Difficult Conversations

Recently finished a really good book called Difficult Conversations.  My takeaways:

• As we argue vociferously for our view, we often fail to question one critical assumption upon which our whole stance in the conversation is built: I am right, you are wrong.  This simple assumption causes endless grief.
• Difficult conversations are almost never about getting the facts right.
• We assume we know the intentions of others when we don’t.  Worse still, when we are unsure about someone’s intentions, we too often decide they are bad.
• Why is it always the other person who is naïve or selfish or irrational or controlling?  Why is that we never think we are the problem?
• Arguing blocks us from exploring each other’s stories
• Telling someone to change make it less rather than more likely that they will
• Instead of asking yourself, “how can they think that?!” ask yourself, “I wonder what information they have that I don’t?”  Instead of asking, “how can they be so irrational?” ask, “How might they see the world such that their view makes sense?”  Certainty locks us out of their story; curiosity lets us in.
• While we care deeply about other people’s intentions toward us, we don’t actually know what their intentions are.
• We make an attribution about another person’s intentions based on the impact of their actions on us.
• Focusing on blame is a bad idea because it inhibits our ability to learn what’s really causing the problem and to do anything meaningful to correct it
• When your real goal is finding the dog, fixing the ceiling, and preventing such incidents in the future, focusing on blame is a waste of time.  It neither helps you understand the problem looking back, nor helps you fix it going forward.
• A particularly problematic form of avoiding is complaining to a third party instead of to the person with whom you’re upset.  It makes you feel better, but puts the third party in the middle with no good way to help.
• No one is always anything.  We each exhibit a constellation of qualities, positive and negative, and constantly grapple with how to respond to the complicated situations life presents.
• Being disappointed that someone isn’t reading our mind is one of our contributions to the problem.