over 25 years as aprofessional coach, I'm thrilled
to explore the personal growthtools that have helped me and
hundreds of people just like youdesign and awaken to their best
life. If you've ever feltoverwhelmed and unfulfilled,
like you're just going throughthe motions day after day, maybe
(00:24):
you're afraid one day all theballs are going to drop, you're
in the right place. Together,let's expand our self awareness
and make sustainable shifts thatimprove our communication
skills, relationships, andoverall wellbeing. This is a
judgment free zone whereopenness, understanding and
support rule. So grab yourheadphones and get ready, it's
(00:46):
time to wake up and payattention.
Hello, and welcome back to WakeUp And Pay Attention. I'm really
excited for episode 7 today.It's gonna be a really deep rich
episode actually going to be oneof multiple episodes around the
(01:06):
same concept. And so reallyexcited to bring it to you today
and continue our conversationwith one another. A few things
as I open one is with regard tomy voice. It's springtime here
in Nashville, and that usuallymeans allergies and I've kind of
had the head and chest cred overthe last week and so if my
voice sounds different, Iapologize for that. But I really
(01:29):
want to get this particularepisode out to you.
Also, want to touch on thedelay, at least has been a delay
for me and maybe for you ifyou've been waiting on this
episode. I've had a couple ofweeks where work was really
busy, devoted some full days toconference with Newfield
network, which was reallypowerful. And then last week, I
was sick, as I mentioned withthis stuff and so just now
(01:52):
getting to it. But I'm excitedto finally get here. And
probably even more so if I'mbeing authentic with you and
being honest with you is thatthis is a topic that I've really
been wrestling with a lot overthe last few weeks, really. A
lot of thoughts swirling aroundin my head as to how to present
this one to you.
What's the best way to lay itout, how do we build upon it as
(02:16):
we lay this out? And so it'sbeen tricky and the reason is,
it's such a deep and rich andmeaty topic. You will see once
we get into it today that thisone can go in so many different
directions, it's gonna have somany different aspects to it
that it's hard to get startedand hard to really figure out
what I want to focus on. But Ithink I've figured that out
(02:38):
today and so I'm excited. As Imentioned, this will be a multi
episode topic that we're goingto be covering and I'm really
excited to get to it today.Finally, as we open I got some
timely feedback, actually todayon the podcast. And by the way,
for everyone that's offeredfeedback.
Thank you so much. It's beenhumbling, again, incredibly
(02:58):
powerful. I'm just wild, but Igot some timely feedback from my
old college buddy Scott. Today,and he said this I wanted to
share it with you and tie it towhat we've been talking about.
He said, the podcast reallymakes me think and then want to
take action. So keep assigningthe homework and keep bringing
the practical examples because Ireally liked those. And so it
(03:21):
made me think about this is theessence of what I'm trying to do
with the podcast is I want tomake you think. So, I want to
share new concepts and newframework that has you stop and
reflect and generate some newthinking for you. And then out
of that, it will likely expandhow you see your world your
reality.
And then you're going to beinspired usually to take a new
(03:44):
action, literally a new actionwill show up for you that
probably wasn't there before.Then it's up to you to put that
into practice. And as we talkedabout, learning is time in
practice. So practicing thatwill be important if you want to
create growth. I loved Scott'sfeedback because it really
helped me realize I'm hittingthe mark. That's the mark I'm
(04:05):
looking for with us to provokenew thinking and inspire you to
take new action. So it's alwaysvalidating to get feedback like
that and actually, that kind ofmoves us into our topic today
because it's at the core offeedback.
But not only that, it's at thecore of so much more of what's
going on, I think in our worldtoday. And I would say so much
(04:25):
of what we're suffering with somuch of the drama and so on.
I'll talk about that a littlemore here in a second. So, to
begin today's conversation. Iwant to remind you of the three
circles we talked about in aprevious episode. Human beings
we are bundles of language,emotion and body. That's what
I've been calling our way ofbeing the observer that we are.
(04:46):
So today we're going to take adeeper dive back into language
and the way that I'm going to dothat is I'm going to introduce
you to. Two of the most powerfulspeech acts, that I mentioned
before these are calledAssessments and Assertions, and
I want to begin sharing ideasabout how the these play out in
our lives.
Both in ways that I think arereally helpful and empowering
(05:09):
and work really well and thenoftentimes in ways where we
suffer and that aredisempowering, causes a lot of
challenges. So today, what Iwant to do is I want to cover
first is just the basicfundamental distinction by
giving you a couple sentencesand contrasting those two. And
then, if we have time, I want tothen explore what I think are
(05:32):
three key aspects in terms ofthe way that we apply this or
use this in our lives, and in away that often will create
suffering for us. Which is a lotof what I'm trying to do here in
this podcast is help eliminatethe unnecessary suffering in
your lives.
And so again, I said, if we havetime because this conversation
is going to stretch aboutAssessments and Assertions over
(05:54):
multiple episodes. So, I'm gonnamonitor the title we'll see
where we get today, and as Imentioned before, and I want to
reiterate, the challenge withtalking about this topic is I
think it has so many tentaclesinto our day to day lives it's
underneath, so much of oursuffering in life. I think are
upset for ourselves and areupset and challenges in our
(06:17):
relationships. The drama, Ithink in our culture is deeply
rooted in this concept whichyou'll get here in a minute. I
think the fundamental tensionsbetween people. This concept is
rooted in that so it's has somany tentacles into our day to
day lives, that I think it'sjust time we launch into this.
I want to equip you with newlanguage tools to start noticing
(06:39):
what's happening here andhopefully, more importantly, to
begin to ship this so let'sbegin. The way that I introduced
this language distinction isbetween these two speech acts is
to give you two sentences. Okay,here they are, I am a man, I am
stupid and then to ask thequestion, what's the difference
between these two statements?And historically, if I have any
(07:02):
women in the audience of aworkshop when I show these two
sentences, I'm a man, I'mstupid, what's the difference?
They often will start laughingand saying there is no
difference, we won. It'sobvious, right? Which is, let's
bring some levity which I thinkis kind of nice. But when I
really ask people so really,what is the difference?
(07:23):
Grammatically, they're the same,they start with I am but then
they branch out with just a keyword but it's hugely different
and we need to understand thatwe need to begin to hold them
separate in our thinking and inour conversations. So again, the
sentences are, I'm a man, I'mstupid. The difference is many
people will say is the ones offact once an opinion. Sometimes
(07:47):
they'll say one subjective, onesobjective, sometimes they'll say
one's reality, and the other isperception, that kind of thing.
So all those words are correct.For today's conversation, let's
go with this. Probably the mostunderstandable way to talk about
it is, I am a man is a fact. Iam stupid is an opinion or a judgement.
(08:08):
So,I want to also say right now,I'm mindful of the time in which
I'm introducing this with youknow, we have conversations
about gender identification andthat sort of thing. But I wanted
to introduce it in the way thatI learned it 30 years ago, and I
don't wanna get caught up inthat notion and missed the
point. So the point here Ithink, is understanding the
(08:32):
difference between factualstatements and opinions. So,
let's talk about the firststatement. I'm a man, it's
called a fact, we call theseassertions. So what are some
other assertions? I am five foot11 and a half inches tall.
What's the nature of assertion?So let's talk about that right
now. Things like I am five feet11 inches tall, I weighed 206
(08:55):
pounds, I live at this address,I drive this car, I own my own
business, could be an assertion.
It's 74 degrees outside, I livein Nashville, Tennessee. There
are men there are women in theroom sometimes, so these are
assertion statements. So what'sthe nature of an assertion? That
(09:15):
can be proven true or false byall observers. So these kinds of
statements we're calling facts,stripped out the difference in
the way that we see things.Which is something we
fundamentally talked about inone of the other episodes is
that we're all unique observers.I see what I see, based on my
(09:36):
history, my background, all thefactors that have shaped my
life, and it's not 100%. I'llnever find another observer on
the planet that's 100% likey,like myself. So, this is what I
talked about when I say thesimple expression if you're ever
in a relationship, you realizewe don't see things the same
way.
Assertion strip that out, we canall measure the assertion. When
I'll talk about that a littlemore when we transition over to
(10:01):
I make an assertion in life, Ishould be able to provide
evidence that it's true, or itsfalse and so it is the objective
the other statement. So, thoseare assertions factual
statements of our life. Theseare factual statements,
statements. Let's shift gears tothe other senates, I'm stupid
hopefully that makes sense. Sowhen we talk about the power of
because this is the morepowerful one, this is the one
language, like we did the firstepisode. I said language is
that we're using that we oftendon't see how we're using it,
generative and creative, notjust passive and descriptive.
(10:22):
This really is the passive anddescriptive element of language.
We'd make an assertion aboutsomething and it's describing it
and it just kind of sits therereally doesn't affect the
future.
(10:50):
that's creating a lot of messes.So, I am stupid, or I'm smart,
these are opinions, these arejudgments, these are
perceptions, these areinterpretations. So, the fact
might be it's 74 degrees inNashville. The assessment is it
a good day or is it a bad day?Is it beautiful weather or is it
(11:12):
nasty whether? Those areassessment. Words like stupid,
smart, is this person fat? Arethey skinny, are they an
extrovert, are they anintrovert? Do they have
confidence or did they lackconfidence? Are they arrogant,
are they assertive, are they toolaid back and are they a
pushover?
All of these are assessmentwords and so, I want to contrast
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these with assertions in acouple of different ways.
Remember, we said thatassertions, always provable true
false assessments are never trueor false. They can't be, they
always depend upon the personmaking them they always depend
upon the person that'sobserving. You and your friend
(11:57):
might be listening to thispodcast in your car, and you
finish the episode and you go,man, that was fantastic. That
was the best episode ever andyour friend goes, that was
terrible. I liked episode two,much better. This one was awful.
What's the truth? The truth is,it was just episode 7.
One observer sees it isfantastic, one sees it is awful.
(12:19):
There's a truth about it's justtwo different observers drawing
two different assessments, whereassertions are measurable and
objective assessments are notmeasurable, they are subjective.
This is the gray area in life.Again, they're never true or
false, they always depend uponthe observer making them.
(12:41):
However, what's one of the keyaspects to assessments is where
assertions are descriptive andkind of sit there, assessments
could be regarded as one of ourmost generative aspects,
creative aspects of language,because they move us into the
future with others.
They move us into the futurewith ourselves, the way you
(13:03):
assess yourself and othersstarts to, bring forth an
identity or a way of looking atsomeone that generates a future
with them and often we sort oftunnel into that way of
assessing ourselves or othersand we miss a whole lot of other
evidence, a whole lot of otherbehavior and I'll try to explain
(13:23):
this more as we go. But for now,a few other thoughts about
assessment. Human beings areassessment machines, we're
judgment machines, that's whatwe do. We judge. And I'm not
saying that we can stop doingthis, I'm not offering that.
It's really kind of constitutiveof who we are. As human beings,
we're language beings, we willalways assess, in fact, that
(13:45):
would say, you have to assess inorder to do life. It's just
begin to notice how we'reassessing and in a way it's like
is that working for you are notworking for you in the way that
I'm assessing myself and others.
For example, if you're married,you had to assess all the people
that you didn't marry up to thispoint as that's not the person.
(14:06):
And then you assess this one isthis is the person other
assessments, you have to assesson a simplistic level, is it
safe for me to cross the streetright now? And we assess and
away we go. If it is or itisn't, you had to assess to take
the job that you took the careeryou're taking. It we're
constantly assessing it juststart to notice how we, how you,
(14:28):
assess and that there's a lot tobe learned in that.
I think as we move through theworld day in day out, we're
assessing. Sometimes it'snegative, which is an assessment
in and of itself, sometimes it'spositive. You start to notice
the assessor that you are. Doyou tend to make lots of
negative critical assessmentsand judgments about yourself and
(14:49):
other people? Or do you tend tohave a different flavor, more of
an assessment of the positive? Isee the positive and things
that's fundamentally about theobserver that you are. Human
beings or assessment machines,we can't stop.
But we need to start noticing,because they have power to shape
the future. That's the key piecethat I want you to understand.
(15:12):
They have huge power, and in forus, one of the ways I was
trained, and one of the mostpowerful aspects of assessments
is what we call a linguistictrap. So what does that mean?
That means we assess, we assess,we assess, and then the moment
you begin to collapse these twoassessments and assertions, and
you hold your assessments as ifthey're an assertion, as if
(15:35):
they're the truth, you're stuckor the other person is stuck. We
often put other people in a boxthey can't get out of because we
begin assessing them early on,we assess them similarly often
in a negative way, sometimespositive and negative.
And we put them in a box theycan't get out of because it
starts to funnel the way we lookat them. In every encounter we
(15:56):
have with them, now we want tovalidate our previous
assessment. And y'all listen, wedo the same thing with ourselves
and the dangerous ones I'll justsay to you right now are the
negative assessments we holdabout ourselves, and over time
begin to think they are thetruth, or the negative ones we
hold about other importantpeople in our lives and begin to
(16:17):
believe they are the truth aswell. It literally orient us to
the world in a different way. SoI call this, a linguistic trap.
It's one of the powerful thingswe do is collapsing assessments
and assertions, so there areways to characterize the kind of
person that does that.
And so they're expressions likethis, that I've often use, how
(16:38):
many of you know the personthat's my way or the highway?
The way I see it is the way itis, and the way you see it,
unfortunately, is wrong. I oftenbring my father back into the
conversation that reallydefining relationship, I often
have spoken and assessed him andspoken about him as one of the
most self righteous human beingsI've met on the planet. And I
(16:59):
say that, not as strongly as Iused to but, it's a
characterization. I assess himthat way because my father's
primary commitment, I believe inlife was to be right. And so,
self righteous people, I think,are doing this collapsing a lot
holding their assessments, theirview of things as if it's the
(17:20):
truth or the facts. I remember Iwould have a conversation with
him, and he might listen.
And they'd say, well Mark, look,the reality of the situation is
this. And he would present hisassessment as if it were the
truth. And there's somethingthat happens or something that's
generated there in relationshipswith other human beings, when
(17:40):
you have a tendency to do thatall the time. You think your way
is the right way and others arewrong. It's a huge cost to this,
okay? And so I'm going to expandon that a little more later but,
I want you to start to get thisidea, and I want to paint a
picture for, like how ourassertions just sitting there
not really impacting the future,but assessment heavily impact
(18:03):
the future. I'll give you acouple examples.
One, let's imagine you meetsomeone new, and you meet them,
you come into a meeting withthem. Let's imagine you're at
work, or you're in a socialsetting, and you get introduced
someone and you meet them, guesswhat we do we start assessing,
that's what we do. Or sometimeswe're so worried about how
they're assessing us. We'rehaving a private conversation
(18:25):
with ourselves assessingourselves negatively, and we're
not even present in theconversation. But let's imagine
we're able to do that and westart assessing the other person
and I meet, let's say Susie, andI think wow, she's nice, and she
seems friendly.
But wow, few times there, sheseemed a little bit hard headed
and stubborn and a little bitrude in terms of our
(18:46):
interaction. And I go away inthe social setting, and I'd meet
other people or I hang out withmy friends or I leave the
meeting. And then a few dayslater, let's say I run into
Susie again at work or at homeand have interactions with her
and all of a sudden there it is,again, there's that kind of
stubbornness, that hardheaded usand there she was being rude
again. What starts to happen isbecause we're patterning our
(19:09):
assessments is now I'm going tostart looking at Susy a certain
way and in every futureencounter, I'm going to start
looking to validate thatassessment that I've made, and I
might miss other evidence.
And maybe more dangerously, whatI was talking about, is if I do
the linguistic trap. I put herin a box, is I hold my
(19:30):
assessments now after a coupleencounters as if they are the
truth about her. And then maybemore dangerously, if anybody
ever stopped and asked me whatdo you think of Suzy, I say this
is who she is, and this is theway that she is. So I'm speaking
my assessments and telling thisperson this is a fact about her,
this is the way she is and it'snot. So that's what I meant
(19:52):
about. How often have youassessed people in your life?
Similarly, over a couple ofencounters, or maybe just the
first encounter, and you putthem now in a box, that they
can't get out of because youhold that as the truth about
them. That's your picture ofthem, and then more dangerously,
you might go start sharing thatwith other people as if that's
(20:13):
the way they are.
And you preload the other personto assess them that way when
they meet them. That's at theheart of prejudice and we'll
talk about that, at some pointin the future as well. So I'm
branching into a few differentareas. But I think you get the
sense, I want you to startnoticing, am I assessing here
judging? Or am I asserting isthat a fact and start holding
(20:35):
them separate? That's the veryfirst step here is we've got to
see the difference. Nevercollapse them and hold them as
separate. It can dramaticallychange the way we have
conversations with others in theway we have conversations in our
head with ourselves. Because ifyou think about it, to build on
this, who's the person we oftenassess the most? Ourselves, and
(20:57):
who's the person we oftennegatively assess the most,
ourselves, we're often harder onourselves, and speak to
ourselves in ways that we wouldnever allow other people to.
And there's a cost to this,y'all. We suffer because of
this. So give me anotherexample, relating to others
assessing us but also how weassess ourselves. It's a story I
(21:18):
heard when I learned this. It'scalled The Little Johnny Story.
So imagine you're little Johnny,and you're in third grade math
class. And you're sitting,you've had a rough night, you're
tired, and you're rambunctiousgot a lot of energy trying to
burn off, so you're making a lotof noise, talking out loud,
interrupting thing, and finally,the teacher says little Johnny,
you always need to do this.You're always behaving stupidly,
(21:40):
that's enough. I've had it. Goto the principal's office.
That's it. I'm done. sent you tothe principal's office, and you
moped down to the principal'soffice. You walk in a little
Johnny, you walk in as littleJohnny and the principal
sequences, little Johnny, whatstupid thing have you done now?
Why are you sitting here in myoffice yet again? And you tell
your story, and they've alreadytalked to the teacher and like,
(22:03):
look, I've had it, can't handlethis stupidness you got to go
home, so you get sent home. Thisis a makeup scenario, obviously,
but stay with me. You get senthome and you're at home, and
you're, you have an oldersister, she's not home yet. And
you think ah you know, I want togo in there and get her iPod and
play some music.
So you go get it and you'replaying music and she comes home
(22:24):
and she looking for iPods, shecan't find it just comes in your
room, little Johnny. She seesthat you have the iPad. You
stupid little kid, give me theiPad get out of here. Wow, tough
day. The day continues your momand dad get home and and they're
preparing dinner and you thinkwow, it's been a rough day, I'm
gonna try to help. So you'rehelping in the kitchen, and then
(22:44):
all of a sudden, you happen tobe carrying a plate from the
kitchen to the dining room tableand you drop it. Plate shatters
food spills everywhere. Yourmom's had a rough, little
Johnny, how could you dosomething so stupid? Clean it
up.
And we'll figure out what we'regonna do for dinner. Maybe your
dad chimes in, here we go, yetagain, doing that thing, you do
that stupid thing. I'm beingdramatic here, but there are
(23:06):
different versions of this, butyou get where I'm going. Now,
let's imagine you actuallyhappen to graduate from high
school, but you've been hearingthat same message or some
version of that for years andyears. Now you're, you graduated
from high school, you go towork, let's say, get a job and
you decide, I'm going to do thebest I can. You're working hard.
And you are working hard, andyou realize that, hey, your
(23:29):
supervisor of your departmentleft, and they're going to hire
a new supervisor. And they saywe want to promote from within.
If you think you're qualified,put in your application. Will
you ever put in yourapplication? Nope. Why? Because
you're stupid. Because you'reholding an assessment, like it's
the truth because it's a messageyou heard over and over again in
(23:49):
life. And it went from maybeothers saying that to you to now
you're saying it to yourself.Holding the assessment of I'm
stupid, I can't possibly applyfor the leadership position
because I'm stupid and if I do,everyone will find out. Okay.
And so that's the cost, that'sthe danger of this is it plays
(24:11):
out into the future. So wordslike assessment where it's like
stupid or smart, are you shy?Are you extroverted? All these,
are beliefs we have in our headassessments we make about
ourselves, and then we hold themto be the truth.
And they get in the way of ourtaking action in life that we
may want to take because we nowcontinually self assess, and we
(24:33):
trap ourselves and we don't takethe action we want in our life.
We suffer with it. I think thatexample makes sense. So, what am
I saying about assessments andassertions. We have to be
willing to keep and start tokeep them separate from what
they're not the same. We have tonotice how we've been talking to
ourselves and those negativethings you've thought were the
(24:53):
truth about you that can't bechanged, have never been the
truth. And you can change, youcan grow. And then we'll talk
about ways to do this in futureepisodes.
don't collapse them? Well,here's the relationship. They
actually can marry together,quite helpfully, where we say,
(25:18):
assertions are always provable,true or false assessments are
never true or false. They'reeither grounded or ungrounded.
So what does that mean? A wellgrounded assessment means you
notice how you assess yourselfand you have facts, assertions,
to support that you canliterally give me measurable
provable actions or behaviors,or data that supports either a
(25:41):
positive or a negativeassessment, that's considered a
well grounded assessment.
An ungrounded assessment oftenis what we'll find, especially
in our negative assessmentsabout ourselves. Because we just
assessed it somewhere along theway, we held it to be the truth,
and we, there's often, one datapoint, one factual event in our
life, or maybe none. But it's anassessment we've made, and we're
(26:02):
holding on to it like, it's thetruth, that's called an
ungrounded assessment. A lot oftimes as a coach, my role with
my clients is personally andprofessionally, is to help them
examine their assessments andrealize which ones are really
ungrounded and it loosens thingsup, it gives them a freedom to
start to hold.
way it is, and it'll neverchange. They begin to realize
(26:29):
there's possibility for growthhere, because they realize it's
an ungrounded assessment. So,another key point. Be willing to
update your assessments aboutyourself or others at any time,
especially about others, buteven yourself. When given
evidence of new behavior andothers, which requires you to
(26:52):
step back and expand how you'reviewing the other important
people in your life, be willingto get off your assessment and
loosen its hold, and update itwhen it's warranted.
And many of us struggle. Weliterally don't know how to
update our pattern, habitual wayof thinking about others and
ourselves. Our pattern habitualway of assessing, because we
(27:13):
haven't had this distinction upuntil now. So, I think it's just
can be incredibly freeing to seethe difference and understand,
there is opportunity here tohold them separate, I can update
my assessment at any time aboutothers of myself and help
generate literally a new realityor a new future. So, I hope that
(27:34):
way of painting the picturemakes sense. There's so much
more I'll say about it in otherepisodes, but let me touch on,
what I think are three keyaspects of this, that I want to
talk with you first about.Probably because they've been
really powerful and impactful inmy life.
They're not necessarily theright order, again, not an
assertion, but, I just thinkthey're powerful to introduce
(27:55):
now. So the first one is,related to this piece up and
talking about with the languagetrap, the moment we look at
things we assess, we assess, weassess, and we hold it to be the
truth. There's something biggerthan just that instance, going
on in our culture and I think insome other cultures, but it's
very characteristic of theAmerican culture. And it's like
(28:15):
a larger, we call it abackground conversation. A
background soup of languagethat's going on for Americans,
some just like we grew up in it.
We may not have even been taughtit but it just gets in our bones
by virtue of the fact that weare Americans. We grew up in it
and it's called this, it'scalled the, I'm right.
(28:37):
Background conversation. Oranother version of it you may
have heard before, it's I'drather be right than happy. It's
the classic case of where wehold our assessments as if
they're right, and if othershave a different one than us, we
make them wrong. They are wrong.Okay. And so literally the way I
(28:57):
was taught this, it's this is akiller conversation. We
literally are killing eachother. We go to war and we kill
people. It's been going on forcenturies. Give you plenty of
examples, but it's alsohappening today, I think, and
then most likely in the IsraeliPalestinian issue, is both sides
are convinced they're right andthe other is wrong.
(29:17):
And they're willing to kill oneanother for it. I think it's
almost at the root of any timewe've ever ward with one another
we kill other human beings isoften there's this I'm right,
you're wrong. So it's a hugebackground conversation,
particularly Americans andprobably other cultures are
rooted in and we may talk moreabout why it is, but, it's a
(29:37):
killer conversation. It'sdangerous. Even we hold it this
way about ourselves. This is theright way to think or the wrong
way to think. This is the rightway to act or the wrong way to
act. Again, it's making anassessment about a gray area,
gray territory, not factualterritory, but subjective
(29:57):
territory and putting the rightrules old template on it.
And it traps us. I'll talk aboutthat a little more in a second.
So, here's a catchy saying Iheard. So, as it relates to this
concept and relationships, youcan be right, or you can be in
relationship, but you can't haveboth. That was the cost with my
father is he was, in myexperience a very righteous
(30:20):
person, he and I were verydifferent observers of the
world, we saw things verydifferently, which is fine, it
happens. But his commitment tobeing right all the time, made
me wrong constantly, when Iwould offer my perspective on
things, and eventually I juststopped offering, I shut down, I
got quiet, because that didn'twant to be made wrong anymore.
(30:41):
And I think most of us don'twant to hang out with other
people that make us wrong allthe time. We just don't. So talk
about it these days, if our goalin relationship is to connect
with others, feel close orunderstanding or get along with
others this, I'm right, you'rewrong, conversation won't work.
(31:01):
It's a killer conversation,didn't work with me and my
father. And so I'm especiallyattuned to that these days, I do
my best not to be righteous orbe right about things but I also
get trapped in it from time totime. I got trapped in it in my
marriage, with my ex wife, attimes, because it just that's
the soup, I grew up in myfamily.
And it got on me, I think manyof us have realized, in some
(31:24):
ways, we become our parents overtime, and we start doing some of
the very thing, same things, wecouldn't stand about them,
because it's in us if we don'tpay attention. So, the another
piece that I touched on, as itrelates to this piece is just
this, right? Rakaat the rightwrong template. What I've
noticed in our culture is, whenI work with my clients,
(31:45):
especially often theirhesitation, their struggles,
their challenges or issues isaround, I don't want to do the
wrong thing.
Or, I want to do the rightthing, I don't want to do the
wrong thing, or they're inrelationships, and they're
getting made wrong, or they'remaking other people wrong. And
usually what I'll discover isthat the territory we're talking
(32:06):
about, it's all gray area, it'ssubjective. And so, in a way,
what I'm saying is, anyassessments you have, are legit
and valid, they come from theobserver that you are. I'm not
saying that they're the best, orother people don't have better
ones in you, I'm just saying,they are legit and valid
assessments. But they are neverright or wrong. They're never
(32:30):
the truth and so to have yourthinking, or your speaking or
the way you interact withothers.
When you put the right roletemplate on top of assessments,
it kills things, it creates atrap. It creates a lot of
suffering, so often will say tomy clients, I think you're using
a template that won't work tohelp you get out of this
(32:51):
situation. It won't help us inour coaching conversation to
help you come up with an answer,that you want, and an action you
want to take to solve this orpotentially solve it. And it
won'thelp you in your thinkingbut because it'll just trap you
it's we're using a template andapplying it to an area where it
doesn't apply. Right wrong canbe applied to assertions,
(33:12):
factual stuff, right? And weoften say notice these days,
Americans we are quick to say,right?
That's our way of validating.But like two plus two equals
four, that's an assertion. It'sa true assertion, and it's
right. Two plus two equals five.It's a false assertion. It's
wrong. So right, wrong appliesthere. But it doesn't apply in
(33:33):
what's the best way to behavehere. What's the best way to
treat someone? What's the bestproduct to buy? What's the best
way to do this thing or thatthing? I think you get what I'm
talking about. It doesn't applyto that situation. It's all
assessment land.
The last thing I'll say aboutthis one is just if you look at
what's going on our culture, Ithink about TV shows that I've
(33:56):
watched at times or debate showsor talk shows, in my view, my
assessment is they typicallywill get two very different
observers to come on and talkabout a controversial topic.
Both being righteous about theirperspective, and they'll turn
them loose, and they'll justprompt them with something
triggering and let them go.
And the conversation justdevolves into I'm right. You're
(34:19):
wrong. No, I'm right, you'rewrong. And that conversation
takes us nowhere. I think thisis at the heart of our inability
in our culture, probablypolitically and in other arenas
to solve some of our deeplyentrenched issues that are
around gray territory, isbecause both sides are dug in
(34:39):
and more committed to beingright than they are to resolving
things connecting comingtogether and working things out.
And we could talk about manydifferent arenas where this
shows up but for now, I justwant you to see the power of
this first aspect of thisbackground conversation and
super swimming in that I thinkcauses a lot of suffering.
(35:00):
So I invite you to look at, areyou that person. are you doing
that in your own life withothers, and maybe it's time to
stop? Maybe it's time tounderstand, wait a minute, I've
got my view, they've got theirs.This hasn't worked for me to
make them wrong, it's time forme to start asking better
questions and start deeplylistening. And maybe most
(35:20):
importantly, is time to noticehow critically you are assessing
yourself, and begin to separatethese and begin to change the
conversation you're having withyourself. Okay, so that's the
first of the three key pieces.The second one is this
assessments, as I said, arenever true or false.
They have an aspect of themabout authority. What do I mean
(35:42):
by that? Who do you giveauthority to assess you in your
life? Now, another more commonway to say that is whose
opinions judgments about you, doyou give weight? Do you grant
weight and then how do you actbased on that? So, we talk about
in terms of whose opinions doyou grant authority. So, when I
talk about this, I like to painta visual picture, imagine a
(36:05):
horizontal line to a shorthorizontal line, and on the left
end of the line is 0%. And onthe right end of the line is
100%. So meaning, on the leftside, if you're 0%, all the way
on a spectrum to 100%, all thepercentages in between.
So start on the left side, ifyou give 0% of people's
(36:28):
assessments authority. It meansbasically, you don't give a shit
what anybody else thinks. Yougive nobody's opinion, any way
you will consider it, you'regonna do what you're gonna do,
and that's it. So, we mightassess or characterize that
person is self absorbed,narcissistic, arrogant, or a lot
of different assessment words wecan make about that. Someone who
(36:50):
gives nobody else's opinionanyway, we go all the way the
other end, which is dangerous, Ibelieve my assessment. I think
we've seen examples of this, wego all the way to the other end,
someone who gives 100% of otherpeople's authorities,
assessments authority.
Now, what's happening there,here, I am moving through my
day, and I encounter my friendand they say, your hair looks
(37:12):
ridiculous. And I go, oh mygosh, I better go back to the
house and change my hair. Andthen I'm back out in the day and
someone says, that's the wrongsoft drink to drink and I'm
having lunch with somebody,that's clearly the wrong soft
drink. And so, I throw it awayand I go get a different one. Or
I run into someone later andthey say, you know, that's
absurd the way that you're doingthat, or the way that you said
(37:35):
that, and I'm giving them fullauthority, their opinion has all
the weight.
Now I've got to go change, I'vegot to go, immediately stopped
doing what I was doing could dosomething different. I hope this
makes sense because like you'regiving everyone's opinion, wait.
So as you move through your day,because everybody's a different
observer, and you're gonna getdifferent opinions, you're gonna
(37:56):
be swaying in the wind. We mightcharacterize this person as a
doormat a pushover, someone whogives everybody else's opinion
weight and then acts upon it.They have no sense of their own
self and their own assessmentsand stand in their own
assessments about themselves andit's okay to stand strongly in
your opinions.
It's just make sure as I saidbefore, that you've examined and
So I asked the question, I thinkboth ends are dangerous. Where
(38:18):
they have some grounding, youhave facts to back them up. You
can have some conversations toshare your assessments, support
do you want to be? Whose opiniondo you want to let matter? And
him with your perspective,invite and listen to other
people's assessments, ask themto ground theirs. And then we
so many people will initially goright in the middle? I would say
can have a healthy productiveconversation, hopefully to reach
a resolution. But as it relatesto who you grant authority, if
I don't think so. By experienceand life has been I want to
(38:39):
you're all the way 100%, you'rescrewed, truly, I mean, it's
going to be a rough lifetime.
actually be further down to theleft side closer to zero. I
think maybe granting 10 to 15%of the people in your life
assessments, inviting them andgranting them authority, people
(39:07):
you trust that you think aregood observers, and you want to
know their opinion.
So you're choosy about who youinvite feedback from? Not
everybody, because look, we livein a culture of tons of
assessments, everybody's gonnahave their opinion, their
(39:28):
judgment and it's just that it'snever the truth. So, it's like
be choosy. So what am I sayingabout what I've discovered for
myself, and the very confidentpeople I've met in life. They're
well grounded in their ownassessments, their old self
assessments about themselves,they have very well grounded
assessments, lots of facts toback them up about who they are,
(39:50):
who they are not.
They have a confidence aboutthemselves what they can do,
what they can't do. The kind ofperson they are what they bring
to themselves and relationshipsand the kind of person they're
not, and they're usually open totalking about it. They're often
very transparent and authentic.So they're choosy, they don't
disregard anybody's feedback,but they are choosy about the
(40:12):
feedback they invite, and whenthey do, they seriously consider
it. Okay, in terms of howthey're showing up to other
people, and especiallysignificant people and it might
be time to make a change.
So that's the second key piece Iwanted to talk with you about,
maybe it's time to look at whoyou've been granting authority
and change that up. I literallyhave met people who are in their
40s, and 50s and they're stillgranting their 70 and 80 year
(40:39):
old parents authority to assessthem in areas that they're not
qualified and so they'regenerating drama, upset, they're
suffering, they're changingtheir lives, there's just a lot
of upset, because they're givingtoo much authority to people in
their lives. Maybe it's time foryou to take back some of that
(41:00):
authority, so to speak. And thelast piece, I know we're getting
a little lengthy here, but Iwant to finish this up.
We have more time to discussthis later. But the third piece
is the idea of stories. So whatdo I mean by that? Human beings
are assessment machines, as Isaid, we constantly assess you
won't stop doing that. But whatwe tend to do is over time we
assess ourselves or others. Andwe start to weave those
(41:23):
assessments together into astory about ourselves, or other
people, we just do it, it's ourway of making sense, putting
things in certain places. But westart to make up a story about
ourselves and others. And thatagain, that story, because it's
mostly assessment will have afuture impact, it will shape
things it will affect things. Sowe're storytelling beings.
(41:46):
We make up stories, it'simportant. Talking about leaders
are really good storytellers.They create powerful stories in
which people can follow them andthrive and create great action.
But stories are at the heart ofwhether we thrive or we suffer,
so start noticing again. Whatare the story? What's the story
you're living in about yourself?What's possible in your life?
(42:09):
What is it possible, who youare, who you're not? Another way
to think of a story is yournarrative, that's a common word
people use well, what's thenarrative you have about
yourself or other people? Andagain, one of the most dangerous
things we can ever do is weavetogether assessments into a
story to make sense of thingsand then hold that like it's the
truth about that person orourselves because then we're
(42:33):
stuck, then change is notpossible.
So, I invite you to look, haveyou been telling powerful
stories about yourself, othersin your life? Your life, what's
possible? What's so in thepresent or have you been living
in some disempowering stories?Some stories that you've trapped
yourself and closedpossibilities? Is it time to
(42:56):
examine the story you've beentelling and update that story to
a more grounded, and poweringstories so you can move forward
in life take more effectiveaction. Okay, and so I'll kind
of wrap this piece up with thisnotion I've often thought of
when I'm talking about storiesand how we tell stories that in
a way, our life is a blank sheetof paper.
(43:17):
You've got the pin, you'rewriting the story, you're
writing the assessments.Do youwant to write? You are the age
you are you have a past, youcan't change it. But what's the
story you want to tell aboutyour past up till now and your
future? You're writing it, youget to decide what you write on
that piece of paper, that's howlanguage comes into play. So how
(43:38):
about writing a grounded,authentic, and empowering story
doesn't mean bad things haven'thappened, as opposed to a
disempowering story that willcause you to suffer. That's my
point, and I think I mentionedit earlier. I'm not sure but in
many ways, I think of coaching.Really good coaches are story
busters. We invite our clientsto talk about their challenges,
(44:02):
issues.
We listen to their stories, wedraw out their stories and then
we parse them, we have them takea look at them and see which
part of the story are youcreating that is helpful and
which part do we want? Updateand let go of, so, I like the
notion that in many aspects,coaches are story busters. And
(44:22):
that's often where the growth isin our coaching is in helping
clients change their story, to amore empowering story but also
stories that are grounded infacts. This isn't rose colored
glasses, this isn't dismissingthe facts of your life. It's
blending them with theassessments and stories of your
life in an authentic way thatyou can grab a hold of and
(44:45):
embrace, so that it has you bemore powerful in your life.
So I think I want to stop there.We're well into the episode
today. So, let me give you justa quick summary of key points.
We make the distinction of anassessment, a judgment, opinion
and an assertion of fact,assertions are always true,
false kind of sit there don't domuch for the future. Assessments
(45:09):
never true false, always dependupon the observer making them,
but have huge impact on thefuture are incredibly powerful.
Humans are assessment machines,so maybe it's time to be willing
to examine and update yourassessments.
We also talked about a versionof that when we hold our
assessments as if theirassertions with the larger
(45:31):
background conversation,particularly in America but
other countries, I'm right orI'd rather be right than happy.
It's a killer conversation toremember what I said, you can be
right or you can be inrelationship, but you can't have
both and I know that's a cliche,but I think it lands for people.
We then talked about who do yougive the authority to assess you
(45:52):
or judge you? Look, people aregoing to assess you, they always
have, and they always will.
Don't be afraid of theirassessments because they're
never the truth. Do not beafraid of anybody else's
assessment about you, becauseit's not speaking to your truth
or the truth of who you are.It's just their experience of
you and the way they've assessedor judged you. Just be choosy
(46:14):
about whose assessments youinvite about you and be more
well grounded in your own selfassessments, that's where I
found I've been more confidentin my life, and others that I
think are confident are reallywell grounded in who they are
And the last piece is, stories,the weaving of assessments
and who they're not.
(46:35):
together into a story, is ittime to examine your story and
alter part of it, or a lot of it? In a way that would be more
empowering for you. Are someaspects of it disempowering and
not working for you and holdingyou back in life are getting in
your way, or you're suffering?Is it time to shift it, it's
time to rewrite the story. Sothat's it, those are the key
(46:57):
points. So your homework, what'syour homework? I like to offer
homework is, step one. Now youhave the distinction of an
assessment, versus an assertion,start to notice how these show
up in your thinking, in yourspeaking, and even probably more
so in how others are using them.
And don't do the language trap.Like hold them separately. My
(47:20):
clients talk sometimes aboutliterally using the lingo of the
go from not saying anything,when they offer their opinion or
being righteous about it tousing the words in my
assessment. This is what I thinkabout this thing. In my view,
this is what I think about thisthing, but you may have a
different one, I'd love to hearyours. So, literally just using
(47:43):
the wording, the language of inmy assessment, they have
remarked for years how thatchanges their conversations with
themselves and more importantlywith others loosens a hold and
it opens up an ability tocommunicate, that's much better.
Another piece of homework mightbe, here's an assignment for
you. Reflect and write down whatare your top three assessments
(48:04):
you have about yourself? Wemight call those your strengths?
What are your top three negativeassessments, we might call those
your weaknesses? And now can yousee that none of those are the
truth about you, they never havebeen. Maybe someone negatively
assessed you along the way,frequently, and you gave it
great authority and now youbelieve it's your biggest
(48:25):
weakness and it's true, and itnever has been.
So it's time to loosen the holdof it, you can actually start to
shift these in the future.Another thing I'll offer you as
homework is maybe now that youknow this is practice talking to
yourself more positively day inand day out. See if you can't
both notice how you've beenassessing but then start
(48:47):
assessing yourself more caringwith more grace, over these next
few weeks. Be more positive withyour language. I want to close
with this idea of look, humanbeings aren't broken and they
don't need to be fixed. They'renot, we aren't like things that
break and need to be fixed.Those are linguistic terms we've
used that I think trap us interms of what's possible in our
(49:11):
life.
We just need to learn to uselanguage more responsibly,
understanding assessments,assertions, working with that
more powerfully. So, we can seeour greatness actually, that I
believe is in everybody. We canwipe off some of the stories,
the mud of the stories thatwe've layered on over our
lifetime and open up some newpossibilities for our lives. And
(49:35):
there may be areas where weassess and we realize, that's
not who I want to be and so wego about making change. So we
thrive. Okay, so that's it fortoday. We will build on this
with more in future episodes,but I'm just gonna wrap with the
thought that I often will wrapwith and then a closing sort of
(49:55):
thought be well, over the nextcouple of weeks practice In
whatever way fits for you, begentle with yourself.
Be gentle with your assessmentsof yourself. Maybe be willing to
update your assessments aboutothers in your life, you have
relationships where they're notwhere you want them to be. Maybe
it's time to reassess and gohave some new conversations with
(50:17):
them. And the final thought,I'll close with this, this kind
of like this idea. We live hars,but we live in a sea of
assessments about things we knownothing about. We are constantly
assessing often about peopleareas, things, that we aren't
even a part of that are notoccurring that are not happening
(50:38):
in our day to day life.
But that doesn't stop us frommaking assessments about it, and
more dangerously holding ourassessments like they're the
truth, like we're right. Okay,it doesn't stop us from having
opinions and often holding themas facts. And you know, what
they say about everybody has anopinion. So, be well, take good
(50:58):
care of yourself. Assess gently,yourself and others and I look
forward to talking with youagain in future episodes.
Well, my friends, that's a wrapfor today. I'm so grateful you
join me and hope you feelenergized by the insights we
took a deeper look at together.If anything resonated with you
or inspired new thinking, dropme a note. I'd love to hear your
(51:20):
biggest takeaway. Please join menext time, as we dive deeper
into this never ending journeyof self discovery. Until then,
be well be present, live fullyand authentically. Wake up and
pay attention.
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