How to Talk with Anyone about Anything, page 19
Reasoned Andre: Yes.
Mr. Alvarez: Thanks for telling me about this. You deserve to be acknowledged for your ideas, and I will do my best to acknowledge your ideas from now on.
Reasoned Andre: Thank you for hearing me and telling me you think my ideas deserve being acknowledged and that you will do so in the future.
CHOOSING HOW TO COMMUNICATE OVER A PERSONAL ISSUE AT WORK
Something as simple as expressing your feelings in a contained way that lands on authentic listening can shift the dynamics between an employer and employee. And here’s an example of expressing frustrations in a nonreactive way between colleagues.
Reactive Danielle: Sophia, your constant pen clicking is driving me crazy! Stop being so annoying!
Reasoned Danielle: Hi, Sophia, are you free to talk right now about a frustration I have?
Sophia: Sure, I’m free to talk now.
Reasoned Danielle: Sophia, I appreciate how responsible you are with your projects and for making the time to talk with me about my frustration. What I want to share is that I’m sensitive to repetitive sounds, and I’ve noticed it’s hard for me to concentrate on work when I hear your regular pen clicking.
Sophia: Let me see if I got it. You appreciate how responsible I am with my work. And you appreciate my willingness to take some time to talk about a frustration you have with me. If I got it, you want me to know that you are sensitive to repetitive sounds, and when I click my pen over and over, it’s difficult for you to stay focused on work. Did I get that? Is there more?
Reasoned Danielle: Yes, you got it, and no, that is my only issue right now.
Sophia: That makes sense. I understand why you’re struggling to concentrate. I can see how that continual sound could make you feel frustrated because your work is being interrupted. Is that how you feel?
Reasoned Danielle: Yes.
Sophia: I will do my best to stop clicking my pen. It’s just a nervous habit when I’m concentrating, and I understand that you may find it distracting. I’ll try to be aware of your sensitivity to repetitive sounds and not do it in your presence. Thanks for letting me know.
Reasoned Danielle: Thank you for understanding, Sophia.
SC Dialogue, as illustrated in the previous examples, not only allows you to talk to anyone about anything despite your differences, but it also creates a sense of safety that brings out the best in your upper Wise Owl Brain.
Healthy Brains, Healthy Relationships Summed Up
In recent years, neuroscientists have discovered there are strategic roles in the brain that go beyond basic survival. This neural system relies on our relationships with other members of our species for health and survival. Our physical survival is equated with the quality of our connecting with others.6
The sense of safety we feel in our healthy relationships enables our brains to foster positive social engagement along with nurturing and growth activities.
When safety reigns in our relationships, the lower brain can let down its guard, and our body begins to release endorphins and serotonin, which create a state of peace and relaxation. These neurochemicals released through the bloodstream are believed to contribute to healthier relationships, healthier bodies, and happier and longer lives.
When danger appears, our systems go on high alert and the primal brain sends out a distress signal. This prompts your adrenal glands to release a surge of hormones, including adrenaline and cortisol, which are toxic neurochemicals that make you anxious, angry, and even murderous.
Once you engage in the Safe Conversations skills, you can create a sense of safety. Your body relaxes, and your higher brain can fully function. Many of us think the magical phrase in our SC Dialogue process is this: “Is there more?” We believe this sentence stem is especially valuable because it helps people shift from judgment to curiosity and wonder. When we are in a state of wonder, we open our minds to new, deeper awareness of one another. Wonder washes our brains with neurochemicals that relax it and give it a longer life. There is always more, if we take the time, that ever expands this wonderful experience of deep relaxation and joyful connecting.
Conclusion
Once we listen more effectively so we understand one another’s points of view, we can put aside our insistence that others agree with us. When we communicate by both talking and listening, we are more likely to grasp and understand the views and perspectives of others. When this happens, it nurtures a sense of caring and understanding between all parties involved in the dialogue. In these mutually respectful conversations, judgment can be eliminated in favor of curiosity about others and the world around us.
We believe the axis of history turns on changing how we talk to each other.
Given that belief, our goal over the next thirty years is to teach the SC Dialogue process to 2.5 billion persons, the tipping point of the world’s projected population in 2050, with the intent of helping usher in the next and fourth stage in human social evolution.
This new stage will replace the third stage of human evolution, which we are in now, called the Age of the Individual. The third age replaced the second stage, called the Age of Agriculture. The first stage was the Age of Tribalism. The Age of Relationship is our next step as a species to ensure we not only survive, but thrive. That will be a new global humanity.
Join the Vision of a New Global Civilization
We believe that SC Dialogue is more than just a new way to communicate. It is the path to a new way of living together that will enhance all lives. We are all connected. The welfare of each of us is dependent upon the welfare of us all. That awareness gives birth to a new value system, and potentially to a new culture in which the health of couples, families, and individuals will be supported by transformed social systems that promote cooperation, collaboration, and equality, thus creating safety, connection, and joy as our shared humanity.
To achieve this, instead of our current polarized and contentious world, we ask you to imagine:
a world filled with healthy and happy couples and thriving children who nurture and encourage each other!;
safe schools without violence or fear, where children achieve academic excellence and keep their sense of wonder;
corporations that place a priority on the relational well-being of all their employees and community members while creating jobs and flourishing financially;
organizations that thrive and make the world a better place by harnessing the power of diverse opinions, perspectives, and talents;
congregations where all members are connected, supportive, empathic, and dedicated to making the world a better place for all;
communities where everyone feels safe and connected and that are welcoming to all;
political systems dedicated to the human values of freedom for all, universal equality, radical inclusiveness, and the celebration of diversity; and
countries where war is a distant memory of a tragic age when people talked in monologues and competed with one another for control and dominance rather than cooperated for the welfare of all.
To achieve this vision requires that the SC Dialogue tools be applied to the following ecosystems:
Families, so they become safe places where everyone feels protected and thrives, keeping the family intact and poverty at bay. This alone would prevent most personal and social problems.
Classrooms, so they become places where all students connect when they are interacting and students make better grades.
Congregations, so they help everyone connect around their similarities and differences.
Workplaces, so they become locations where employees feel seen, heard, and valued (which affects the communities they serve) and their bottomline increases.
Organizations, so they become resources for the communities they serve.
First responders, so that they replace the use of force with positive social engagement.
Criminal justice system, so that it shifts from a philosophy of punishment as justice to repairing the cognitive and emotional scars from childhood that produced the antisocial behavior that created the need for a criminal justice system.
Prisons, so they become centers of relational well-being, where inmates are taught SC Dialogue to use for their benefit when they return to society.
Social movements, so they replace polarization with positive social engagement.
Political organizations, to help them respectfully embrace differences as opportunities to promote legislation for the benefit of all stakeholders.
Professional organizations, in order to develop a philosophy of promoting relational well-being as the end goal of all their educational and implementation strategies.
We believe this is all possible because of a little-known fact: the way we talk to each other embodies a value system that evolves over time into the structures of social, political, economic, and religious institutions. SC Dialogue will create lateral human systems to replace the vertical one that uses monologue. Lateral human systems are safe and support freedom, equality, inclusion, and the celebration of difference for all.
In a relational world that values universal freedom, full equality for everyone, the celebration of difference, and total inclusiveness, a case could be made that all civilizations are people adapting to their environment, and all external changes change our brains.
Putting relationships first would restructure the neural circuits of the brain. We would eventually quiet the anxious, reactive Crocodile Brain and grow the empathic Wise Owl Brain so we can live a life marked by wonder and peace, thus creating more evolved human beings who can live together in community.
Putting relationships first also challenges the default position of the brain, which puts self-interest first. Our brains are social, and connecting is our foundational reality. The welfare of the whole serves the interest of individuals. This radicalizes all interactions in all human ecosystems, making relationship first an ethical practice.
Spread the Word
We encourage you to use the sentence stems of SC Dialogue in your daily life, whether in your personal relationships, a planning meeting with your boss and coworkers, when discussing growth strategies with your fellow congregation members at your church or designing legislative initiatives with your fellow constituents.
Armed with the tools of Safe Conversations, you can be part of a global transformation by applying them to every facet of your life. We invite you to create a ripple effect that will help all of us grow toward a world of complete peace and joy where SC Dialogue is the new human language, replacing monologue. Then we can all talk to one another and be supportive and productive despite our differences.
As SC Dialogue becomes practiced more widely, the methodology can help transform the value systems by which we live. We hope to see our collective consciousness evolve from the individual self and independence toward one of greater interdependency with a stronger sense of community.
While promoting the welfare of the individual has furthered human evolution over the last three hundred years, shifting to relationship first supports the next phase of human evolution by making all relationships important. Finally, putting relationships first serves as a catalyst of a new community based on a relational value system as a way of life, a way of being with others.
A world community with that priority would transcend any that was organized around the individual. This is how we can live together and thrive in all our interactions with others.
What a world that will be!
Additional Resources
For relational educational opportunities by Harville and Helen, please visit www.HarvilleandHelen.com where you can:
purchase books, e-books, and online courses;
discover writings, podcasts, and invitations to special events, including live teleseminars with Harville and Helen;
find updates on Harville and Helen’s workshop and lecture schedule; and
participate in a global mission of creating healthy relationships.
Quantum Connections brings the transformative power of Safe Conversations® Dialogue Methodology and Tools to small businesses, large corporations, global faith communities, educational institutions, and community organizations, along with individuals, couples, and families. Based in the neuro and quantum social sciences, Quantum Connections delivers comprehensive and highly structured training programs designed to foster the use of essential SC Dialogue skills in all interpersonal interactions—empowering people to talk to one another without criticism and listen without judgment to connect beyond difference. Our customers gain measurable value as high-performing teams eliminate silos and traditional company and cultural boundaries and move the organization from monologue to dialogue, which will, ultimately, result in significantly improved levels of employee engagement, retention, and inclusivity.
Developed and refined over four decades, the Safe Conversations Dialogue Methodology and Tools that form the foundation of Quantum Connections’ training programs are the intellectual property of founders Harville Hendrix, PhD, and Helen LaKelly Hunt, PhD. Together, the proven methodology, time-tested tools, and skill-development practices used in Quantum Connections programs serve as the basis for the founders’ bestselling book, Getting the Love You Want, with more than four million copies sold worldwide since 1988.
www.QuantumConnections.com
Imago Relationships International (IRI) was cofounded by Harville Hendrix, PhD, and Helen LaKelly Hunt, PhD, to help couples and individuals create strong and fulfilling relationships. More than twenty-five hundred certified Imago Therapists are available in more than sixty countries. IRI is dedicated to providing the very best resources for therapists and laypersons seeking training to develop proficiency in the Imago relational method. The Imago Clinical and Facilitator Training will provide you with an overview of the theory and essential skills for working with relationships.
www.ImagoRelationships.org
Acknowledgments
The completion of any book is always a function of people other than its authors. In this case, we are deeply indebted to many people whose contributions were essential for this book to come to fruition.
Of course, as an Imago advocate, Oprah Winfrey gets the top mention, as she gave Imago and the Dialogue Process global visibility in 1988 by featuring our book, Getting the Love You Want: A Guide for Couples, on The Oprah Winfrey Show and then showcasing it seventeen more times over the next twenty years.
Given global visibility by Oprah, many therapists joined the Imago clinical training program. Among the earliest were Eugene Shelly, Wendy Palmer Patterson, and Maya Kollman, each of whom adopted dialogue as a therapeutic process. Later, Al Turtle and Orli Wahrman, Imago therapists, were among those who moved the SC Dialogue process out of the clinic into the public, as well as the group dialogue process called Communologue, which they implemented in a variety of nonclinical settings, including peace talks between nations, negotiations in unions and communities, and in corporations and universities. Appreciation also goes to Bob Patterson, who was the first to language Imago as a social mission in his now-famous and globally adopted phrase: “transforming the world, one couple at a time.”
While this book was given form by us, the inspiration and content within it is a product of a community of professional colleagues, businesses, educational and therapy professionals, and couples with whom we have been in conversation, for decades, about the transformative power of SC Dialogue. Again, to list everyone who inspired us, those who supported us, and all who contributed their experience and wisdom would create a list too long for this page, and we would no doubt leave someone out. So we decided to name only the select few who were hands-on in helping with the actual research, writing, management, and production of the book.
First among those is Wes Smith, our writing partner, whose organizational skills, research savvy, and creative pen gave the book its literary style. With deep intelligence, Wes comprehended the concept and scope of the book. And with an artistic command of language, he has made an abstract concept and complex methodology accessible to both the professional world and the general public, moving SC Dialogue toward becoming a new way of talking for everyone and ushering in a new relational civilization.
Second is Sanam Hoon, who, for over thirty years, has managed the complexity of our professional lives and supported all our projects, like this one. In this case, Sanam not only helped keep the book on schedule and interfaced with the publishers on many details, but she also secured most of the stories that populate the book. Without her, the richness of the personal story would have been missing.
Next, we would like to acknowledge the many people from the Safe Conversations and Imago communities who shared their stories with us. They made the book a living testament of the power of the Safe Conversations process. While not all their musings made it to this book, they all informed the work and nuances along the way. These include (but are not limited to): Clay and Sonja Arnold, Helit Assa, Pollyanna and Baldwin Barnes, Michael and Nancy Bryant, Mo Byers, John Castranova, Ronald A. Clark, Michael DiPaolo, Cassie Guerin, Morella Hammer, Robin Hills, Michael Kaufmann, James Kennedy, Maya Kollman, David Lawson, Deborah Lindholm and Samuel Mayson, Carlee Myers, Jolena Nicol and Burger Pretorius, Rev. Doc Lisa, Rabbi Elana Rosen-Brown, David Rudnick, Sonali Sadequee, Jose Soto, Meira Tamir, Al Turtle, Jen Urano, Orli Wahrman, and LaSheryl Walker.
A special acknowledgment goes to Charlotte Legg, who not only was integral in the growth of the Safe Conversations community of leaders, but also helped capture their stories. Her passionate belief in our work has been unwavering.
Another special acknowledgment goes to Laura Davis, an executive at JPMorgan in NYC, who supported this project from its beginning many years ago.
We are also deeply grateful to Dan Siegel and Caroline Welch for not only contributing to the foreword of this book, but also for their friendship and expert guidance on interpersonal neurobiology.
