{"id":1040448,"date":"2023-07-17T10:29:54","date_gmt":"2023-07-17T17:29:54","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/customerthink.com\/?p=1040448"},"modified":"2023-07-17T10:29:54","modified_gmt":"2023-07-17T17:29:54","slug":"i-hear-you-my-way","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/customerthink.com\/i-hear-you-my-way\/","title":{"rendered":"I Hear You My Way"},"content":{"rendered":"
I recently got an email from a subscriber complaining that although he\u2019d read and learned a ton from my articles over the years, he was having trouble reading them on his computer and would I please put them up on my\u00a0blog<\/u><\/a>. (They\u2019re up.)<\/p>\n When I read the email, I heard him\u00a0from my own filters. At the time it sounded like he was\u00a0telling me what to do and being disrespectful. My inner response: \u201cWait, what?! Why email me before checking? They’re already there! And if you loved my ideas why don\u2019t you want to buy the learning tools that go with them?? And why would you contact me to tell me what I’ve done wrong when you’ve never even thanked me?”?<\/p>\n I didn\u2019t say all that, naturally. Instead I wrote suggesting he check my site<\/a> and suggested he print it out to possibly resolve\u00a0his reading problem. He replied by offering names of other bloggers that do it his way (He STILL didn\u2019t\u00a0check! And I’m STILL wrong!)\u00a0and\u00a0that he was merely trying to help (Help what? Who?) so why didn\u2019t I appreciate his efforts (To do what?), and (the best one): why was I getting defensive when he was offering me valuable advice (Valuable for who?).<\/p>\n Two people hearing what they heard, entering a dialogue with unique expectations, subjective\u00a0filters and biases, and each some distance from the truth.<\/p>\n SUBJECTIVE FILTERS CAUSE A TRANSLATION PROBLEM<\/p>\n When a misunderstanding occurs Speakers assume they are in the \u2018right\u2019 because they \u2018said it clearly\u2019, and believe their communication partner is just \u2018not listening\u2019; Listeners assume what they think they hear is accurate and when there’s a problem, assume it’s the Speaker’s fault for ‘not saying it clearly’.<\/p>\n But both are wrong: Speakers erroneously think that because they choose what seem like the \u2018right\u2019 words to impart their message accurately, Listeners should understand exactly what they mean\/intend. But it\u2019s not possible, and it\u2019s not a \u2018listening\u2019 problem, or a problem of intent, skill, or concentration. It\u2019s a translation problem caused by the brain\u2019s wiring.<\/p>\n As Listeners we can certainly hear the words spoken. But when it comes to interpreting them, we\u2019re at the mercy of how our\u00a0subjective listening filters<\/a>\u00a0translate the words we hear. Indeed, we only grasp our own unconscious translation of what\u2019s been said, regardless of how disparate it is from the message intended.<\/p>\n My book What? Did you really say what I think I heard?<\/em><\/strong><\/a> breaks down how our subjective filters, normalized thinking patterns, and habituated neural pathways determine what we hear Others say. And as I learned while writing, it\u2019s not our fault when we get it wrong.<\/p>\n WE CAN’T UNDERSTAND ACCURATELY<\/p>\n The problem is neither Speaker or Listener can get it right. And unfortunately, both assume the Other has heard accurately:<\/p>\n So net net, we hear according to our history, according to the existing neural circuits that translate incoming \u2018words\u2019 into meaning unique to us, regardless of how different from what the Speaker intended. And it\u2019s all electrochemical, mechanical, and meaningless. Until our brain translates it for us.<\/p>\n What a Speaker intends is often not what a Listener\u2019s brain translates.\u00a0And it\u2019s no one\u2019s fault: no one intends\u00a0mishear or misunderstand;\u00a0everyone intends to choose words that can be easily understood; most of us pay attention. But our brain is in charge.<\/p>\n WHAT\u2019S IN OUR WAY<\/p>\n Let me name just a few things that keep us from hearing accurately:<\/p>\n Bias:<\/strong>\u00a0There are hundreds of types of bias, assumptions, filters, triggers,\u00a0and habits\u00a0that keep us congruent by making sure what we hear perpetuates our\u00a0lifelong conditioning.\u00a0Our brain actually deletes out signals! And Oops! Forgets to tell us.<\/p>\n Even if we try hard to hear the exact words spoken (if we write down each word as it\u2019s spoken \u2013 we remember words spoken for about 3 seconds), knowing the words does NOT denote accuracy: our brains interpret incoming words idiosyncratically regardless of the meaning\/intent behind the spoken words<\/em>.<\/p>\n The story gets worse. Not only do we unwittingly interpret what\u2019s been said according to our own beliefs and biases, we have no idea of the reality: we might hear ABL when the Speaker actually said\/meant ABC and we have no way of knowing that our brains deleted D,E,F,G,H,I,J,K discarding elements of ideas, meaning, etc. in its search for compatibility.<\/p>\n We then, still unconsciously, assign a unique meaning to whatever remains according to compatibility (or incompatibility) and connections with our existing beliefs and history of similar ideas<\/em>.<\/p>\n My goodness. How do we even understand each other? Hint: it\u2019s why we live near folks we understand and agree with, work with folks we understand and agree with, and marry folks who are similar. Our lives are ruled by the ways our brain translates.<\/p>\n WHO GETS HURT<\/p>\n Here are some of the areas particularly affected by the way our brains translate what they hear:<\/p>\n Questions to gather information: <\/strong>when Speakers seek answers to achieve goals or gather data (i.e. sellers,\u00a0doctors<\/a>, coaches, influencers, parents, etc.) they can\u2019t help but pose biased questions according to their need to know, and sometimes\u00a0restrict the full landscape<\/a>\u00a0of possibility to a confined data set. So Listeners end up potentially offering \u2018bad\u2019 or incomplete data that is mistaken for Truth. It\u2019s not bad data, exactly: Listeners brains get triggered to memory channels according to the biases inherent in the questions, offering Speakers some unknown\/unknowable portion of reality.<\/p>\n Compounded with the natural unconscious translation process Listeners incur, most exchanges suffer some degree of restriction due to the biases in a Speaker\u2019s questions. [Note: I\u2019ve invented\u00a0Facilitative Questions<\/a>\u00a0that are systemic, unbiased, directional, leading Listeners to specific neural circuits to actually discover and share more accurate answers.]<\/p>\n Influencer conversations: <\/strong>doctors, consultants, coaches, leaders, etc. offer advice, stories, requests, information, etc. as persuasion tactics, trying to use \u2018rational reasoning\u2019, Behavior Modification, intuition\/stories\/scientific arguments, etc. to cause, congruent change<\/a>.\u00a0Unwittingly, due to the Other’s brain neurology, and absence of circuitry to translate the new, they end up facing resistance.<\/p>\n Change requests from professionals: <\/strong>change leaders end up getting resistance when they assume their requests are heard as intended, especially when the Listener has not bought into the change. <\/strong>Unfortunately, as you can see above, we often cause the resistance we get.<\/p>\n Situations of great import to Speaker:<\/strong> regardless of the importance of the message – i.e. a doctor imploring a patient to stop smoking, or a parent discussing the danger of drugs to teenagers, for example \u2013 patients hear, translate, mishear uniquely, and too often end up with a different take-away than doctors intend; partners end up annoyed for no reason; buyers end up feeling manipulated and pushed.<\/p>\n I often tell a story of an unfortunate conversation I had with a new business partner and his wife: John suddenly got angry, shouting at me about something I never said. \u2018I never said that,\u2019 said I. \u2018Of course you did! I heard it with my own ears! I was standing right here!\u2019 \u2018She never said that, John. I was sitting right here also. She\u2019s right. She never said that.\u2019 \u2018What\u2019s wrong with you two!!!! You\u2019re both lying to me!\u2019 and he stomped out of the room, ending our partnership.<\/p>\n Net net: unless the criteria, the mindset, the outcomes, the definitions, and the challenges have been agreed to prior to conversation by all communication partners, the odds are bad that Others can hear the intended message accurately. Obviously, this restricts the range of possible outcomes.<\/p>\n HOW YOU CAN BE HEARD<\/p>\n So:<\/p>\n In What?<\/em><\/strong><\/a> I have chapters that tell Speakers how to notice when the responses they get seem to be faulty, and teach Listeners how to go \u2018beyond the brain\u2019 and listen from a \u2018dissociative\u2019 place (I devote Chapter 6 in What?<\/em><\/strong> to dissociative listening.) that avoids the\u00a0normalized and habituated neural pathways<\/a>, different from conventional listening.<\/p>\n\n
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