May 5, 2026 • 25 mins
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You've said it once.
You've said it twice.
You've said it fifteen times over four months.
And somehow, nothing changes.
You're not crazy.
You're just not being heard.
I lived this recently. I told a coworker in January that we needed to cut a software that wasn't working. He agreed. Or so I thought. Fast forward to April and we're still having the same conversation.
January. That's when we decided. January.
In this video, I'm breaking down the three reasons people don't listen when you speak and three things you can actually do about it.
Distraction.
Different wiring.
Lack of clarity.
These three things are behind almost every "why won't they just listen to me" moment you've ever had.
I'm also walking you through the DISC personality framework (my favorite tool for understanding how people process information differently) and why speaking louder has never once helped someone understand you better.
The hard question isn't "why won't they listen?"
The hard question is "am I being a person worth listening to?"
That's the one that changes everything.
I'm Dr. Kimberly Beam Holmes. After a decade transforming marriages at Marriage Helper, I've realized that the greatest tragedy isn't a failed relationship; it's the person who stays stuck and never experiences the fullness of all God intended.
The Way You Show Up is for the high-achiever who is tired of "fine."
We're dismantling the average life to build an exceptional one—using the science of the PIES: Physical, Intellectual, Emotional, and Spiritual health.
If you want to save your marriage, go to Marriage Helper. If you want to master yourself and lead your legacy, stay here.
New episodes every Tuesday.
Don't just exist. Show up.
🔗 Website: https://kimberlybeamholmes.com
🎥YouTube https://youtube.com/@kimberlybeamholmes
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
SPEAKER_00 (01:28):
What do you do when no one is freaking listening to
you?
SPEAKER_01 (01:33):
This is one of the most frustrating things that I
feel in my life.
In fact, I'm going to tell you astory that just recently
happened.
We, as a company, back inNovember, we got this software.
We hoped that it was going to doXYZ and have all these great
things and be able to serveclients in a really amazing way.
But actually, what ended uphappening was it didn't really
(01:53):
work well much at all.
But the data was kind of messy,and but I just had a gut feel
like this isn't worth it.
We need to just cancel thissoftware.
So I met with one of mycoworkers back in January.
We were talking about it.
And I said, we just need to cutit.
We just need to cancel it.
We just need to honestly get ridof it.
To which my coworker was like,well, let's just give it X
amount of more time and look atthe data.
(02:15):
And I said, we could do that.
But on this day, January 21st,if it hasn't done what we want
it to do, it needs to go.
We agreed.
Or so I thought.
But here we were yesterday,April 30th, and we're still
talking about this software,about how it's not doing what we
want it to do.
(02:35):
It's not giving us the resultsthat we were hoping it would.
And he said, Well, at what pointdo you think we should decide to
cut the software?
And I looked at him and I said,January.
January is when we decided tocut the software.
January.
Why did it not happen?
Why did you not listen?
(02:56):
Have you ever felt this way?
Have you ever felt this way intalking with your kids, with
your mom, with your dad, withyour husband, with your wife?
You feel like you are goingaround in circles trying to tell
them something about how youfeel, about a desire that you
have, about a concern that youhave, about a boundary, maybe.
SPEAKER_00 (03:15):
And you just feel like no one is listening to you.
SPEAKER_01 (03:20):
And you feel like you're going crazy.
Here's what we're going to talkabout today.
We're going to talk about thethree reasons.
The three reasons, they're notall encompassing, but I think
they are the three main reasonsthat people don't listen when
you speak.
And then three things that youcan do so that the other person
will actually listen.
(03:41):
Okay, so here's reason numberone.
People don't listen because theyare distracted.
I am for sure guilty of thismyself.
I can easily be checking emails,Slack, Instagram, on my phone,
and become really distractedwhen important people in my life
(04:02):
are talking to me, when myhusband's talking to me, when
coworkers are talking to me,when my mom or dad are talking
to me.
And it's not great.
I shouldn't defend that inmyself because there's not
really any reason to do it.
There's nothing to defend.
But a lot of the times when youare trying to talk to someone,
maybe it's not that they don'twant to hear you.
It's just that they aredistracted and their brain and
(04:25):
their eyes and their ears aren'tfully attuned to what you are
saying in the moment.
It's not necessarily nefariouson their part.
They're not trying to disrespectyou.
They're not trying to act likeyou don't matter or the words
that you say aren't important tothem.
They're just distracted.
The second reason that peopledon't hear you is because you
(04:47):
process things differently fromeach other.
Now here's the thing.
I think this is actually apretty common reason that we
don't give enough attention to.
There's a bunch of differentpersonality assessments out
there.
There's Myers Briggs, there'sEnneagram.
My favorite one is called theDisc.
And on a very high level, here'swhat the disc tells us about
other people's behavioral stylesor the temperaments that they
(05:10):
have in the way that they act ingiven situations.
There are these people that Ilike to call the commanders.
They are the people who are verydriven.
They want just give me thehigh-level idea, give me the
overall concept, move quickbecause I move quick.
That's a commander.
They like to take, take charge,they like to get things done.
(05:30):
And when they're listening toinformation, the more details
you give them, the more theywant to crawl under their desk
and die.
Then you have the communicators.
These are the people who aresuper fun, outspoken.
They just love doing fun andexciting things.
They're spontaneous.
They're great communicators.
That's why they're calledcommunicators in the way that we
(05:51):
talk about them.
And these people, again, withthe details or with anything
that's super analytical, wherethey feel like there's too many
rules, they just start to tuneout because you're kind of
raining on their parade andcramping their style.
Then you have these people thatwe call completers.
They're very peaceful, loyal,they hate taking big risks.
(06:13):
And so whenever they feel likethat you are overbearing, they
can start to kind of close intothemselves.
They they like safety and theylike peace.
They also really likepsychological safety.
So they can kind of start goinginto themselves.
Or if you start talking to themabout an issue, if you're trying
to address conflict with someonewho's a completer, they kind of
(06:35):
try and run away from it.
They don't like that.
And then we have thecalculators.
These are the people who areincredibly analytical.
They love details, they lovefacts, and they hate being
wrong.
They calculate every singledecision.
Now you can kind of begin to seehow if you have a communicator
who's super fun, lovesspontaneity, doesn't really care
(06:57):
about the details, definitelydoesn't care about always
getting everything exactlyright.
I mean, get it 10 to 20% in themargin of error.
That's good enough.
That's what a communicatorthinks.
And when they're talking to acalculator who has to have every
single detail, they have aspreadsheet for every single
thing.
The communicator doesn't knowwhere the spreadsheets are.
(07:19):
They keep losing them.
And then you have the calculatorwho lives and breathes by the
spreadsheets.
You can begin to see how theydon't listen to each other.
Not because necessarily they'renot hearing each other, but
because they don't know how tospeak each other's language.
Then you can begin to see howthe completely who loves peace,
calm, things to stay just evenkeel, everyone to just get
(07:42):
along.
And then you have a commanderwho doesn't mind conflict one
bit, will charge into the eye ofthe storm, isn't afraid of
really hurting people's feelingsbecause they just want to get
stuff done.
You can begin to see how thosepeople can begin to not hear
each other.
When the commander says, I needthis done, the complet, I've
(08:06):
made them mad.
I don't know what to do.
I don't need to tell them howthey are making me feel.
I'm just going to try and keepthe peace.
You have the calculator who saysthings to the communicator like,
you don't think things throughall of the time.
And the communicator's superhurt and feels like they've
they're being rejected, which istheir worst fear.
All of these things you canbegin to see how they pile on
top of each other.
(08:28):
One of the reasons that we don'thear each other is because we're
talking past each other and wedon't understand how the other
person is wired.
It's a big problem.
The third reason that peopledon't hear you is because you're
not being clear.
For 15 years now, I have helpedpeople with their relationships.
(08:49):
And one of the things that hasbeen consistent that I actually
started noticing 11 years agonow was that men tended to not
know why their wives or whytheir girlfriends wanted out of
the relationship?
It was really interesting to seeunfold at first.
(09:09):
They would call in and theywould say, I just don't know
what happened.
It was just one day she shewanted out and she wouldn't tell
me why.
And the more I began to talk tothem and ask, okay, think back.
Is there anything over the pastcouple of years, over the past
10 years, 20 years that she'sthat she has said that maybe you
just didn't hear at the time?
(09:29):
And it never failed that theywould say, you know what?
She did say that she didn't feellike I was listening to her very
much, or she wished that we werespending more time together, or
she wished that I would workless, but it didn't really seem
like that big of a deal.
Many times the women in theserelationships are trying to tell
(09:52):
their husbands how they feel,but their husbands aren't
listening.
I'm not trying to make this agender thing by any stretch of
the imagination.
I'm sure that there aresituations where women don't
listen to their husbands eitherabout how their husbands feel,
but it does really seem that thetrend weighs way more heavily on
this towards men.
Women, when their husbandsleave, they typically know why.
(10:14):
Their husbands have made itknown.
And again, I'm not necessarilytrying to make this a gender
thing, but as a woman who's beenin a level of leadership for,
again, 12 years now, I do knowthat it is different for women
when they are in situations andin roles that men typically
occupy.
As a female CEO, I amconsistently in mastermind
(10:38):
groups, boardroom groups, thingslike that, which are more
heavily male-dependent.
And women do have to shift theway that they speak and the way
that they show up in order to beseen equally to men.
It's just part of how it is.
I'm not going to say if it'sgood or bad necessarily.
It's just, I guess, kind of partof the job.
(11:00):
But I think it can be moredifficult for women to be clear
because a lot of our lives weare told to be polite.
We're told to be all smiles.
We're told to make sure thatwe're coming across a certain
way, to always have our legscrossed, to always make sure
that we're dressed appropriatelyand that we have our makeup on
(11:23):
and are fully presentable.
That's how women have beentaught from the time they were
very young.
And so, yes, there is kind of anexpectation we put on ourselves
of I can't be too needy.
I can't be too direct, or peoplewill think that I'm a word that
I can't say on this YouTubebecause I love Jesus, even
(11:44):
though I cuss a littlesometimes, but not here.
So that's one of the things thatcan make it more difficult for
women to speak up and to reallybe clear.
But the thing is, there was abook I read a couple of years
ago, and the whole premise of itwas clear is kind.
We think we're being polite, andmen can do this too, for sure,
but we think that we are beingpolite when we lessen ourselves.
(12:07):
When we, and I'm not gonna, I'mnot talking about being humble,
being humble is good, but whenwe say, you know, I would prefer
it if you, instead of saying,here's what I need you to do.
Sometimes we just need to beclear about what our needs are,
about what our desires are,about what our expectations are,
clear is kind.
(12:27):
And we can be clear in a kindway, but we don't need to
sacrifice being kind for beingclear.
So what do you do?
If distractions could be in theway, if the way that each of you
see the world and yourpersonality differences could be
in the way, if if just yourinability to maybe be clear or
(12:50):
as clear as you could be attimes are all being in the way
of someone listening to you,then what do you do?
At the end of the day, you can'tforce someone to listen to you.
Many times when people travel,like I know me, when my husband
and I lived in Korea, we didn'tspeak the same language, right?
(13:10):
And we tried to communicate withthe Koreans, but we didn't try
to learn Korean at first.
I mean, we did know, we dideventually learn to speak Korean
to an extent to be able to getaround.
But at first, in our firstcouple of weeks there, when we
were needing to catch a taxi,when we were needing to go to
the market, when we were needingto figure stuff out, and we
couldn't speak the language ofthe other person, what did we
(13:33):
do?
We slowed our words and spokelouder.
But they still didn't speak ourlanguage.
It didn't help at all.
Being louder and being moreforceful doesn't actually help
someone hear you.
They don't, it doesn't helpsomeone actually understand what
(13:55):
you're doing.
You can't force someone else tolisten to.
So what should you do?
Become a person worth listeningto.
It wasn't until, especially if Ithink about our time in Korea,
it wasn't until I actually beganto notice the things going on
around me, to try and show theother person that I was trying
(14:17):
to learn their language, that Iwould make eye contact and smile
and do things that would leadthat person to want to help me
understand them and try andunderstand me.
That's what led to the biggestdifference in us being able to
listen to each other andunderstand each other.
So then what can we do in theseaspects?
(14:39):
Well, first of all, if you'retrying to talk to someone who's
clearly in the middle ofsomething, they're checking
their phone, they're trying tofinish up a project at work, you
just walk into their office, butthey're clearly in the middle of
trying to finish in to finishsomething up, maybe just wait.
Don't try and talk to someonewhile they're distracted.
Wait until you can have theirfull attention.
(15:01):
I've done this a couple of timesin my life and it's always
awkward.
It's always awkward.
And I've had this done to me acouple of times in my life, and
it's always awkward.
But it works.
And that's this.
If I am trying to talk tosomeone and I see that they are
clearly on their phone, I try tobe as nice as I can, clear as
(15:21):
kind, and can still be kind.
I try and be as clear as I canand say, it's okay, finish what
you're doing.
I'll just wait until you'redone.
I've had that done to me acouple of times immediately.
Like, oh my focus is on you now.
Again, that can be kind of weirdto do.
It feels a bit.
(15:45):
But if you want to actuallycommunicate and make sure the
other person is listening toyou, wait until they can listen
to you, especially if you'veinterrupted their day in order
to have this conversation.
That's number one.
So then number two, what do youdo when the other person is
speaking a different languagethan you?
You just can't seem to get onthe same page because you are
(16:06):
different.
The way you see the world isdifferent.
What can you do then?
And again, I think this is themajority of where we feel like
people aren't listening to us.
There was a situation a coupleof years ago where there were
some bigger issues happening inmy extended family.
But it had gotten to the pointwhere I just didn't want to go
(16:29):
to a particular family gettogether for my own reasons.
And my reasons were good andwere valid and they weren't bad.
And I don't think it was a badthing that I wanted to set a
boundary of, you know what, I'mnot gonna go to this event.
And so that's what I did.
But when I told my mom, who washosting the event, who is the
(16:51):
completely, who is the personwho just wants everyone to be
happy with each other andeveryone to just love each
other, when I said, Mom, I'm notgoing.
I love you, I love everyone, butfor this particular set of
circumstances that are going on,I will not be at that event.
And it broke her.
(17:13):
Her response was, Kimberly, Ijust want everyone to love each
other.
Which I felt you're not hearingme.
You care more about everyoneelse being happy and all of us
being happy together than me andmy feelings and the way that I'm
processing some of the thingsthat have been happening.
(17:35):
I felt like she cared more abouteveryone else than me in that
moment.
But she at that moment felt likeI cared.
I don't, I actually don't knowwhat she thought I cared about
at that moment, but she feltlike there was a like an
earthquake about to happen thatwas going to tear the whole
family apart.
And that's her biggest fear.
And so we kept talking past eachother until finally we were able
(18:00):
to just actually sit and trulytry and hear from the other
person.
I think a lot of times whenwe're trying to just talk past
the other person, we care moreabout having our needs and
desires heard than hearing whatthe other person's needs and
desires are as well.
Now, I think the fear thatpeople have in that is, well,
(18:21):
I'm just gonna always becatering to another person.
I'm never actually going to beable to make sure that my needs
are met.
And I know and I understandthat.
And I think it's a validconcern.
We can end up becoming doormatsjust trying to make everyone
else happy.
That's not what this is about.
This is about being able to doboth and I wanna be able to
listen to you and understandwhere your heart and your needs
(18:45):
and your fears are, but also I'mgonna meet that with here's
mine, here's my hurts, here's myheart, here's my needs, my
desires.
Let's figure out how to moveforward from here, either how to
compromise or how to agree todisagree, but still love each
other.
And in that particular situationwith my mom, I didn't go to that
(19:07):
family get together.
But you know what?
My mom and I sat together and weended up having that
heart-to-heart, like I was justtalking about.
And it was good.
It was okay.
Both of us understood eachother's needs.
We didn't have any hard feelingstowards each other, and
everything's been good since.
I needed to be able to set thatboundary for that situation and
(19:29):
for people to honor it.
And my mom understood she neededto honor it.
And I understood that I couldn'tset a firm boundary that made my
mom feel like I was never gonnacome back to a family get
together.
So we worked it out.
And I feel like we just need tohave more of that kind of
process with people we feel likewe are talking past.
(19:49):
I know that that probably couldhave helped me and my coworker
back in January for us toactually, instead of both of us
trying to be right, he wantedmore data.
I had my gut feel, which wasright.
But either way, he wanted to beable to see the data for
himself.
Maybe I could have leaned moreinto that and said, okay, let's
(20:10):
go down that path.
Let's let's get the data.
What is that gonna look like?
How long is that gonna take?
And let's set a secondarydeadline instead of just
allowing time to pass and thenended up feeling completely
disrespected.
I ended up feeling completelydisrespected by the time it came
up again, and I realized itstill had been done.
(20:31):
I was part of the problem.
But it's harder to realize andask yourself that question, at
least I know it is for me.
I want to ask the question, whyare you not listening to me?
But maybe the harder question Ishould be asking is Am I being
the kind of person worthlistening to right now?
(20:53):
It's a much harder one to dealwith and to wrestle with.
And then finally, be clear.
You have to learn to be clear inyour communication.
I said it a little bit before,but clear is kind, of course.
What is it you want to say?
Say it in a way that is kind butclear.
(21:17):
My husband and I are verydifferent personality styles as
well.
And one of the things about myhusband that I've learned over
our 15 years of marriage is whenhe says we need to leave at 10
a.m., what's gonna actuallyhappen is he's gonna be ready to
go at 9.50 and wonder why I'mnot ready.
A couple of times this has kindof come to a head where he's
(21:40):
it's 9.50 and he is saying weare out the door.
Although I asked and he said wewere leaving at 10.
What I really want to say is,Rob, I asked you what time you
said 10.
Leave me alone.
I have 10 more minutes.
Instead, what I have learned tosay is on the front end, hey
babe, I just want to make surethat I'm well aware of the time
(22:03):
we need to leave.
So tell me the time that youexpect me to be ready for us to
walk out the door.
And then when he responds withwhatever, 10 a.m., I say, okay,
great.
So just to be clear, I am notgonna be ready to leave until 10
a.m.
That's communication.
Sender, receiver, messagereceived, right?
(22:25):
Just to be clear so that we havethat on the front end now.
And when it comes 9:50, and hereally wants because he's ahead
of time.
I'm never ahead of time.
He was in the army.
To be early is to be late.
I was not and would have died inthe army.
So I'm always late toeverything.
That's that's the situation thatwe have to work with.
(22:46):
And so at 9:50, when he's likeready to get out in the car, now
what he knows to do is he knowshe told, he said, 10.
So instead, he says, Hey, babe,I'll be out in the car waiting
for you.
Now I need to honor my part andmake sure I'm in that car at 10
a.m.
But we have learned how to makeit work because I have learned
to be clear.
And of course, in ourrelationship, he has learned to
(23:08):
be very clear about things withme as well like, do not touch
his stuff.
I know not to move anything thathe owns.
But he's clear.
So I know what to do and whatnot to do.
That helps us have betterrelationships and understand how
to be a person worth listeningto because when you say
something, you You mean it.
(23:29):
And it's something the otherperson can respect because they
know what to do or what not todo.
I'll end with this.
When my husband and I adoptedour two kids from India, they
did not speak any English.
Our daughter was four and a halfat the time, and our son had
just turned two.
And communication was not likethis.
(23:53):
And everyone said, you'll learnhow to communicate over time.
And I thought, I don't know howthat's going to happen, but I
guess we're all going to see.
But the thing is, even though wedid not speak each other's
language, even though when Itried to talk to them, they
wanted to understand, theywanted to listen, but they just
couldn't.
The thing that made the biggestdifference was me learning how
(24:17):
to meet their needs, how to pullthem into wanting to listen to
me instead of trying to pushmyself into their heads, into
their hearts, into their lives.
Instead of trying to say, you dothis or you do that.
It was seeing how bringing themto the fridge and showing them
different foods that we have andoffering it to them and waiting
(24:39):
until their eyes lit up andseeing, hey, maybe you want to
try this and then offering it tothem.
It was that kind of nonverbalcommunication that ultimately
led to later such strongerverbal communication.
If you feel like no one islistening to you, maybe the hard
question that you need to askyourself about the way that
(25:01):
you're showing up is am Ishowing up as a person that's
worth listening to?
I would love to know what youthought about this video and
what you learned from it.
Put that in the comments below.
I read every single comment.
I love to reply to them as well.
But if you are asking yourself,well, how can I know more about
this?
(25:21):
I am struggling.
I'm struggling with knowing howto show up better, how to be the
kind of person that someonewants to listen to.
I have a free assessment thatyou can take.
You can find the link to it inthe description below this
video.
Completely free assessment.
And it's going to show you thefour different areas of
yourself, physically,intellectually, emotionally, and
(25:42):
spiritually.
And it's going to show you theareas that you're struggling the
most that are affecting the waythat you're showing up and the
areas that you're doing reallywell in, because we all need
some wins in our lives.
I'd love for you to take that.
Again, you can find it in theshow notes below.
Until next time, stay strong.
What do you do when no one is freaking listening to
you?
SPEAKER_01 (01:33):
This is one of the most frustrating things that I
feel in my life.
In fact, I'm going to tell you astory that just recently
happened.
We, as a company, back inNovember, we got this software.
We hoped that it was going to doXYZ and have all these great
things and be able to serveclients in a really amazing way.
But actually, what ended uphappening was it didn't really
(01:53):
work well much at all.
But the data was kind of messy,and but I just had a gut feel
like this isn't worth it.
We need to just cancel thissoftware.
So I met with one of mycoworkers back in January.
We were talking about it.
And I said, we just need to cutit.
We just need to cancel it.
We just need to honestly get ridof it.
To which my coworker was like,well, let's just give it X
amount of more time and look atthe data.
(02:15):
And I said, we could do that.
But on this day, January 21st,if it hasn't done what we want
it to do, it needs to go.
We agreed.
Or so I thought.
But here we were yesterday,April 30th, and we're still
talking about this software,about how it's not doing what we
want it to do.
(02:35):
It's not giving us the resultsthat we were hoping it would.
And he said, Well, at what pointdo you think we should decide to
cut the software?
And I looked at him and I said,January.
January is when we decided tocut the software.
January.
Why did it not happen?
Why did you not listen?
(02:56):
Have you ever felt this way?
Have you ever felt this way intalking with your kids, with
your mom, with your dad, withyour husband, with your wife?
You feel like you are goingaround in circles trying to tell
them something about how youfeel, about a desire that you
have, about a concern that youhave, about a boundary, maybe.
SPEAKER_00 (03:15):
And you just feel like no one is listening to you.
SPEAKER_01 (03:20):
And you feel like you're going crazy.
Here's what we're going to talkabout today.
We're going to talk about thethree reasons.
The three reasons, they're notall encompassing, but I think
they are the three main reasonsthat people don't listen when
you speak.
And then three things that youcan do so that the other person
will actually listen.
(03:41):
Okay, so here's reason numberone.
People don't listen because theyare distracted.
I am for sure guilty of thismyself.
I can easily be checking emails,Slack, Instagram, on my phone,
and become really distractedwhen important people in my life
(04:02):
are talking to me, when myhusband's talking to me, when
coworkers are talking to me,when my mom or dad are talking
to me.
And it's not great.
I shouldn't defend that inmyself because there's not
really any reason to do it.
There's nothing to defend.
But a lot of the times when youare trying to talk to someone,
maybe it's not that they don'twant to hear you.
It's just that they aredistracted and their brain and
(04:25):
their eyes and their ears aren'tfully attuned to what you are
saying in the moment.
It's not necessarily nefariouson their part.
They're not trying to disrespectyou.
They're not trying to act likeyou don't matter or the words
that you say aren't important tothem.
They're just distracted.
The second reason that peopledon't hear you is because you
(04:47):
process things differently fromeach other.
Now here's the thing.
I think this is actually apretty common reason that we
don't give enough attention to.
There's a bunch of differentpersonality assessments out
there.
There's Myers Briggs, there'sEnneagram.
My favorite one is called theDisc.
And on a very high level, here'swhat the disc tells us about
other people's behavioral stylesor the temperaments that they
(05:10):
have in the way that they act ingiven situations.
There are these people that Ilike to call the commanders.
They are the people who are verydriven.
They want just give me thehigh-level idea, give me the
overall concept, move quickbecause I move quick.
That's a commander.
They like to take, take charge,they like to get things done.
(05:30):
And when they're listening toinformation, the more details
you give them, the more theywant to crawl under their desk
and die.
Then you have the communicators.
These are the people who aresuper fun, outspoken.
They just love doing fun andexciting things.
They're spontaneous.
They're great communicators.
That's why they're calledcommunicators in the way that we
(05:51):
talk about them.
And these people, again, withthe details or with anything
that's super analytical, wherethey feel like there's too many
rules, they just start to tuneout because you're kind of
raining on their parade andcramping their style.
Then you have these people thatwe call completers.
They're very peaceful, loyal,they hate taking big risks.
(06:13):
And so whenever they feel likethat you are overbearing, they
can start to kind of close intothemselves.
They they like safety and theylike peace.
They also really likepsychological safety.
So they can kind of start goinginto themselves.
Or if you start talking to themabout an issue, if you're trying
to address conflict with someonewho's a completer, they kind of
(06:35):
try and run away from it.
They don't like that.
And then we have thecalculators.
These are the people who areincredibly analytical.
They love details, they lovefacts, and they hate being
wrong.
They calculate every singledecision.
Now you can kind of begin to seehow if you have a communicator
who's super fun, lovesspontaneity, doesn't really care
(06:57):
about the details, definitelydoesn't care about always
getting everything exactlyright.
I mean, get it 10 to 20% in themargin of error.
That's good enough.
That's what a communicatorthinks.
And when they're talking to acalculator who has to have every
single detail, they have aspreadsheet for every single
thing.
The communicator doesn't knowwhere the spreadsheets are.
(07:19):
They keep losing them.
And then you have the calculatorwho lives and breathes by the
spreadsheets.
You can begin to see how theydon't listen to each other.
Not because necessarily they'renot hearing each other, but
because they don't know how tospeak each other's language.
Then you can begin to see howthe completely who loves peace,
calm, things to stay just evenkeel, everyone to just get
(07:42):
along.
And then you have a commanderwho doesn't mind conflict one
bit, will charge into the eye ofthe storm, isn't afraid of
really hurting people's feelingsbecause they just want to get
stuff done.
You can begin to see how thosepeople can begin to not hear
each other.
When the commander says, I needthis done, the complet, I've
(08:06):
made them mad.
I don't know what to do.
I don't need to tell them howthey are making me feel.
I'm just going to try and keepthe peace.
You have the calculator who saysthings to the communicator like,
you don't think things throughall of the time.
And the communicator's superhurt and feels like they've
they're being rejected, which istheir worst fear.
All of these things you canbegin to see how they pile on
top of each other.
(08:28):
One of the reasons that we don'thear each other is because we're
talking past each other and wedon't understand how the other
person is wired.
It's a big problem.
The third reason that peopledon't hear you is because you're
not being clear.
For 15 years now, I have helpedpeople with their relationships.
(08:49):
And one of the things that hasbeen consistent that I actually
started noticing 11 years agonow was that men tended to not
know why their wives or whytheir girlfriends wanted out of
the relationship?
It was really interesting to seeunfold at first.
(09:09):
They would call in and theywould say, I just don't know
what happened.
It was just one day she shewanted out and she wouldn't tell
me why.
And the more I began to talk tothem and ask, okay, think back.
Is there anything over the pastcouple of years, over the past
10 years, 20 years that she'sthat she has said that maybe you
just didn't hear at the time?
(09:29):
And it never failed that theywould say, you know what?
She did say that she didn't feellike I was listening to her very
much, or she wished that we werespending more time together, or
she wished that I would workless, but it didn't really seem
like that big of a deal.
Many times the women in theserelationships are trying to tell
(09:52):
their husbands how they feel,but their husbands aren't
listening.
I'm not trying to make this agender thing by any stretch of
the imagination.
I'm sure that there aresituations where women don't
listen to their husbands eitherabout how their husbands feel,
but it does really seem that thetrend weighs way more heavily on
this towards men.
Women, when their husbandsleave, they typically know why.
(10:14):
Their husbands have made itknown.
And again, I'm not necessarilytrying to make this a gender
thing, but as a woman who's beenin a level of leadership for,
again, 12 years now, I do knowthat it is different for women
when they are in situations andin roles that men typically
occupy.
As a female CEO, I amconsistently in mastermind
(10:38):
groups, boardroom groups, thingslike that, which are more
heavily male-dependent.
And women do have to shift theway that they speak and the way
that they show up in order to beseen equally to men.
It's just part of how it is.
I'm not going to say if it'sgood or bad necessarily.
It's just, I guess, kind of partof the job.
(11:00):
But I think it can be moredifficult for women to be clear
because a lot of our lives weare told to be polite.
We're told to be all smiles.
We're told to make sure thatwe're coming across a certain
way, to always have our legscrossed, to always make sure
that we're dressed appropriatelyand that we have our makeup on
(11:23):
and are fully presentable.
That's how women have beentaught from the time they were
very young.
And so, yes, there is kind of anexpectation we put on ourselves
of I can't be too needy.
I can't be too direct, or peoplewill think that I'm a word that
I can't say on this YouTubebecause I love Jesus, even
(11:44):
though I cuss a littlesometimes, but not here.
So that's one of the things thatcan make it more difficult for
women to speak up and to reallybe clear.
But the thing is, there was abook I read a couple of years
ago, and the whole premise of itwas clear is kind.
We think we're being polite, andmen can do this too, for sure,
but we think that we are beingpolite when we lessen ourselves.
(12:07):
When we, and I'm not gonna, I'mnot talking about being humble,
being humble is good, but whenwe say, you know, I would prefer
it if you, instead of saying,here's what I need you to do.
Sometimes we just need to beclear about what our needs are,
about what our desires are,about what our expectations are,
clear is kind.
(12:27):
And we can be clear in a kindway, but we don't need to
sacrifice being kind for beingclear.
So what do you do?
If distractions could be in theway, if the way that each of you
see the world and yourpersonality differences could be
in the way, if if just yourinability to maybe be clear or
(12:50):
as clear as you could be attimes are all being in the way
of someone listening to you,then what do you do?
At the end of the day, you can'tforce someone to listen to you.
Many times when people travel,like I know me, when my husband
and I lived in Korea, we didn'tspeak the same language, right?
(13:10):
And we tried to communicate withthe Koreans, but we didn't try
to learn Korean at first.
I mean, we did know, we dideventually learn to speak Korean
to an extent to be able to getaround.
But at first, in our firstcouple of weeks there, when we
were needing to catch a taxi,when we were needing to go to
the market, when we were needingto figure stuff out, and we
couldn't speak the language ofthe other person, what did we
(13:33):
do?
We slowed our words and spokelouder.
But they still didn't speak ourlanguage.
It didn't help at all.
Being louder and being moreforceful doesn't actually help
someone hear you.
They don't, it doesn't helpsomeone actually understand what
(13:55):
you're doing.
You can't force someone else tolisten to.
So what should you do?
Become a person worth listeningto.
It wasn't until, especially if Ithink about our time in Korea,
it wasn't until I actually beganto notice the things going on
around me, to try and show theother person that I was trying
(14:17):
to learn their language, that Iwould make eye contact and smile
and do things that would leadthat person to want to help me
understand them and try andunderstand me.
That's what led to the biggestdifference in us being able to
listen to each other andunderstand each other.
So then what can we do in theseaspects?
(14:39):
Well, first of all, if you'retrying to talk to someone who's
clearly in the middle ofsomething, they're checking
their phone, they're trying tofinish up a project at work, you
just walk into their office, butthey're clearly in the middle of
trying to finish in to finishsomething up, maybe just wait.
Don't try and talk to someonewhile they're distracted.
Wait until you can have theirfull attention.
(15:01):
I've done this a couple of timesin my life and it's always
awkward.
It's always awkward.
And I've had this done to me acouple of times in my life, and
it's always awkward.
But it works.
And that's this.
If I am trying to talk tosomeone and I see that they are
clearly on their phone, I try tobe as nice as I can, clear as
(15:21):
kind, and can still be kind.
I try and be as clear as I canand say, it's okay, finish what
you're doing.
I'll just wait until you'redone.
I've had that done to me acouple of times immediately.
Like, oh my focus is on you now.
Again, that can be kind of weirdto do.
It feels a bit.
(15:45):
But if you want to actuallycommunicate and make sure the
other person is listening toyou, wait until they can listen
to you, especially if you'veinterrupted their day in order
to have this conversation.
That's number one.
So then number two, what do youdo when the other person is
speaking a different languagethan you?
You just can't seem to get onthe same page because you are
(16:06):
different.
The way you see the world isdifferent.
What can you do then?
And again, I think this is themajority of where we feel like
people aren't listening to us.
There was a situation a coupleof years ago where there were
some bigger issues happening inmy extended family.
But it had gotten to the pointwhere I just didn't want to go
(16:29):
to a particular family gettogether for my own reasons.
And my reasons were good andwere valid and they weren't bad.
And I don't think it was a badthing that I wanted to set a
boundary of, you know what, I'mnot gonna go to this event.
And so that's what I did.
But when I told my mom, who washosting the event, who is the
(16:51):
completely, who is the personwho just wants everyone to be
happy with each other andeveryone to just love each
other, when I said, Mom, I'm notgoing.
I love you, I love everyone, butfor this particular set of
circumstances that are going on,I will not be at that event.
And it broke her.
(17:13):
Her response was, Kimberly, Ijust want everyone to love each
other.
Which I felt you're not hearingme.
You care more about everyoneelse being happy and all of us
being happy together than me andmy feelings and the way that I'm
processing some of the thingsthat have been happening.
(17:35):
I felt like she cared more abouteveryone else than me in that
moment.
But she at that moment felt likeI cared.
I don't, I actually don't knowwhat she thought I cared about
at that moment, but she feltlike there was a like an
earthquake about to happen thatwas going to tear the whole
family apart.
And that's her biggest fear.
And so we kept talking past eachother until finally we were able
(18:00):
to just actually sit and trulytry and hear from the other
person.
I think a lot of times whenwe're trying to just talk past
the other person, we care moreabout having our needs and
desires heard than hearing whatthe other person's needs and
desires are as well.
Now, I think the fear thatpeople have in that is, well,
(18:21):
I'm just gonna always becatering to another person.
I'm never actually going to beable to make sure that my needs
are met.
And I know and I understandthat.
And I think it's a validconcern.
We can end up becoming doormatsjust trying to make everyone
else happy.
That's not what this is about.
This is about being able to doboth and I wanna be able to
listen to you and understandwhere your heart and your needs
(18:45):
and your fears are, but also I'mgonna meet that with here's
mine, here's my hurts, here's myheart, here's my needs, my
desires.
Let's figure out how to moveforward from here, either how to
compromise or how to agree todisagree, but still love each
other.
And in that particular situationwith my mom, I didn't go to that
(19:07):
family get together.
But you know what?
My mom and I sat together and weended up having that
heart-to-heart, like I was justtalking about.
And it was good.
It was okay.
Both of us understood eachother's needs.
We didn't have any hard feelingstowards each other, and
everything's been good since.
I needed to be able to set thatboundary for that situation and
(19:29):
for people to honor it.
And my mom understood she neededto honor it.
And I understood that I couldn'tset a firm boundary that made my
mom feel like I was never gonnacome back to a family get
together.
So we worked it out.
And I feel like we just need tohave more of that kind of
process with people we feel likewe are talking past.
(19:49):
I know that that probably couldhave helped me and my coworker
back in January for us toactually, instead of both of us
trying to be right, he wantedmore data.
I had my gut feel, which wasright.
But either way, he wanted to beable to see the data for
himself.
Maybe I could have leaned moreinto that and said, okay, let's
(20:10):
go down that path.
Let's let's get the data.
What is that gonna look like?
How long is that gonna take?
And let's set a secondarydeadline instead of just
allowing time to pass and thenended up feeling completely
disrespected.
I ended up feeling completelydisrespected by the time it came
up again, and I realized itstill had been done.
(20:31):
I was part of the problem.
But it's harder to realize andask yourself that question, at
least I know it is for me.
I want to ask the question, whyare you not listening to me?
But maybe the harder question Ishould be asking is Am I being
the kind of person worthlistening to right now?
(20:53):
It's a much harder one to dealwith and to wrestle with.
And then finally, be clear.
You have to learn to be clear inyour communication.
I said it a little bit before,but clear is kind, of course.
What is it you want to say?
Say it in a way that is kind butclear.
(21:17):
My husband and I are verydifferent personality styles as
well.
And one of the things about myhusband that I've learned over
our 15 years of marriage is whenhe says we need to leave at 10
a.m., what's gonna actuallyhappen is he's gonna be ready to
go at 9.50 and wonder why I'mnot ready.
A couple of times this has kindof come to a head where he's
(21:40):
it's 9.50 and he is saying weare out the door.
Although I asked and he said wewere leaving at 10.
What I really want to say is,Rob, I asked you what time you
said 10.
Leave me alone.
I have 10 more minutes.
Instead, what I have learned tosay is on the front end, hey
babe, I just want to make surethat I'm well aware of the time
(22:03):
we need to leave.
So tell me the time that youexpect me to be ready for us to
walk out the door.
And then when he responds withwhatever, 10 a.m., I say, okay,
great.
So just to be clear, I am notgonna be ready to leave until 10
a.m.
That's communication.
Sender, receiver, messagereceived, right?
(22:25):
Just to be clear so that we havethat on the front end now.
And when it comes 9:50, and hereally wants because he's ahead
of time.
I'm never ahead of time.
He was in the army.
To be early is to be late.
I was not and would have died inthe army.
So I'm always late toeverything.
That's that's the situation thatwe have to work with.
(22:46):
And so at 9:50, when he's likeready to get out in the car, now
what he knows to do is he knowshe told, he said, 10.
So instead, he says, Hey, babe,I'll be out in the car waiting
for you.
Now I need to honor my part andmake sure I'm in that car at 10
a.m.
But we have learned how to makeit work because I have learned
to be clear.
And of course, in ourrelationship, he has learned to
(23:08):
be very clear about things withme as well like, do not touch
his stuff.
I know not to move anything thathe owns.
But he's clear.
So I know what to do and whatnot to do.
That helps us have betterrelationships and understand how
to be a person worth listeningto because when you say
something, you You mean it.
(23:29):
And it's something the otherperson can respect because they
know what to do or what not todo.
I'll end with this.
When my husband and I adoptedour two kids from India, they
did not speak any English.
Our daughter was four and a halfat the time, and our son had
just turned two.
And communication was not likethis.
(23:53):
And everyone said, you'll learnhow to communicate over time.
And I thought, I don't know howthat's going to happen, but I
guess we're all going to see.
But the thing is, even though wedid not speak each other's
language, even though when Itried to talk to them, they
wanted to understand, theywanted to listen, but they just
couldn't.
The thing that made the biggestdifference was me learning how
(24:17):
to meet their needs, how to pullthem into wanting to listen to
me instead of trying to pushmyself into their heads, into
their hearts, into their lives.
Instead of trying to say, you dothis or you do that.
It was seeing how bringing themto the fridge and showing them
different foods that we have andoffering it to them and waiting
(24:39):
until their eyes lit up andseeing, hey, maybe you want to
try this and then offering it tothem.
It was that kind of nonverbalcommunication that ultimately
led to later such strongerverbal communication.
If you feel like no one islistening to you, maybe the hard
question that you need to askyourself about the way that
(25:01):
you're showing up is am Ishowing up as a person that's
worth listening to?
I would love to know what youthought about this video and
what you learned from it.
Put that in the comments below.
I read every single comment.
I love to reply to them as well.
But if you are asking yourself,well, how can I know more about
this?
(25:21):
I am struggling.
I'm struggling with knowing howto show up better, how to be the
kind of person that someonewants to listen to.
I have a free assessment thatyou can take.
You can find the link to it inthe description below this
video.
Completely free assessment.
And it's going to show you thefour different areas of
yourself, physically,intellectually, emotionally, and
(25:42):
spiritually.
And it's going to show you theareas that you're struggling the
most that are affecting the waythat you're showing up and the
areas that you're doing reallywell in, because we all need
some wins in our lives.
I'd love for you to take that.
Again, you can find it in theshow notes below.
Until next time, stay strong.
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