November 17, 2025 • 43 mins
In this enlightening episode, Dr. Doug speaks with Chuck Wisner, author of The Art of Conscious Conversations. They explore how storytelling, collaboration, creativity, and commitment shape the way we relate—with others and ourselves. Chuck shares tools to break old patterns, navigate ego, and create meaningful dialogue in every part of life. A must-listen for anyone seeking deeper connection and awareness.
Https://ChuckWisner.com
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Https://ChuckWisner.com
Inspire Vision Podcast is broadcast on K4HD Radio (www.k4hd.com) part of Talk 4 Radio (www.talk4radio.com) on the Talk 4 Media Network (www.talk4media.com).
Inspire Vision Podcast TV Show is viewed on Talk 4 TV (www.talk4tv.com).
Inspire Vision Podcast is also available on Talk 4 Podcasting (www.talk4podcasting.com), iHeartRadio, Amazon Music, Pandora, Spotify, Audible, and over 100 other podcast outlets.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:01):
This program is designed to provide general information with regards
to the subject matters covered. This information is given with
the understanding that neither the hosts, guests, sponsors, or station
are engaged in rendering any specific and personal medical, financial,
legal counseling, professional service, or any advice.
Speaker 2 (00:22):
You should seek the services.
Speaker 1 (00:23):
Of competent professionals before applying or trying any suggested ideas.
Speaker 3 (00:31):
At the end of the day, it's not about what
you have or even what you've accomplished. It's about what
you've done with those accomplishments. It's about who you've lifted up,
who you've made better. It's about what you've given back.
Denzel Washington, Welcome to Inspire Vision. Our sole purpose is
to elevate the lives of others and to inspire you
(00:51):
to do the same.
Speaker 4 (00:52):
Suck Welcome to the show.
Speaker 2 (00:54):
Thanks for having me. Happy to be here.
Speaker 5 (00:56):
Well, it's good to have you and folks, Just so
you know, we had a chat what was it about
a month ago? And about a month ago, Yeah, and
I had some issues on my end with the sound system,
and it's like we couldn't do it, and so we
have rescheduled, and I'm really excited about this because our
conversation before was so enlightening, and I really appreciate this
(01:19):
book that you've written and the concepts that you've come
up with. So what I'd love for you to do
is share with the audience who you are and what
motivated you to write the book The art of conscious communication.
Speaker 2 (01:32):
The art of conscious conversations, their conversation. I'm sorry, yeah, yeah,
Well who am I? That's a big question.
Speaker 4 (01:41):
I know we all ask ourselves that, don't we?
Speaker 2 (01:43):
Yeah? Who am I? Anyway, well, I'd say writing the
book was my fourth career. I was originally a musician.
I was an architect in Boston for twenty years, and
I changed careers when I started studying language and leadership,
and so that's sort of how that all evolved and
(02:06):
interesting just to underscore that is, I never was rejecting
the previous profession. I was more fell in love with
a new one and I couldn't help myself. So I
ended up doing leadership coaching and advising for the last
twenty five thirty years at large corporations with the executives
(02:28):
and their teams. And then the book came about because
some of my clients said, I love all the work
we're doing, but I don't know how to connect the dots,
and is there a book I can read? And I
realized there was a lot of different books, but the
work we were doing was a compilation of all those.
So I decided, maybe I can put all the pieces together.
(02:48):
And that's what inspired me to write the book.
Speaker 4 (02:51):
All right, and you've actually put four pieces together? What
are they?
Speaker 2 (02:54):
Yeah? Yeah, so the thing that connects all those different pieces?
One client says, how do I connect the dots? Right?
That stuck with me. And then I realized when I
was studying the ontology of language that there's four types
basic types of conversations that we're in all the time,
but we're not aware of those those and those four
(03:17):
conversations storytelling, collaboration, creativity, and commitment. Conversations are the structure
that hold all the different tools and practices that help
us be better in our communications.
Speaker 5 (03:31):
Okay, and you know, as we look at what the
problem is, and I want to go into that.
Speaker 4 (03:36):
First of all, what is the issue?
Speaker 5 (03:38):
What is the problem that you have experienced three or
many years of working with companies and individuals that you
found need this type of help. What are the issues
that come up with people in general.
Speaker 2 (03:52):
So in general, I think we are in conversations all
the time. It's the one human tool that we have
across the world globe, you know, conversations. And yet we
adopt our conversational patterns unconsciously through our culture, our family.
So we learn to talk, we mimic our families, we
(04:13):
mimic our our cultures, and then we learn through experience.
So we're in conversation often on autopilot without understanding them
as deeply as we can. And so when we're on autopilot,
we we are playing out our pattern but not always
to our benefit or to to the creativity of a
(04:35):
to the creative to the to the generation of a good,
good conversation. So in some ways it's like being we
are in conversations, but we don't really know how they work.
And so my book is trying to say, let's take
it apart a little bit, let's look deeply into it,
how they how they work, and what we can learn
from each kind of conversation.
Speaker 5 (04:56):
Well, and you know, it's interesting as we look at
what's going on in the country in the US right now,
those conversations are not working.
Speaker 2 (05:04):
Real well, not at all if I if I could
stick my book under the pillow of every politician, I would, Well.
Speaker 4 (05:12):
That would be nice.
Speaker 5 (05:13):
But even as we look at divorce rates, as we
look at challenges that parents have with their children and
vice versa, as we look at all of that, recognizing
that conversation and I said communication, But it's conversation that
creates that communication that.
Speaker 4 (05:32):
Becomes the major issue.
Speaker 5 (05:34):
And you know, and we'll get into this maybe a
little bit later if we have time, But I was
thinking today as I was re listening to a little
bit of our conversation before, is that even the conversation
we have with ourselves, yes, in our lives. And so
as we go through this, you know, we'll talk about
those on different levels. But at this point in time,
(05:55):
let's go have you explain Number one, what are the
individual areas you talked about, storytelling, collaborative, creative commitment.
Speaker 4 (06:06):
Let's go through each one of those to begin with. Also,
at the.
Speaker 5 (06:09):
Beginning of your book, you talked about ego and I'm
trying to figure out how that fits in. So if
you can fit that in and let me know where
that fits in, I want to get into that conversation too.
Speaker 2 (06:19):
Okay, great, so I'll do a brief explanation of each conversation, okay,
And if you want to do a dive into each one,
just interrupt me. Or if you have a question about
each one, just interrupt me.
Speaker 4 (06:31):
We'll do it after you've explained them all.
Speaker 2 (06:33):
Okay, I'll do it. I'll do a brief explanation. So
storytelling is primary. I say that because that's how we live,
lot that's how humans live. We live through stories. And
Uval Harari's book Sapiens does a great history lesson in
how this evolved, So that law is a story and
(06:55):
money is a story, but they stick because we all
agree on them. We read that the dollar is worth x.
But anyway, So in our personal lives, we also have stories.
We have stories about ourselves and we have stories about
other people. Some are helpful, some are harmful. The helpful
ones we connect with people, we love people, we have
(07:17):
good relationships. The harmful ones hold us back individually because
we aren't living up to our potential or they do
damage to a relationship. So exploring our stories and the
storytelling conversation is primary because it helps us do all
the other conversations better. Now ego comes in because the
(07:39):
ego loves our stories, loves our beliefs and the package
that we have about how we see the world, and
convinces us that, yeah, you're right, you know you're right,
and you should fight for your position. However, it sort
of is a constricting element. Ego sort of gets us
(08:00):
to be tight and hold on to our perspectives and beliefs,
and so we aren't as open as we could be,
open mind, open heart. But when we begin to look
at them and we increase our awareness, stories are like
put us in the ego is like putting as foggy
and gets us in the fog. We identify with our
positions and we can't see very much. When we become
(08:22):
aware of our stories, that's like bringing that's like bringing
light to the situation. So now we can say, oh,
I have that a story I adopted from my dad,
or I'm behaving that way because that's what I was
taught to do, and so then we have a chance
to change. So storytelling is very personal and it's very profound.
(08:42):
Now as we do that work, the next conversation, which
is relational, the collaborative conversation, is the conversation between you
and I, or meet and five people or meeting ten
people in a meeting that's relational because everybody now is
bringing their story to the table. And so we've all
been in meetings where everyone has their perspective and there's
(09:04):
a lot of disagreement around the room. But the real
art of collaboration conversations is our ability to advocate with
an open hand instead of a fist, and to listen
in a way that we can really absorb other people,
ask good questions and learn from one another. So the tools,
(09:25):
the basic tools there are open advocacy and open inquiry
versus closed advocacy and close inquiry. So when we do
that collaborative thing, we learn from each other and we
get smart together instead of getting domb together. And it's
just another way of sort of opening our minds, and
(09:45):
it takes humility and it takes vulnerability. We do that
conversation well, we are in a creative conversation where we
generate ideas, ideas that bubble up out of an open
space conversation, a good collaborative conversation. We all had that
experience in a meeting or with someone where we go
we're talking and all of a sudden, because we're sharing ideas,
(10:06):
An idea bubbles up and says, oh, I never thought
of it that way, we could do X. And that
came out of the collaborative conversation because we were both
open and ideas are available to us. So the creative
conversation is about relational, but it's also personal in that
do we exercise our right brain? Do we exercise our
(10:27):
creative self? Do we allow ourselves to dream about possibilities
or to wonder what ifs? So that's an interesting conversation
because it's relational and personal. And then if we do
all those conversations well, ideally we go into a commitmic conversation,
which is really the action conversation is how we coordinate
(10:47):
getting things done with other people. So it's very relevant
to our everyday life from the kitchen sync to the boardroom.
Yet that is a complex conversation that we don't understand
and we tend to do it in a sloppy manner.
So we make promises we shouldn't make, We make promises
we can't keep, We make promises that break, and then
(11:09):
that that is a that is a precursor to to
losing losing trust in people. So that action conversation we
love it, but we don't do it well well.
Speaker 5 (11:21):
And I love how how you've got step by step,
and I think it's fascinating that you know, if you
haven't been able to accomplish step number one, which is
a storytelling, you're not able to move into step number two.
And do you have any specific examples that you could
share with the audience. I know I have a couple,
but let's see if you do where people were experiencing
(11:45):
that challenge of storytelling and what the effect was on
that relationship.
Speaker 2 (11:52):
I have a personal story that I'm willing to share
that's in the book, actually, and that is what I
grew up with a step grandfather who was a bit
of a redneck, which means super conservative and racist. But
I had three sisters. I was a younger son. Later
(12:13):
I had a brother. But so in my growing up,
when I showed emotions or cried like my sisters, or
I didn't want to shoot the deer, or I didn't
want to do something that was in his eyes, manly,
he constantly told me I wasn't a big enough man. So,
as a young boy with an authority figure telling me that,
I unconsciously adopted that story. That story became a really
(12:37):
internal dialogue I had with myself that was very harmful
because no matter what I was doing, and I had
some great successes, but no matter what I was doing,
that was always nagging in the back of my mind.
I was not good enough. You're not big enough, you're
not man enough, you're not strong enough. And it wasn't
until I busted that story by investigating facts and saying,
(12:58):
wait a minute, that's his idea what man is, But
I don't need to I don't know. I no longer
need to adopt his idea. Well, and that was that
was life changing.
Speaker 5 (13:07):
How did that affect your communication and your conversations with
other people that very astue that I'm not good enough?
Speaker 2 (13:15):
Yeah, well, it lifts a it lifts sort of an
internal filter that that always has you feeling a little
less confident or a lot less confident, or it lifts
some some some barrier that allows you to be totally
who you are and be comfortable in your own skin.
(13:36):
And then you can be open in dialogue and open
in conversation and more vulnerable because you're confident in your skin.
So it's sort of like a lifting a veil of suppression. Well,
that makes sense.
Speaker 4 (13:49):
It does.
Speaker 5 (13:50):
And you know, as you were talking about ego, one
of the things that came to my mind is because
I think we've all experienced wonder where or another I'm
not good enough, We've all kind of developed that subconscious
concept for whatever reason and oftentimes, and this is just
the thought that I had. How often is it that
(14:11):
that ego then is saying, I'm going to prove that
I am right.
Speaker 4 (14:14):
I'm going to prove that I am good enough.
Speaker 5 (14:16):
And therefore that ego gets in our way because we're
not willing to be able to move that ego to
the side and listen.
Speaker 2 (14:24):
That's right, yes, right exactly. So when we have we
had we grow up learning to advocate and have strong
positions and have answers and be smart and all that jazz.
So we have these we have these ideas about the
world and beliefs and perspectives, but we tend to get
identified with them. And that's what our ego does. It
(14:44):
keeps us identified with that and until we can sort
of step out like with Like I said, awareness is
like the separation. Now I can be out here, I think,
be a witness to my thinking, and then from there
I can say I can change that. But if we're
identified with it, we're going to defend it to death.
And our ego is there to us help us do that.
(15:05):
So they are wearing this sort of brings the light
and brings the opportunity to go, wait a minute, I
don't have to do that. I can do this well.
Speaker 5 (15:12):
In one of the stories I want to share, and
I shared this with you before, but you know, I
have a neighbor that dropped out where I was back
in the US for a week or so, and I
had a neighbor drop by and say, hey, how are
you doing? And we started talking and just you know,
really a friendly guy, good.
Speaker 4 (15:28):
Friend, and so forth.
Speaker 5 (15:30):
And we were chatting a little bit and you know,
and I said, hey, I didn't see you at church
last Sunday.
Speaker 4 (15:36):
He goes, yeah, I'm going okay. I said, so what's up?
Speaker 5 (15:40):
He says, well, you know, the people there just I'm
not comfortable with the way they think a lot of them.
And I'm going really, and I started to get an
idea of what was all about, but it.
Speaker 4 (15:53):
Was like, so tell me about it.
Speaker 5 (15:55):
And so he started to share with me that his
particular political thinking and beliefs were such that was very
opposite of the majority of the people that we both
knew at church. And as I was asking him, and
you know, I was trying to, you know, at least
get into the collaborative part. But as I was asking
(16:17):
him about that, you know, it's like, well, this is
what's happening, and this is what's happening, and I'm.
Speaker 4 (16:22):
Going, wha, wha, wait a minute, what about this? And
what about that? Oh, that's just fake news.
Speaker 5 (16:27):
And then he just went on and on and on
they mean a little bit more towards the left.
Speaker 4 (16:32):
And I thought to myself, how sad is.
Speaker 5 (16:36):
It that we can allow this ego, we can allow
this situation to occur to where it literally affects our
life in a negative way. It starts to eliminate friendships
potentially that could be so valuable, and in some ways
it literally changes how we live our lives.
Speaker 2 (16:57):
Absolutely, yeah, absolutely it. Yeah, that identity, that that clenching,
you know, to our perspective or clenching to our identity.
Then we can't be open, we can't listen, we can't absorb.
And and that's that's that's part of the work, and
that's why, that's why it takes a. It takes courage
(17:17):
to look like, do I really? You know, there's only
three things in stories. There's facts, which is debatable these
days according to some people. There's there's there's our emotions,
and then there's our opinions. And so our emotions are
a sign that we should be investigating our investigating our thinking.
(17:39):
Because it was proof that said our emotions are a
physical upheaval of our thinking. Yes, right, so we have
we have an emotion, and then there's when we look
at it, take the courage to look at it. We
go underneath and go why am I angry? Why am
I disappointed? Why am I frustrated? Well, there's a story there.
They shouldn't treat me that way. We shouldn't do that.
(18:02):
Women shouldn't behave that way. Men shouldn't treat women that way.
We have these stories and I'm not saying they're good
or bad, and I'm not saying get rid of them,
but investigate them because as soon as we have a
look at them, then we are free and we can
change them or we can adopt right, So those are
signs to look at our thinking. And then facts are facts,
(18:22):
no matter what we've experienced. The last ten years or so.
But opinions is where things get messy because our opinions
are our beliefs and everything we've accumulated over time, and
that we get cling to, that we get attached to well.
Speaker 5 (18:37):
And you know, as you talked about that, and you
talked about awareness to use the word awareness and courage,
and what comes to my mind is, and this has
been a question in my mind for a long time,
how do we help people or how do we as
individuals help ourselves to really become aware?
Speaker 4 (18:54):
How do we get to the point where we.
Speaker 5 (18:56):
Can say to ourselves, you know what, I'm allowing the
story to affect my relationship with others, I'm allowing a
story to affect my conversation with others.
Speaker 4 (19:05):
How do we become aware?
Speaker 5 (19:08):
And how do we you know, and how do we
develop the courage to go, Okay, I'm aware now I
know I need to do something about it.
Speaker 4 (19:16):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (19:16):
Yeah, So there's a couple of steps. One step is
to the courage is to acknowledge that our story is
not the truth, that our opinion is not the truth,
because you know, the truth, the truth is a big, big,
big subject, a whole podcast we could have on but
you know, we can start saying, wait, man, my opinion
(19:37):
isn't the truth. So what do I have? So I
have my emotional feelings, I have my thinking, what are
the facts? Let's ground ourselves in facts that you and
I wouldn't couldn't disagree on, you know, And then we
have the we have the willingness to say, okay, my
opinion is made up with certain things. And in my book,
(19:57):
I have these four quintessential questions, and that weave through
each conversation. That's a great shortcut for investigating our own
stories and for helping other people share theirs. And that
the way I like to think of it is that
we come into a conversation, we're attached to our position
like a fift and with these four questions, we can
(20:20):
slowly open our hand by the four questions, and we're
in a conversation sharing the thinking under our opinion or
under our judgment, rather than just clinging to the to
the to the judgment and the opinion. So by that
opening our hand, we are being humble. We're saying, my
(20:40):
story is a story, but it's not the story. And
so then we can invite other people to do the same.
So I'm happy to show those four questions, and we're.
Speaker 5 (20:51):
Going to ask you what are those four questions we
need to ask ourselves? And that's really at the basis
of storytelling, isn't it at that level.
Speaker 2 (20:57):
That's right at that level if we if we look
at our emotions and say, okay, there's a story under
our emotions, and then we check the facts. The next
thing to do is let's take apart our opinions and
our judgments that have us sort of stock or have
us feeling rigid. So the four questions to open our
hand is first of every judgment we have, is there's
(21:20):
a desire underneath something's happening that we didn't want to
have happened, or we want something to happen that we
have no control over in the future. Desires can be
a good thing because they can create goals and they
can inspire us to do things. But there are also
traps when we have a desire that doesn't align with reality,
and so there's always it's always there in the background,
(21:42):
but we forget often to surface it and share it.
So it's a powerful piece. I'll go through them quickly
because they each could have more depth. The second is concerns,
so every opinion we have, we have a concern that's
based in time. What's going to happen next week? I
don't want tomorrow to feel like today. And concerns are
(22:06):
you know, we all have concerns, but often in difficult
conversations attached to our position, we forget to share our concern.
I'm concerned that X might happen if we don't do
why and that that's a very different conversation because no
one can sort of argue with your concern. They might
have a different concern, but they can't argue with it.
The third third question is questions of authority. Every relationship
(22:31):
we're in with kids, with partners, with our colleagues, with
our bosses, with our community, we give different people's voices,
different levels of authority. These are power issues. It's very
obvious in hierarchies, because there's there's a man made hierarchy
that says you have more power than you more stripes
(22:52):
than I do, so I got to listen to what
you say. That's very obvious. It creates its own set
of problems inside corporations and inside leadership. Right, but every
conversation we have has power issues involved. Even with friends,
Some friends we give their if they think we aren't
doing something well, one person we might say, well, I'm
(23:13):
interested to know why do you think that? Another friend
might say that, and we just brush them off because
we don't give their opinion much authority. So this always
playing out in every conversation. It's good to check and
in with ourselves and say are there power issues at play?
And the last one is lovely because it's everywhere. Every
judgment we have, every opinion we have, is based on
(23:35):
our standards. And standards is an umbrella word for our values,
our morals, what's right, wrong, good, bad, ugly, pretty, all
those things. It's a packaged deal. That's that every judgment
you have, ask yourself, what standard am I holding that's
allowing me to say he's being an idiot or I'm
(23:56):
not good enough, or she shouldn't behave that way? What
is a standard underneath? We did not adopt most of
our standards. I I'm sorry. We did not consciously adopt
our standards. We adopted them through our families and our cultures,
and so then we live them. But often they get
us in trouble because we aren't willing to investigate them.
(24:18):
So those four things are a really good way to
get what I'm doing is I'm saying, Okay, what are
my desires, what are my concerns? Are their powers? Use?
What are my standards? I'm opening my hand and I'm
sharing my thinking, which is why I say it can
feel vulnerable.
Speaker 5 (24:32):
Well, and as you get to standards, you know, the
thing that comes to my mind is AI And what
happens now is that you know, if we're on Facebook,
if we're on anything, or if we're listening to news,
we will tend to have reinforced to our mind the
very thing that we tend to listen to, and so
(24:53):
we keep getting reinforced that Yeah, I'm right, I'm right,
I'm right, this is the standard. This is a correct standard,
when in fact it may or may not be. As
you said, truth at this point in time had really
a tough thing to define.
Speaker 2 (25:06):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, So we should remember that. You know,
it's very easy because of our ears and how we've
learned to listen that we do not make a distinction
between facts and opinions or in your in the case
you brought up facts and standards. Our standards are just
what's right or wrong. It doesn't mean that we necessarily
(25:27):
have the truth of the matter right, so investigate the
facts and they go, what is my standard? I often do,
not often, but I used to do some courses with
women around communication and conversations.
Speaker 6 (25:42):
With with with men, and when we would get to standards,
I was if I was teaching about standards, I would
ask the room, so, how many of you if you
leave home and the beds aren't made you feel like
you're not a good enough wife, not a good enough husband,
not a good enough wife, not a good mother, And
most hands would go up.
Speaker 2 (26:02):
Yeah, and I'm saying, now, no judgment, however, all my
only question is where did where, from whom? How did
you adopt that standard? And then when they look, they go, oh, yeah, well,
as we just that's what my mother taught me. That's
what my grandmother insisted on. That's whatever. So it's fine
you can hold that standard, but if you hold it
as a standard and not the truth, you might have
(26:25):
to rush off to work one day and not may
have the beds made or not. The kids don't make
their beds, But you don't have to carry the burden
of believing that you're a bad mom because you did
that well.
Speaker 4 (26:36):
And that's true.
Speaker 5 (26:36):
And you know what's what's interesting to me is, you know,
we've spent a huge amount of time just on that
basic storytelling because without overcoming that foundational issue, we cannot.
Speaker 4 (26:48):
Move into the collaborative.
Speaker 5 (26:50):
And then as we move into the collaborative again, that's
where the ego, at least in my mind, the ego
comes in.
Speaker 4 (26:56):
Because if you're if you're on.
Speaker 5 (26:58):
Opposite side of me, let's say, politically, and you want
to start sharing your issues, first thing my ego.
Speaker 4 (27:04):
Is going to do is, oh, no, no, you're wrong,
you're wrong, this is what's right.
Speaker 2 (27:08):
You know that's right.
Speaker 5 (27:10):
Whereas if we're both in that mentality of you know what,
I really want to have a conversation because I really
want to maintain a friendship here, and it's like, so
I'm going to listen and I'm going to be open,
and I may ask some questions, but they're not antagonistic questions,
just helping me to understand.
Speaker 4 (27:31):
And is that where the collaboration comes in.
Speaker 2 (27:34):
Yeah. The two basic tools of a good collaborative conversation
is open advocacy and open open inquiry. And but to
understand that the opposite is we're trained to be clothed
advocates or or or or non productive at we're trained
(27:55):
to sort of defend our position whole and have a
have a have you know defense that in fact, we're
trained that way from school on to have the answer.
We're not trained to ask questions, right, So the difference
between closed advocacy and open advocacy is really that willingness
to share our thinking underneath our position, to reveal our thinking.
(28:16):
That's the that's the humble vulnerability part. On the other
side of the equation, the inquiry is rather than asking
questions to prove them wrong, to prove my point right,
we ask questions to truly understand the other person's position
and guess what. The four questions are a great shortcut
recipe for asking good questions. So if we were in
(28:39):
a disagreement around politics, I say, what do you? What
do you what's your desire here? What are you trying
to accomplish? What's the goal in your position, or what
are you concerned about? What's your deepest concern about this issue?
Or what are your standards whether we're talking about abortion
or gun control, or what are your standards for making
(29:01):
this judgment? What we're doing when we ask good questions
that we're opening other we're helping other people open their
hand and reveal their thinking. Now, that doesn't always work
because some people just won't can't open their fist. It's
too scary, it's too you know, vulnerable. But many people
it's if you do it, they'll do it. There's an
(29:23):
open heart to open heart, but you don't always get that,
but you do your best by asking the good questions.
Speaker 5 (29:31):
Well, and I appreciate what you said because when you
first were saying asking questions, I'm thinking, okay, so let
me ask you a question. What do you think about this?
The fact that these facts have come out and so forth?
And that's doing exactly the opposite of what you said.
Speaker 2 (29:44):
That's trying to do right.
Speaker 4 (29:46):
Rather than that, it's like.
Speaker 5 (29:48):
Okay, tell me a little bit about your standards, tell
me a little bit about that, and really seeming to
understand them.
Speaker 2 (29:55):
And yeah, I would.
Speaker 5 (29:57):
Assume that if that happens, and you're right, some people
that are so closed off that it's not going to
make any difference, and right, that's something we can't control.
But for those that are willing to be opened a
little bit to that all of a sudden they will
share that. And as they share that, then how do
we respond to the answer to the questions that we
(30:18):
ask them as they tell us, all right, here's my
standard or here's you know, here's this or that.
Speaker 2 (30:24):
Well, so that could play out different different ways, but
one mediate response would be, wow, that's interesting, I have
a different standard. Uh, and here this is my standard.
Interesting that we we have different standards that somehow we
adopt it, you know, through life. And so let's let's
talk about that a little bit, because there there we
(30:47):
can connect and we can see, you know, we're not
talking about a universal yet it's right or wrong. We're
talking about oh wow, we're thinking about this differently. That's
a very different conversation than pointing fingers and saying you know,
I'm right, you're wrong, and we're in a fistfight. Right,
So one is to just acknowledge their point of view,
(31:08):
their standard, their concerns, their desires, and we can acknowledge,
we can disagree, we can take each one apart a
little bit if they're willing, so we can find even
if we find one common idea that we share, that's
a thread to keep our friendship alive. That's a thread
to keep our connection alive.
Speaker 5 (31:30):
Well, and I think sometimes we may stop at collaborative
h In other words, look, you know what, you and
I are friends, and let's disagree to disagree, and that's it,
and let's avoid that conversation because we've got so many
other things that are so good. All right, yes, but
if you can then move into the next step, the creativity, how.
Speaker 4 (31:50):
Does that happen? And what happens there?
Speaker 2 (31:53):
So if two people are willing to open their hands
and have an open minded, open hearted conversation, what we're
creating in the conversation is space. We're creating an open
space in our minds and in the conversation. So think
of it as a dialogue that's rather too fist fighting.
(32:17):
It's this life of exploration, like, oh wow, we're really
learning from each other. And from that space we go
what's possible? And that's the heart of the creative conversation,
what's possible? Can we wonder what else might be? And
that's a really lovely conversation because it forces us to
(32:39):
get out of our single minded, linear, rational left brain
into our right brain, which is a bigger thinker connects
the dots, you know, has has ideas, but that's a
different process because it takes courage on our part to go,
I have a position, but then maybe there's four mores
(33:00):
that we haven't thought of. Let's just do it. Let's brainstorm.
Now we all know the word brainstorm, but without understanding conversations,
we get into brainstorms. And as soon as somebody says
an idea, the next person says that will never work.
We tried it a year ago, and that shuts down
the creative conversation.
Speaker 5 (33:18):
Well, and I know what comes to my mind, and
it's just very recent, you know, the immigration policy. I mean,
you've got those on one side that says absolutely, we've
got to close those borders, and we've got other people saying, yeah,
but you know what, there's some good people that need
to come in that so on and so forth. And
what I've observed just recently, and I don't know where
(33:40):
it's going, but I've observed people on both sides coming
together and saying, you know what, we need to look
at the immigration policy and make changes so that we
can do the good that we need to do, but
at the same time prevent the bad that we need
to prevent.
Speaker 4 (34:01):
And I saw that happening and to me, that's.
Speaker 5 (34:03):
Such a great example of how that creativity is coming
into place.
Speaker 4 (34:08):
Whether they're able to do it or not.
Speaker 2 (34:10):
We'll see, yeah, yeah, no, that's a whole other subject,
but yeah, no, that's a perfect example. It's it's such
an opportunity to wonder, I wonder what else we could create?
I wonder what else is possible? And that's you know,
you have to give up your hold on the truth
and you're and you have to give up in your
(34:31):
attachment to your identity to be in that wonder space,
to be in that space of wow, there's we could
redo this whole damn thing. So it really really works
for everybody exactly exactly.
Speaker 5 (34:44):
And so as we move from that creative aspect now
to the commitment, what what's the difference between creative conversation
and commitment conversation?
Speaker 2 (34:55):
So, you know, from from from exploring our store worries
to being in a good collaborative conversation and then being
in a creative conversation is sort of an opening in
our in our mind, we're getting we're thinking bigger, we're
more open, we're more humble, and we're getting smart. Together,
the commitment conversation is actually a collapse back into a
(35:21):
position because it says, Okay, we've done all the exploration,
but now we have to get to work. Who's going
to do what by when? So it is how we
get things done with other people, and it generates what's
interesting about the commitment conversation that we don't pay much
attend to. Every promise you make will change your tomorrow.
(35:41):
Every promise you make will affect your relationships with your kids,
with your spouse, with your colleague, with your boss. So
this conversation is about someone asks us to do something.
We can say yes, we can say no, we can
make a counter offer, and that there's a dance there
that we don't consciously understand that will help us make
(36:02):
better promises rather than what I call sloppy promises, because
we do them day in and day out without much
awareness of a how important they are if they generate
our future, and b how much we can just say
yes without even thinking about the consequences of what we're
(36:25):
saying yes to.
Speaker 5 (36:26):
Okay, and so as we talk about awareness of this
whole thing, I know in you're moving to talk a
little bit about meditation, and I think you even have
some stuff on your website tell me a little bit
about meditation and what your thoughts are on meditation and
how important is that or something similar to that to
helping people to start to be able to follow these
(36:48):
four areas of conversation.
Speaker 2 (36:52):
So the reason I put it in the book is
it's a sister to awareness, or it's a tool for awareness,
because with all the all the different techniques and all
the different methodologies around meditation and all the sometimes like
deep Tibetan Buddhist stuff is lovely, but it's incredibly complex.
(37:17):
But with all those complexities, when we nail it down,
it's like us sitting quietly observing our own thinking, observing
what's going on inside this this chamber up here, and
and that that exercise of observation is like being the
witness to our thinking. And there from being a witness
(37:39):
rather than being attached to is similar to what I
was talking about earlier. It's a methodology. It's a tool
to understand ourselves in a way that without without it,
we're an autopilot. Well that makes sense.
Speaker 5 (37:53):
Oh yeah, And you know, as I meditate, and I
try to do it every day, you know, as I meditate,
and one thing I've learned as I've rune to different
courses and so forth. Is that as we truly meditate,
things come up, things come up. And if we look
at those things that come up, and particularly if it's
emotions of some sort, and then we start to ask
(38:15):
the questions you just were sharing with us that, okay,
what's the standard here?
Speaker 4 (38:21):
You know why that emotion?
Speaker 5 (38:23):
And all of a sudden, through that meditation, if we're
able to, as you say, step outside of ourselves and
be an observer, all of a sudden, we start to discover.
And that was going to be kind of my final
question here with you is let's take this communication and
conversation that we have with other people and let's talk
about the conversation and just a short amount of time
(38:46):
that we have with themselves and with their own life.
Speaker 4 (38:48):
It applies to It.
Speaker 2 (38:52):
Definitely applies. So, you know, meditation give us that observation perspective.
We've become a witness of our own thinking, and as
a witness we can we can make transform things instead
of being an autopilot. And another process that we can
do is we all have what in the lang language
(39:13):
flophy language world, there's there's our public conversation and then
there's our private conversation, and our private conversation is the
monkeys in our mind or or or or the committee,
you know that's always telling us, you know what's going on.
And I have an exercise in the book that was
actually created by Chris Argis many many years ago, I
(39:35):
think at the Harvard Business School. He was way out
of his time, and I don't think it was well
received then, but now it's pretty pretty pretty cool. You
literally document a conversation and you divide a piece of
paper in half with the line, and on one side
you write a conversation as you were spoken, and on
the left side you write what you were thinking and
feeling while both parties were talking. And I've done this
(40:00):
with hundreds of people and the left side. When people
actually do this and they write down their private conversation,
there's a fair amount of surprise because we just don't
pay attention. That chatter is just there running. It's routine
for twenty thirty, forty fifty years, whatever. But when we
write it down, we go, oh, my gosh, I had
(40:21):
no idea. I was so judgmental because there's curse words,
there's like a lot of negative negativity. So when we
look at it, we don't. I'm not criticizing the act,
and I'm saying the only option we have. If we
bury those things, those thoughts, it's not good for our health.
If we speak them out loud, it's not good for
a relationship. So we can process our private conversations and
(40:45):
find goodness in them because we have concerns that are legitimate.
We have standards that we can share and learn from
other people's standards. So it's the processing of our private
conversations that frees us from the grip they have that
keeps us from being present because the chatter is there.
Speaker 4 (41:06):
I love that. I love that.
Speaker 5 (41:07):
Well, guess what we have gone through time again. It's
just amazing to me how fast time goes by. So
as we close, how do people find your book?
Speaker 2 (41:16):
Okay, so they can, there's Amazon and other online places.
Better yet, order it your favorite bookstore. Good for the bookstore,
good for me. But it's it's out there and it's
alive and well, which is really good, ring to my heart.
And then on my website, I think you scroll down
(41:38):
a little bit and there's a free PDF of the introduction.
So all you have to do is put your email
and then you get a PDF of the introduction, and
what's your website is? Chuck Wisner dot com, c h U,
c k W S and air dot com. Yeah, and
I'm a little bit on social media, a little bit
(41:58):
on Instagram, a little bit on link in. Not a
heavy user, but I'm there.
Speaker 5 (42:03):
Okay, And as we close, what would be a final
message you want to share with the audience.
Speaker 2 (42:08):
These conversational tools take practice. So if you start looking
and start observing and start paying attention, look at it
non judgmentally. Try to just look at it as like, well,
I have a pattern, it's not serving me. Well maybe
I didn't adopt that consciously, but I can look at
it now non judgmentally and just be kind to yourself.
(42:32):
So you have the courage to look deeper, which will
change every conversation in every relationship you have.
Speaker 5 (42:40):
So wonderful, wonderful, Yeah, Jock, thanks so much.
Speaker 4 (42:43):
This has been great, good conversation here. Thank you.
Speaker 2 (42:48):
I'm glad this. I hope this one works out.
Speaker 4 (42:50):
Yeah it does, it did, believe me.
Speaker 5 (42:52):
So anyway, thanks so much, And folks, I hope you
got something good out of this, because I sure did.
Speaker 4 (42:57):
And hopefully hopefully you'll get the book, read the book.
I've already read a part of it. It's fantastic.
Speaker 5 (43:03):
And read the book and hopefully allow it to change
your life for the positive.
Speaker 4 (43:09):
So anyway, this is
Speaker 5 (43:10):
Doctor Doug thanking you for joining us, hoping you'll join
us again soon, saying no mista
This program is designed to provide general information with regards
to the subject matters covered. This information is given with
the understanding that neither the hosts, guests, sponsors, or station
are engaged in rendering any specific and personal medical, financial,
legal counseling, professional service, or any advice.
Speaker 2 (00:22):
You should seek the services.
Speaker 1 (00:23):
Of competent professionals before applying or trying any suggested ideas.
Speaker 3 (00:31):
At the end of the day, it's not about what
you have or even what you've accomplished. It's about what
you've done with those accomplishments. It's about who you've lifted up,
who you've made better. It's about what you've given back.
Denzel Washington, Welcome to Inspire Vision. Our sole purpose is
to elevate the lives of others and to inspire you
(00:51):
to do the same.
Speaker 4 (00:52):
Suck Welcome to the show.
Speaker 2 (00:54):
Thanks for having me. Happy to be here.
Speaker 5 (00:56):
Well, it's good to have you and folks, Just so
you know, we had a chat what was it about
a month ago? And about a month ago, Yeah, and
I had some issues on my end with the sound system,
and it's like we couldn't do it, and so we
have rescheduled, and I'm really excited about this because our
conversation before was so enlightening, and I really appreciate this
(01:19):
book that you've written and the concepts that you've come
up with. So what I'd love for you to do
is share with the audience who you are and what
motivated you to write the book The art of conscious communication.
Speaker 2 (01:32):
The art of conscious conversations, their conversation. I'm sorry, yeah, yeah,
Well who am I? That's a big question.
Speaker 4 (01:41):
I know we all ask ourselves that, don't we?
Speaker 2 (01:43):
Yeah? Who am I? Anyway, well, I'd say writing the
book was my fourth career. I was originally a musician.
I was an architect in Boston for twenty years, and
I changed careers when I started studying language and leadership,
and so that's sort of how that all evolved and
(02:06):
interesting just to underscore that is, I never was rejecting
the previous profession. I was more fell in love with
a new one and I couldn't help myself. So I
ended up doing leadership coaching and advising for the last
twenty five thirty years at large corporations with the executives
(02:28):
and their teams. And then the book came about because
some of my clients said, I love all the work
we're doing, but I don't know how to connect the dots,
and is there a book I can read? And I
realized there was a lot of different books, but the
work we were doing was a compilation of all those.
So I decided, maybe I can put all the pieces together.
(02:48):
And that's what inspired me to write the book.
Speaker 4 (02:51):
All right, and you've actually put four pieces together? What
are they?
Speaker 2 (02:54):
Yeah? Yeah, so the thing that connects all those different pieces?
One client says, how do I connect the dots? Right?
That stuck with me. And then I realized when I
was studying the ontology of language that there's four types
basic types of conversations that we're in all the time,
but we're not aware of those those and those four
(03:17):
conversations storytelling, collaboration, creativity, and commitment. Conversations are the structure
that hold all the different tools and practices that help
us be better in our communications.
Speaker 5 (03:31):
Okay, and you know, as we look at what the
problem is, and I want to go into that.
Speaker 4 (03:36):
First of all, what is the issue?
Speaker 5 (03:38):
What is the problem that you have experienced three or
many years of working with companies and individuals that you
found need this type of help. What are the issues
that come up with people in general.
Speaker 2 (03:52):
So in general, I think we are in conversations all
the time. It's the one human tool that we have
across the world globe, you know, conversations. And yet we
adopt our conversational patterns unconsciously through our culture, our family.
So we learn to talk, we mimic our families, we
(04:13):
mimic our our cultures, and then we learn through experience.
So we're in conversation often on autopilot without understanding them
as deeply as we can. And so when we're on autopilot,
we we are playing out our pattern but not always
to our benefit or to to the creativity of a
(04:35):
to the creative to the to the generation of a good,
good conversation. So in some ways it's like being we
are in conversations, but we don't really know how they work.
And so my book is trying to say, let's take
it apart a little bit, let's look deeply into it,
how they how they work, and what we can learn
from each kind of conversation.
Speaker 5 (04:56):
Well, and you know, it's interesting as we look at
what's going on in the country in the US right now,
those conversations are not working.
Speaker 2 (05:04):
Real well, not at all if I if I could
stick my book under the pillow of every politician, I would, Well.
Speaker 4 (05:12):
That would be nice.
Speaker 5 (05:13):
But even as we look at divorce rates, as we
look at challenges that parents have with their children and
vice versa, as we look at all of that, recognizing
that conversation and I said communication, But it's conversation that
creates that communication that.
Speaker 4 (05:32):
Becomes the major issue.
Speaker 5 (05:34):
And you know, and we'll get into this maybe a
little bit later if we have time, But I was
thinking today as I was re listening to a little
bit of our conversation before, is that even the conversation
we have with ourselves, yes, in our lives. And so
as we go through this, you know, we'll talk about
those on different levels. But at this point in time,
(05:55):
let's go have you explain Number one, what are the
individual areas you talked about, storytelling, collaborative, creative commitment.
Speaker 4 (06:06):
Let's go through each one of those to begin with. Also,
at the.
Speaker 5 (06:09):
Beginning of your book, you talked about ego and I'm
trying to figure out how that fits in. So if
you can fit that in and let me know where
that fits in, I want to get into that conversation too.
Speaker 2 (06:19):
Okay, great, so I'll do a brief explanation of each conversation, okay,
And if you want to do a dive into each one,
just interrupt me. Or if you have a question about
each one, just interrupt me.
Speaker 4 (06:31):
We'll do it after you've explained them all.
Speaker 2 (06:33):
Okay, I'll do it. I'll do a brief explanation. So
storytelling is primary. I say that because that's how we live,
lot that's how humans live. We live through stories. And
Uval Harari's book Sapiens does a great history lesson in
how this evolved, So that law is a story and
(06:55):
money is a story, but they stick because we all
agree on them. We read that the dollar is worth x.
But anyway, So in our personal lives, we also have stories.
We have stories about ourselves and we have stories about
other people. Some are helpful, some are harmful. The helpful
ones we connect with people, we love people, we have
(07:17):
good relationships. The harmful ones hold us back individually because
we aren't living up to our potential or they do
damage to a relationship. So exploring our stories and the
storytelling conversation is primary because it helps us do all
the other conversations better. Now ego comes in because the
(07:39):
ego loves our stories, loves our beliefs and the package
that we have about how we see the world, and
convinces us that, yeah, you're right, you know you're right,
and you should fight for your position. However, it sort
of is a constricting element. Ego sort of gets us
(08:00):
to be tight and hold on to our perspectives and beliefs,
and so we aren't as open as we could be,
open mind, open heart. But when we begin to look
at them and we increase our awareness, stories are like
put us in the ego is like putting as foggy
and gets us in the fog. We identify with our
positions and we can't see very much. When we become
(08:22):
aware of our stories, that's like bringing that's like bringing
light to the situation. So now we can say, oh,
I have that a story I adopted from my dad,
or I'm behaving that way because that's what I was
taught to do, and so then we have a chance
to change. So storytelling is very personal and it's very profound.
(08:42):
Now as we do that work, the next conversation, which
is relational, the collaborative conversation, is the conversation between you
and I, or meet and five people or meeting ten
people in a meeting that's relational because everybody now is
bringing their story to the table. And so we've all
been in meetings where everyone has their perspective and there's
(09:04):
a lot of disagreement around the room. But the real
art of collaboration conversations is our ability to advocate with
an open hand instead of a fist, and to listen
in a way that we can really absorb other people,
ask good questions and learn from one another. So the tools,
(09:25):
the basic tools there are open advocacy and open inquiry
versus closed advocacy and close inquiry. So when we do
that collaborative thing, we learn from each other and we
get smart together instead of getting domb together. And it's
just another way of sort of opening our minds, and
(09:45):
it takes humility and it takes vulnerability. We do that
conversation well, we are in a creative conversation where we
generate ideas, ideas that bubble up out of an open
space conversation, a good collaborative conversation. We all had that
experience in a meeting or with someone where we go
we're talking and all of a sudden, because we're sharing ideas,
(10:06):
An idea bubbles up and says, oh, I never thought
of it that way, we could do X. And that
came out of the collaborative conversation because we were both
open and ideas are available to us. So the creative
conversation is about relational, but it's also personal in that
do we exercise our right brain? Do we exercise our
(10:27):
creative self? Do we allow ourselves to dream about possibilities
or to wonder what ifs? So that's an interesting conversation
because it's relational and personal. And then if we do
all those conversations well, ideally we go into a commitmic conversation,
which is really the action conversation is how we coordinate
(10:47):
getting things done with other people. So it's very relevant
to our everyday life from the kitchen sync to the boardroom.
Yet that is a complex conversation that we don't understand
and we tend to do it in a sloppy manner.
So we make promises we shouldn't make, We make promises
we can't keep, We make promises that break, and then
(11:09):
that that is a that is a precursor to to
losing losing trust in people. So that action conversation we
love it, but we don't do it well well.
Speaker 5 (11:21):
And I love how how you've got step by step,
and I think it's fascinating that you know, if you
haven't been able to accomplish step number one, which is
a storytelling, you're not able to move into step number two.
And do you have any specific examples that you could
share with the audience. I know I have a couple,
but let's see if you do where people were experiencing
(11:45):
that challenge of storytelling and what the effect was on
that relationship.
Speaker 2 (11:52):
I have a personal story that I'm willing to share
that's in the book, actually, and that is what I
grew up with a step grandfather who was a bit
of a redneck, which means super conservative and racist. But
I had three sisters. I was a younger son. Later
(12:13):
I had a brother. But so in my growing up,
when I showed emotions or cried like my sisters, or
I didn't want to shoot the deer, or I didn't
want to do something that was in his eyes, manly,
he constantly told me I wasn't a big enough man. So,
as a young boy with an authority figure telling me that,
I unconsciously adopted that story. That story became a really
(12:37):
internal dialogue I had with myself that was very harmful
because no matter what I was doing, and I had
some great successes, but no matter what I was doing,
that was always nagging in the back of my mind.
I was not good enough. You're not big enough, you're
not man enough, you're not strong enough. And it wasn't
until I busted that story by investigating facts and saying,
(12:58):
wait a minute, that's his idea what man is, But
I don't need to I don't know. I no longer
need to adopt his idea. Well, and that was that
was life changing.
Speaker 5 (13:07):
How did that affect your communication and your conversations with
other people that very astue that I'm not good enough?
Speaker 2 (13:15):
Yeah, well, it lifts a it lifts sort of an
internal filter that that always has you feeling a little
less confident or a lot less confident, or it lifts
some some some barrier that allows you to be totally
who you are and be comfortable in your own skin.
(13:36):
And then you can be open in dialogue and open
in conversation and more vulnerable because you're confident in your skin.
So it's sort of like a lifting a veil of suppression. Well,
that makes sense.
Speaker 4 (13:49):
It does.
Speaker 5 (13:50):
And you know, as you were talking about ego, one
of the things that came to my mind is because
I think we've all experienced wonder where or another I'm
not good enough, We've all kind of developed that subconscious
concept for whatever reason and oftentimes, and this is just
the thought that I had. How often is it that
(14:11):
that ego then is saying, I'm going to prove that
I am right.
Speaker 4 (14:14):
I'm going to prove that I am good enough.
Speaker 5 (14:16):
And therefore that ego gets in our way because we're
not willing to be able to move that ego to
the side and listen.
Speaker 2 (14:24):
That's right, yes, right exactly. So when we have we
had we grow up learning to advocate and have strong
positions and have answers and be smart and all that jazz.
So we have these we have these ideas about the
world and beliefs and perspectives, but we tend to get
identified with them. And that's what our ego does. It
(14:44):
keeps us identified with that and until we can sort
of step out like with Like I said, awareness is
like the separation. Now I can be out here, I think,
be a witness to my thinking, and then from there
I can say I can change that. But if we're
identified with it, we're going to defend it to death.
And our ego is there to us help us do that.
(15:05):
So they are wearing this sort of brings the light
and brings the opportunity to go, wait a minute, I
don't have to do that. I can do this well.
Speaker 5 (15:12):
In one of the stories I want to share, and
I shared this with you before, but you know, I
have a neighbor that dropped out where I was back
in the US for a week or so, and I
had a neighbor drop by and say, hey, how are
you doing? And we started talking and just you know,
really a friendly guy, good.
Speaker 4 (15:28):
Friend, and so forth.
Speaker 5 (15:30):
And we were chatting a little bit and you know,
and I said, hey, I didn't see you at church
last Sunday.
Speaker 4 (15:36):
He goes, yeah, I'm going okay. I said, so what's up?
Speaker 5 (15:40):
He says, well, you know, the people there just I'm
not comfortable with the way they think a lot of them.
And I'm going really, and I started to get an
idea of what was all about, but it.
Speaker 4 (15:53):
Was like, so tell me about it.
Speaker 5 (15:55):
And so he started to share with me that his
particular political thinking and beliefs were such that was very
opposite of the majority of the people that we both
knew at church. And as I was asking him, and
you know, I was trying to, you know, at least
get into the collaborative part. But as I was asking
(16:17):
him about that, you know, it's like, well, this is
what's happening, and this is what's happening, and I'm.
Speaker 4 (16:22):
Going, wha, wha, wait a minute, what about this? And
what about that? Oh, that's just fake news.
Speaker 5 (16:27):
And then he just went on and on and on
they mean a little bit more towards the left.
Speaker 4 (16:32):
And I thought to myself, how sad is.
Speaker 5 (16:36):
It that we can allow this ego, we can allow
this situation to occur to where it literally affects our
life in a negative way. It starts to eliminate friendships
potentially that could be so valuable, and in some ways
it literally changes how we live our lives.
Speaker 2 (16:57):
Absolutely, yeah, absolutely it. Yeah, that identity, that that clenching,
you know, to our perspective or clenching to our identity.
Then we can't be open, we can't listen, we can't absorb.
And and that's that's that's part of the work, and
that's why, that's why it takes a. It takes courage
(17:17):
to look like, do I really? You know, there's only
three things in stories. There's facts, which is debatable these
days according to some people. There's there's there's our emotions,
and then there's our opinions. And so our emotions are
a sign that we should be investigating our investigating our thinking.
(17:39):
Because it was proof that said our emotions are a
physical upheaval of our thinking. Yes, right, so we have
we have an emotion, and then there's when we look
at it, take the courage to look at it. We
go underneath and go why am I angry? Why am
I disappointed? Why am I frustrated? Well, there's a story there.
They shouldn't treat me that way. We shouldn't do that.
(18:02):
Women shouldn't behave that way. Men shouldn't treat women that way.
We have these stories and I'm not saying they're good
or bad, and I'm not saying get rid of them,
but investigate them because as soon as we have a
look at them, then we are free and we can
change them or we can adopt right, So those are
signs to look at our thinking. And then facts are facts,
(18:22):
no matter what we've experienced. The last ten years or so.
But opinions is where things get messy because our opinions
are our beliefs and everything we've accumulated over time, and
that we get cling to, that we get attached to well.
Speaker 5 (18:37):
And you know, as you talked about that, and you
talked about awareness to use the word awareness and courage,
and what comes to my mind is, and this has
been a question in my mind for a long time,
how do we help people or how do we as
individuals help ourselves to really become aware?
Speaker 4 (18:54):
How do we get to the point where we.
Speaker 5 (18:56):
Can say to ourselves, you know what, I'm allowing the
story to affect my relationship with others, I'm allowing a
story to affect my conversation with others.
Speaker 4 (19:05):
How do we become aware?
Speaker 5 (19:08):
And how do we you know, and how do we
develop the courage to go, Okay, I'm aware now I
know I need to do something about it.
Speaker 4 (19:16):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (19:16):
Yeah, So there's a couple of steps. One step is
to the courage is to acknowledge that our story is
not the truth, that our opinion is not the truth,
because you know, the truth, the truth is a big, big,
big subject, a whole podcast we could have on but
you know, we can start saying, wait, man, my opinion
(19:37):
isn't the truth. So what do I have? So I
have my emotional feelings, I have my thinking, what are
the facts? Let's ground ourselves in facts that you and
I wouldn't couldn't disagree on, you know, And then we
have the we have the willingness to say, okay, my
opinion is made up with certain things. And in my book,
(19:57):
I have these four quintessential questions, and that weave through
each conversation. That's a great shortcut for investigating our own
stories and for helping other people share theirs. And that
the way I like to think of it is that
we come into a conversation, we're attached to our position
like a fift and with these four questions, we can
(20:20):
slowly open our hand by the four questions, and we're
in a conversation sharing the thinking under our opinion or
under our judgment, rather than just clinging to the to
the to the judgment and the opinion. So by that
opening our hand, we are being humble. We're saying, my
(20:40):
story is a story, but it's not the story. And
so then we can invite other people to do the same.
So I'm happy to show those four questions, and we're.
Speaker 5 (20:51):
Going to ask you what are those four questions we
need to ask ourselves? And that's really at the basis
of storytelling, isn't it at that level.
Speaker 2 (20:57):
That's right at that level if we if we look
at our emotions and say, okay, there's a story under
our emotions, and then we check the facts. The next
thing to do is let's take apart our opinions and
our judgments that have us sort of stock or have
us feeling rigid. So the four questions to open our
hand is first of every judgment we have, is there's
(21:20):
a desire underneath something's happening that we didn't want to
have happened, or we want something to happen that we
have no control over in the future. Desires can be
a good thing because they can create goals and they
can inspire us to do things. But there are also
traps when we have a desire that doesn't align with reality,
and so there's always it's always there in the background,
(21:42):
but we forget often to surface it and share it.
So it's a powerful piece. I'll go through them quickly
because they each could have more depth. The second is concerns,
so every opinion we have, we have a concern that's
based in time. What's going to happen next week? I
don't want tomorrow to feel like today. And concerns are
(22:06):
you know, we all have concerns, but often in difficult
conversations attached to our position, we forget to share our concern.
I'm concerned that X might happen if we don't do
why and that that's a very different conversation because no
one can sort of argue with your concern. They might
have a different concern, but they can't argue with it.
The third third question is questions of authority. Every relationship
(22:31):
we're in with kids, with partners, with our colleagues, with
our bosses, with our community, we give different people's voices,
different levels of authority. These are power issues. It's very
obvious in hierarchies, because there's there's a man made hierarchy
that says you have more power than you more stripes
(22:52):
than I do, so I got to listen to what
you say. That's very obvious. It creates its own set
of problems inside corporations and inside leadership. Right, but every
conversation we have has power issues involved. Even with friends,
Some friends we give their if they think we aren't
doing something well, one person we might say, well, I'm
(23:13):
interested to know why do you think that? Another friend
might say that, and we just brush them off because
we don't give their opinion much authority. So this always
playing out in every conversation. It's good to check and
in with ourselves and say are there power issues at play?
And the last one is lovely because it's everywhere. Every
judgment we have, every opinion we have, is based on
(23:35):
our standards. And standards is an umbrella word for our values,
our morals, what's right, wrong, good, bad, ugly, pretty, all
those things. It's a packaged deal. That's that every judgment
you have, ask yourself, what standard am I holding that's
allowing me to say he's being an idiot or I'm
(23:56):
not good enough, or she shouldn't behave that way? What
is a standard underneath? We did not adopt most of
our standards. I I'm sorry. We did not consciously adopt
our standards. We adopted them through our families and our cultures,
and so then we live them. But often they get
us in trouble because we aren't willing to investigate them.
(24:18):
So those four things are a really good way to
get what I'm doing is I'm saying, Okay, what are
my desires, what are my concerns? Are their powers? Use?
What are my standards? I'm opening my hand and I'm
sharing my thinking, which is why I say it can
feel vulnerable.
Speaker 5 (24:32):
Well, and as you get to standards, you know, the
thing that comes to my mind is AI And what
happens now is that you know, if we're on Facebook,
if we're on anything, or if we're listening to news,
we will tend to have reinforced to our mind the
very thing that we tend to listen to, and so
(24:53):
we keep getting reinforced that Yeah, I'm right, I'm right,
I'm right, this is the standard. This is a correct standard,
when in fact it may or may not be. As
you said, truth at this point in time had really
a tough thing to define.
Speaker 2 (25:06):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, So we should remember that. You know,
it's very easy because of our ears and how we've
learned to listen that we do not make a distinction
between facts and opinions or in your in the case
you brought up facts and standards. Our standards are just
what's right or wrong. It doesn't mean that we necessarily
(25:27):
have the truth of the matter right, so investigate the
facts and they go, what is my standard? I often do,
not often, but I used to do some courses with
women around communication and conversations.
Speaker 6 (25:42):
With with with men, and when we would get to standards,
I was if I was teaching about standards, I would
ask the room, so, how many of you if you
leave home and the beds aren't made you feel like
you're not a good enough wife, not a good enough husband,
not a good enough wife, not a good mother, And
most hands would go up.
Speaker 2 (26:02):
Yeah, and I'm saying, now, no judgment, however, all my
only question is where did where, from whom? How did
you adopt that standard? And then when they look, they go, oh, yeah, well,
as we just that's what my mother taught me. That's
what my grandmother insisted on. That's whatever. So it's fine
you can hold that standard, but if you hold it
as a standard and not the truth, you might have
(26:25):
to rush off to work one day and not may
have the beds made or not. The kids don't make
their beds, But you don't have to carry the burden
of believing that you're a bad mom because you did
that well.
Speaker 4 (26:36):
And that's true.
Speaker 5 (26:36):
And you know what's what's interesting to me is, you know,
we've spent a huge amount of time just on that
basic storytelling because without overcoming that foundational issue, we cannot.
Speaker 4 (26:48):
Move into the collaborative.
Speaker 5 (26:50):
And then as we move into the collaborative again, that's
where the ego, at least in my mind, the ego
comes in.
Speaker 4 (26:56):
Because if you're if you're on.
Speaker 5 (26:58):
Opposite side of me, let's say, politically, and you want
to start sharing your issues, first thing my ego.
Speaker 4 (27:04):
Is going to do is, oh, no, no, you're wrong,
you're wrong, this is what's right.
Speaker 2 (27:08):
You know that's right.
Speaker 5 (27:10):
Whereas if we're both in that mentality of you know what,
I really want to have a conversation because I really
want to maintain a friendship here, and it's like, so
I'm going to listen and I'm going to be open,
and I may ask some questions, but they're not antagonistic questions,
just helping me to understand.
Speaker 4 (27:31):
And is that where the collaboration comes in.
Speaker 2 (27:34):
Yeah. The two basic tools of a good collaborative conversation
is open advocacy and open open inquiry. And but to
understand that the opposite is we're trained to be clothed
advocates or or or or non productive at we're trained
(27:55):
to sort of defend our position whole and have a
have a have you know defense that in fact, we're
trained that way from school on to have the answer.
We're not trained to ask questions, right, So the difference
between closed advocacy and open advocacy is really that willingness
to share our thinking underneath our position, to reveal our thinking.
(28:16):
That's the that's the humble vulnerability part. On the other
side of the equation, the inquiry is rather than asking
questions to prove them wrong, to prove my point right,
we ask questions to truly understand the other person's position
and guess what. The four questions are a great shortcut
recipe for asking good questions. So if we were in
(28:39):
a disagreement around politics, I say, what do you? What
do you what's your desire here? What are you trying
to accomplish? What's the goal in your position, or what
are you concerned about? What's your deepest concern about this issue?
Or what are your standards whether we're talking about abortion
or gun control, or what are your standards for making
(29:01):
this judgment? What we're doing when we ask good questions
that we're opening other we're helping other people open their
hand and reveal their thinking. Now, that doesn't always work
because some people just won't can't open their fist. It's
too scary, it's too you know, vulnerable. But many people
it's if you do it, they'll do it. There's an
(29:23):
open heart to open heart, but you don't always get that,
but you do your best by asking the good questions.
Speaker 5 (29:31):
Well, and I appreciate what you said because when you
first were saying asking questions, I'm thinking, okay, so let
me ask you a question. What do you think about this?
The fact that these facts have come out and so forth?
And that's doing exactly the opposite of what you said.
Speaker 2 (29:44):
That's trying to do right.
Speaker 4 (29:46):
Rather than that, it's like.
Speaker 5 (29:48):
Okay, tell me a little bit about your standards, tell
me a little bit about that, and really seeming to
understand them.
Speaker 2 (29:55):
And yeah, I would.
Speaker 5 (29:57):
Assume that if that happens, and you're right, some people
that are so closed off that it's not going to
make any difference, and right, that's something we can't control.
But for those that are willing to be opened a
little bit to that all of a sudden they will
share that. And as they share that, then how do
we respond to the answer to the questions that we
(30:18):
ask them as they tell us, all right, here's my
standard or here's you know, here's this or that.
Speaker 2 (30:24):
Well, so that could play out different different ways, but
one mediate response would be, wow, that's interesting, I have
a different standard. Uh, and here this is my standard.
Interesting that we we have different standards that somehow we
adopt it, you know, through life. And so let's let's
talk about that a little bit, because there there we
(30:47):
can connect and we can see, you know, we're not
talking about a universal yet it's right or wrong. We're
talking about oh wow, we're thinking about this differently. That's
a very different conversation than pointing fingers and saying you know,
I'm right, you're wrong, and we're in a fistfight. Right,
So one is to just acknowledge their point of view,
(31:08):
their standard, their concerns, their desires, and we can acknowledge,
we can disagree, we can take each one apart a
little bit if they're willing, so we can find even
if we find one common idea that we share, that's
a thread to keep our friendship alive. That's a thread
to keep our connection alive.
Speaker 5 (31:30):
Well, and I think sometimes we may stop at collaborative
h In other words, look, you know what, you and
I are friends, and let's disagree to disagree, and that's it,
and let's avoid that conversation because we've got so many
other things that are so good. All right, yes, but
if you can then move into the next step, the creativity, how.
Speaker 4 (31:50):
Does that happen? And what happens there?
Speaker 2 (31:53):
So if two people are willing to open their hands
and have an open minded, open hearted conversation, what we're
creating in the conversation is space. We're creating an open
space in our minds and in the conversation. So think
of it as a dialogue that's rather too fist fighting.
(32:17):
It's this life of exploration, like, oh wow, we're really
learning from each other. And from that space we go
what's possible? And that's the heart of the creative conversation,
what's possible? Can we wonder what else might be? And
that's a really lovely conversation because it forces us to
(32:39):
get out of our single minded, linear, rational left brain
into our right brain, which is a bigger thinker connects
the dots, you know, has has ideas, but that's a
different process because it takes courage on our part to go,
I have a position, but then maybe there's four mores
(33:00):
that we haven't thought of. Let's just do it. Let's brainstorm.
Now we all know the word brainstorm, but without understanding conversations,
we get into brainstorms. And as soon as somebody says
an idea, the next person says that will never work.
We tried it a year ago, and that shuts down
the creative conversation.
Speaker 5 (33:18):
Well, and I know what comes to my mind, and
it's just very recent, you know, the immigration policy. I mean,
you've got those on one side that says absolutely, we've
got to close those borders, and we've got other people saying, yeah,
but you know what, there's some good people that need
to come in that so on and so forth. And
what I've observed just recently, and I don't know where
(33:40):
it's going, but I've observed people on both sides coming
together and saying, you know what, we need to look
at the immigration policy and make changes so that we
can do the good that we need to do, but
at the same time prevent the bad that we need
to prevent.
Speaker 4 (34:01):
And I saw that happening and to me, that's.
Speaker 5 (34:03):
Such a great example of how that creativity is coming
into place.
Speaker 4 (34:08):
Whether they're able to do it or not.
Speaker 2 (34:10):
We'll see, yeah, yeah, no, that's a whole other subject,
but yeah, no, that's a perfect example. It's it's such
an opportunity to wonder, I wonder what else we could create?
I wonder what else is possible? And that's you know,
you have to give up your hold on the truth
and you're and you have to give up in your
(34:31):
attachment to your identity to be in that wonder space,
to be in that space of wow, there's we could
redo this whole damn thing. So it really really works
for everybody exactly exactly.
Speaker 5 (34:44):
And so as we move from that creative aspect now
to the commitment, what what's the difference between creative conversation
and commitment conversation?
Speaker 2 (34:55):
So, you know, from from from exploring our store worries
to being in a good collaborative conversation and then being
in a creative conversation is sort of an opening in
our in our mind, we're getting we're thinking bigger, we're
more open, we're more humble, and we're getting smart. Together,
the commitment conversation is actually a collapse back into a
(35:21):
position because it says, Okay, we've done all the exploration,
but now we have to get to work. Who's going
to do what by when? So it is how we
get things done with other people, and it generates what's
interesting about the commitment conversation that we don't pay much
attend to. Every promise you make will change your tomorrow.
(35:41):
Every promise you make will affect your relationships with your kids,
with your spouse, with your colleague, with your boss. So
this conversation is about someone asks us to do something.
We can say yes, we can say no, we can
make a counter offer, and that there's a dance there
that we don't consciously understand that will help us make
(36:02):
better promises rather than what I call sloppy promises, because
we do them day in and day out without much
awareness of a how important they are if they generate
our future, and b how much we can just say
yes without even thinking about the consequences of what we're
(36:25):
saying yes to.
Speaker 5 (36:26):
Okay, and so as we talk about awareness of this
whole thing, I know in you're moving to talk a
little bit about meditation, and I think you even have
some stuff on your website tell me a little bit
about meditation and what your thoughts are on meditation and
how important is that or something similar to that to
helping people to start to be able to follow these
(36:48):
four areas of conversation.
Speaker 2 (36:52):
So the reason I put it in the book is
it's a sister to awareness, or it's a tool for awareness,
because with all the all the different techniques and all
the different methodologies around meditation and all the sometimes like
deep Tibetan Buddhist stuff is lovely, but it's incredibly complex.
(37:17):
But with all those complexities, when we nail it down,
it's like us sitting quietly observing our own thinking, observing
what's going on inside this this chamber up here, and
and that that exercise of observation is like being the
witness to our thinking. And there from being a witness
(37:39):
rather than being attached to is similar to what I
was talking about earlier. It's a methodology. It's a tool
to understand ourselves in a way that without without it,
we're an autopilot. Well that makes sense.
Speaker 5 (37:53):
Oh yeah, And you know, as I meditate, and I
try to do it every day, you know, as I meditate,
and one thing I've learned as I've rune to different
courses and so forth. Is that as we truly meditate,
things come up, things come up. And if we look
at those things that come up, and particularly if it's
emotions of some sort, and then we start to ask
(38:15):
the questions you just were sharing with us that, okay,
what's the standard here?
Speaker 4 (38:21):
You know why that emotion?
Speaker 5 (38:23):
And all of a sudden, through that meditation, if we're
able to, as you say, step outside of ourselves and
be an observer, all of a sudden, we start to discover.
And that was going to be kind of my final
question here with you is let's take this communication and
conversation that we have with other people and let's talk
about the conversation and just a short amount of time
(38:46):
that we have with themselves and with their own life.
Speaker 4 (38:48):
It applies to It.
Speaker 2 (38:52):
Definitely applies. So, you know, meditation give us that observation perspective.
We've become a witness of our own thinking, and as
a witness we can we can make transform things instead
of being an autopilot. And another process that we can
do is we all have what in the lang language
(39:13):
flophy language world, there's there's our public conversation and then
there's our private conversation, and our private conversation is the
monkeys in our mind or or or or the committee,
you know that's always telling us, you know what's going on.
And I have an exercise in the book that was
actually created by Chris Argis many many years ago, I
(39:35):
think at the Harvard Business School. He was way out
of his time, and I don't think it was well
received then, but now it's pretty pretty pretty cool. You
literally document a conversation and you divide a piece of
paper in half with the line, and on one side
you write a conversation as you were spoken, and on
the left side you write what you were thinking and
feeling while both parties were talking. And I've done this
(40:00):
with hundreds of people and the left side. When people
actually do this and they write down their private conversation,
there's a fair amount of surprise because we just don't
pay attention. That chatter is just there running. It's routine
for twenty thirty, forty fifty years, whatever. But when we
write it down, we go, oh, my gosh, I had
(40:21):
no idea. I was so judgmental because there's curse words,
there's like a lot of negative negativity. So when we
look at it, we don't. I'm not criticizing the act,
and I'm saying the only option we have. If we
bury those things, those thoughts, it's not good for our health.
If we speak them out loud, it's not good for
a relationship. So we can process our private conversations and
(40:45):
find goodness in them because we have concerns that are legitimate.
We have standards that we can share and learn from
other people's standards. So it's the processing of our private
conversations that frees us from the grip they have that
keeps us from being present because the chatter is there.
Speaker 4 (41:06):
I love that. I love that.
Speaker 5 (41:07):
Well, guess what we have gone through time again. It's
just amazing to me how fast time goes by. So
as we close, how do people find your book?
Speaker 2 (41:16):
Okay, so they can, there's Amazon and other online places.
Better yet, order it your favorite bookstore. Good for the bookstore,
good for me. But it's it's out there and it's
alive and well, which is really good, ring to my heart.
And then on my website, I think you scroll down
(41:38):
a little bit and there's a free PDF of the introduction.
So all you have to do is put your email
and then you get a PDF of the introduction, and
what's your website is? Chuck Wisner dot com, c h U,
c k W S and air dot com. Yeah, and
I'm a little bit on social media, a little bit
(41:58):
on Instagram, a little bit on link in. Not a
heavy user, but I'm there.
Speaker 5 (42:03):
Okay, And as we close, what would be a final
message you want to share with the audience.
Speaker 2 (42:08):
These conversational tools take practice. So if you start looking
and start observing and start paying attention, look at it
non judgmentally. Try to just look at it as like, well,
I have a pattern, it's not serving me. Well maybe
I didn't adopt that consciously, but I can look at
it now non judgmentally and just be kind to yourself.
(42:32):
So you have the courage to look deeper, which will
change every conversation in every relationship you have.
Speaker 5 (42:40):
So wonderful, wonderful, Yeah, Jock, thanks so much.
Speaker 4 (42:43):
This has been great, good conversation here. Thank you.
Speaker 2 (42:48):
I'm glad this. I hope this one works out.
Speaker 4 (42:50):
Yeah it does, it did, believe me.
Speaker 5 (42:52):
So anyway, thanks so much, And folks, I hope you
got something good out of this, because I sure did.
Speaker 4 (42:57):
And hopefully hopefully you'll get the book, read the book.
I've already read a part of it. It's fantastic.
Speaker 5 (43:03):
And read the book and hopefully allow it to change
your life for the positive.
Speaker 4 (43:09):
So anyway, this is
Speaker 5 (43:10):
Doctor Doug thanking you for joining us, hoping you'll join
us again soon, saying no mista
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