#42 - Ten Rules To Become Better In Any Social Situation

Welcome, everybody, to the first week of the four-week solo episode series.

It's not just me today.

I'm hanging out here, but I got Logan in the production seat.

How's your week been?

It's been good.

Yeah, it's been a fun week.

It's been, I know, work is work, and just been kind of chilling, you know, waiting on something to change a little bit.

So, working on myself.

What are you waiting on to change?

Honestly, like, just something like this, like creatively to change.

And then we talked about, we're kind of in a slump right now, creatively.

But I've kind of been trying to build that back up and get back into writing and just story and world building and stuff like that.

I know, very creative stuff, but like, yeah.

And I'm excited that you're here because you were such a big help setting all this up.

Yeah.

And then now, I just get to chill, talk to all of you, and also Logan and I get to hang out.

He gets better at production.

And I'll just straight up say it right now.

I've had a hard time with the podcast, doing it all by myself.

It's hard to last.

There's a ton of statistics about solopreneurs and how quickly they burn out.

And the fact of the matter is, if you want something to go far, you have to have people.

So being able to meet people who are interested in all of the stuff and who want to be creative and create together is a blessing.

So together we get to create.

I was gonna say also, we're not designed to be alone, just in general.

We're supposed to be talking to people, meeting people, all this stuff with people.

We're just not designed to do anything alone, really.

Bingo.

See, you're in the right chair.

That's the subject matter.

Yeah, life recently has been cool.

It's been interesting.

We just aired the podcast with Jared Outen, who's the director of the Crisis Line for Kansas headquarters, Suicide Prevention.

Super interesting.

I got really nervous because it's suicide, and I know how heavy suicide is, but I also know that humans are humans, and we have decision-making processes in our heads, and talking about it is really helpful.

So, that was really big for me.

I've been, I just started job-seeking.

So, I know you and I were talking about jobs.

Like, I need to find a new main thing.

Yeah.

For those of you who have been listening for a while, you all know I used to work in like corporate, healthcare IT, federal consultant, traveling around.

But out of two years, I was traveling like 400 nights.

And what that job did for me, I was on a podcast this week, and I got to talk about this more in depth.

Shout out to One Sharp Sword with Dr.

Wayne Purnell.

He's going to air that later, but that'll be really cool.

I'll plug that if y'all want to see me on the other side of the house, on the guest side.

Okay, cool.

But I got to talk about on there how I had this Harvard complex.

I wanted to scratch this itch of being the golden boy because I'm the youngest of four.

And I got this job where I got to go on a plane every week.

They had me wearing a suit.

I'd show up and I'd have a badge.

And I was managing people and emailing people and getting people's travel.

And it was really my ego.

It was my ego.

And but after two years, your ego can only take you so far.

And I could tell that Annie and I, we weren't really progressing.

We had gotten married and we weren't spending any time together.

I didn't have any community.

So I was like, I need to switch it up.

So this past year has been me switching it up.

I've been able to create the podcast and build the newsletter and build a production company and be there for my mom.

So it was really good to have that flexibility.

But lately, Annie and I, we're going to be moving soon.

So that's exciting.

I haven't talked about that on this podcast.

But that's a big reason why we're doing solo episodes because whenever you showed up to set up, Annie was moving some stuff.

So her and her brother are currently moving.

And later today, we'll be moving more.

But we're moving and learning about property tags, learning about home insurance, learning about all of these bills.

Makes me think, I've always wanted to make money, sure.

And I've made money throughout this process.

I've made less money than I was making.

But I've certainly made money.

But now I'm like, I want to have more of a main thing because I always hear the best time to build something is in your spare time.

So if you can get a main thing and invest in a passion of yours or a hobby or a project of yours in your spare time and get to the point to where that gets so big that you can't not make that your main thing, then that's the move.

But what I did was I hopped out of the plane without having a main thing, and I made this my main thing, which has been cool and it's grown, and it's cool to see all of that.

But I feel called to get another main thing and continue to build this.

And honestly, I think it's even going to be better now, because now I recognize the importance of having a team, and I can't do this alone.

And I should probably plug right now for anybody listening, if you've loved this podcast, or if you've ever thought to yourself, ooh, I want to be part of a podcast.

I am, this is the first time anybody is hearing of this, opening up a Talk to People Podcast development team.

So if you go to talktopeoplepodcast.com/team, it's going to load up a page.

I'll give you the chance.

If you're not driving and not running on a treadmill currently, I'll give you the chance right now, open up your web browser.

If you use Safari, if you use Chrome, if you use another one that you downloaded from the App Store for some reason that we probably don't need to know, talk in talktopeoplepodcast.com/team.

All right, I just gave you a virus.

Boom, malware.

There you go.

No, no, no.

But you will see that I want to build this team.

And I think there's going to be some great people who can get behind this.

For instance, Logan, I want you to fill that out.

Get your stuff in there, because I want you to be a part of this team.

And you're creative, but you also know how to produce.

So we need to use that.

Now, whenever I say the team, know that I won't be cutting anybody W2s right now.

But once the podcast begins to eat, we will all be fed.

And I want to be able to take care of people in a lot of different ways.

But I'll have different roles.

These are all like scratch your itch of curiosity.

Whatever that looks like.

I got writers, I got producers, I got guest partnerships.

You name it.

It's all on there.

We'll get everybody together.

We'll have a call.

You don't have to be in Lawrence, but you can be remote.

I think also another one that you had on there was the guest experience.

I really like that too, because it's like you do bring in a lot of guests, like almost every new episode, and you want this space to be a safe space for them.

So I think that's a really important one to highlight as well, because that also helps people's skills with just other humans, how to figure out, okay, so this worked, it didn't work, they like this, they don't like this.

So that's also a really cool tab you got there.

Yeah, that human-based skills.

Because I may not be the best host, but what I can do is be hospitable.

And this is something that I've learned from Pastor Justin Jenkins is you can be known for your hospitality.

If you go above and beyond with hospitality, then that experience is going to be in their heads.

And I'm going to do something quickly for you guys after this little banter at the very beginning, but go through 10 rules that you can abide by to become a better communicator and become better with the people in your life.

These are 10 things that I promise, if one of them doesn't stick out to you, then you can quit listening to this podcast because you guys got it made in the shade.

But one of these will at least resound with you.

I promise that, but I'm learning a ton.

And one of the things I'm learning, I'm just going to go ahead and spoil it, is it's not what you say, but it's your presence.

Content is contextual.

No matter where you are, the content is going to change.

But how important presence is will never change.

So I think about this often, and I know I can get way better at it.

But before I really jump the lead and hop into that, I wanted to read quickly an email that got sent in from a listener that is in...

Where you at?

Hmm, where is she at?

In the Pacific Northwest.

And she emailed, shout out to her, if something pops out to you, feel free to email me or tell me on the podcast.

Because right now, I ain't making all the cash.

I ain't making a whole bunch of stuff.

I'm doing this because I feel called to do it, but it's always great to hear.

So she messaged me and she wanted to let me know, I started listening to your podcast, and it has been a game changer for how I serve in my role.

I met her at a conference.

So she says, our conversation at conference taught me so much that I regularly reflect on when I feel myself wanting to withdraw from conversations with people and stay in my comfort zone.

Thank you for sharing your podcast with me.

I'm so encouraged by and excited to see my confidence and skills develop to reflect my heart for people and transform my relationships.

Keep it up.

So shout out to Rebecca.

That is incredible.

This made my day, being able to read the email.

I was like, wow, how cool is that?

Thank you for saying all that.

And that's our goal.

That's what we're here for, is we know that life is made up of people and people can't live life alone.

Okay, last couple of things, housekeeping.

There is building connected communities.

It's going to be a virtual event.

It is happening October 12th to 14th, I believe.

And what that will be is Harvard University is hosting it.

The Foundation for Social Connection is a partner, the Einhorn Collaborative.

Essentially, think of Harvard professors, US senators, big executives.

They're all getting together talking about the power of social connection.

And it's streaming virtually for free.

So it's called Building Connected Communities.

I'll put a link into it in the description if you guys want to check that out.

Lastly, I've been reading a book.

A professor in social connection contacted me and asked if I could read his book before publication and provide feedback.

How cool is that?

Yeah, so this week, I've been reading that.

It's been a ton on my brain, but I've been loving it.

It is such a good feeling to be reading a book and feel encouraged in your calling.

And I do feel called to help people grow in social connection to live fuller lives.

And one of the ways I need to do that is to become a SME, a subject matter expert.

So I've got to read.

Should we hop in the ten?

Yes, sir.

All right.

Here we go.

Ten rules.

Shout out to JP, Jordan Peterson, giving us 24 rules to live a better life.

But I'm going to give you ten rules to go by that will help you relate and work with the people in your life.

And they will help you become a better communicator.

Here we go.

Logan's taking notes already.

Shout out to the man.

All right.

Rule number one.

I'm going to start kind of like in a chronological order from getting into a conversation to getting out of a conversation.

Rule number one.

Before we even get into conversations with people or think about relationships.

Rule number one.

Your goal should be to make people feel like they're the only person in the room.

I was in college my sophomore year.

I became an RA.

This was like my first leadership role.

They cut me a check.

They paid for my housing and dining, which was imperative because I couldn't pay that money.

That was the only way I could really be in college.

And I had this sticky note on my in my RA room that I was living in by myself.

And I put it on my wall and it said, I want people to feel like they're the only person in the room.

We get to do that.

And it's not through our words.

Like I said, content is contextual.

But just going in there with an open mind and being attentive is going to set you miles apart from any other potential reality.

Like being there, being attuned, being dialed in, it's going to be super, super important before we get into any other technicalities.

So make people feel like they're the only person in the room.

All right.

Done.

Rule number two, you need to have a why or a well that you can continually draw from.

Now, this could be faith.

This could be principles or this could simply be curiosity.

The reason why this is so important is despite whatever conversations you're in and whoever you're talking to, you have to have a motive to keep going.

With this podcast, I really want to build a collection of conversations.

But for you, you need to know why you're talking to people.

I know many people who are involved in a synagogue, a mosque, a church, they recognize that God made people in his image, which means everybody has value.

And then everybody has a testimony, which means a unique story to their life.

And a big draw is to hear other people's testimonies because you've never heard them before, right?

So that is a why, that is a well, and that will motivate you.

All right, two down.

Yeah, I also like the whole just like the like you said, everyone has a story.

And you don't know what similarities you guys have until you hear their stories, you know, and whether it be your childhood, your best friends are the same or something like that.

But you could be from completely different parts of the world.

But your stories are still the same.

That's like I love that's why I love stories.

But right me too.

And the only way to that's the platform.

Barack Obama ran on is that our commonalities are more than what sets us apart.

Yeah.

And whatever Democrat or Republican, we can unite on what brings us together.

If you read his book, The Odyssey to Change, that's like the main thesis.

So good point.

Number three, when you go into conversation, quit fearing awkwardness.

What I want you to fear is that you never added value or you didn't let the person know that they were valued.

If we are constantly thinking, oh, I don't want to be awkward, I don't want to be awkward, it's not going to be the right metric or the right outlook to get a good outcome.

Because being awkward is just humans.

Humans are unpredictable, right?

And if we are awkward, that means it didn't go according to the script that we had in our head.

And 95% of the time, we're going to be wrong.

And the other 5% of the time, where it does match our script, that means that one, we either got lucky or we were being a bit too predictable.

So if we fear awkwardness, it's going to pop up a lot and we're going to identify with it.

So let's just, from the jump, not associate fear with awkwardness.

Being awkward is being made up of carbon matter with hydrogen, and it's essentially being human.

So quit fearing awkwardness.

What I want you to fear is that you went through a conversation or a meaningful interaction, and one, you didn't add value, or two, you didn't let the other people know that they are valued.

And this doesn't mean that you have to go to every person and say, hey, you're valued.

Spending time or giving people attention is giving them value because your time and attention is limited.

So don't fear awkwardness.

Fear not adding value.

I also think on that subject too, when you say spending time with somebody, quality time is a love language.

It might not be your love language, but it's also a way for people to show love.

And love is like the biggest thing in the world, to show someone love just in general.

But yeah, just giving someone that time, your time.

Yeah, that quality time, that QT.

I'm a QTPT guy.

Quality time physical touch.

Ah, okay.

A deadly combo.

All right, number four.

So tip or rule to live by number four.

And I call this one the Leonardo DiCaprio.

And what this means is that you're not in a movie, so you're not going to sound like those people doing their own movies.

If you ever watch Leonardo DiCaprio and he says the perfect thing at the right time, or Keanu Reeves says that really cool thing at the right time, no one's going to tell you lie in line.

It's not scripted.

It's going to be completely normal if you don't know what to say.

So don't go into conversations thinking you're Scarlett Johansson.

They have dozens of script writers writing that stuff.

If you watch a movie and you're like, oh, I want to communicate like that, don't do that.

You're going to be setting up yourself for failure.

I think this is super important because I know sometimes Annie and I will get in conflict, and we're like, oh, we both studied communication.

We should know how to do this.

Every time, we don't know how to do it.

We have to learn each time, and it's the Leonardo DiCaprio rule.

There is no movie script telling us what lines to say.

Every time, it's a brand new conversation.

Let's navigate it like that.

Don't be worried if you don't have the perfect line.

Number five, humans are unpredictable, which means relationships are hard, so you need to get ready.

Number six, have the ability to move on.

Think of the next conversation rather than the last.

So I thought about this.

I call this the Kevin Durant rule.

The reason why is someone asked Kevin Durant, whenever you miss a shot, what do you do?

What do you tell yourself?

Do you get upset?

And he said, well, I can't get upset at my future self.

I don't want to get down on my future self.

I have to forget that I missed.

That way, whenever I get the opportunity to take another shot, I can make it.

And I think with conversations, oftentimes we leave conversations beating ourselves up.

Ah, man, I could have said this.

And to be honest, you're probably right.

There's a chance that you could have said that, or you missed an opportunity to do that.

But the more time we reflect on that, then the less time we get to think forward to the next conversation, which a simple way to change that is, rather than I could have asked Logan that question back to him whenever he asked me, because it's reciprocity and I want to extend value to him, instead of being like, next time, I'm going to make sure I ask that question.

Right?

Because I feel like if you always live in the past, you'll never be ready for the future.

You know, like that's why just in general, that's why it's called the past because it's past tense.

It already happened.

We can't change it.

So let's move on from it.

You know?

Yeah, that's good.

That's good, right?

All right.

Number seven, your social muscles are adaptable to demands.

So be demanding.

Adam Grant, the psychologist, put out this piece.

I don't know where he put it out.

Maybe New York Times.

But he says after COVID, expect a lot of awkwardness because people were chilling and they weren't talking.

And due to that, our social muscles experienced atrophy.

So they shrunk because we weren't using them.

Now, if you look at the other side, if you do use them, they'll grow.

So they'll be adaptable if you give them demands.

We just need to make sure we're demanding and we're putting the stress on them so that they will grow.

So be demanding to your social muscles, aka flex your social muscles.

Number eight, and we're getting close to the end.

Content is contextual.

Presence is not.

I previewed this.

I spoiled this one.

But if anyone ever asks you, did you hear me, make it resounding to them that the answer is yes.

Make it resounding to them that you were being attentive, that you were being 100% there, and that you're being present.

Your presence is a present, right?

Yeah.

So I tell a lot of my friends when their birthdays are coming up, I'm like, well, my present to you is my present, so that's not what I meant.

But it's true.

You're like, I'm here.

I'm here.

Number nine, know your social battery.

Recognize when it's on E and know how to get it to F.

This is something not a lot of people talk about.

Everybody has different social batteries.

We've done an attempt at explaining this by calling different people extroverts and introverts, delineating humans into two different groups, but it's a fingerprint.

Everybody has a different fingerprint.

Everybody has a different way that they refill their tank and different capacity.

I may be able to talk to people eight hours a day.

You may be able to talk to people six hours a day.

That doesn't necessarily matter.

It mainly just makes us attuned to different roles, but we all have a battery and they need to be charged by social interaction.

But if it's too much, if we're on E, it's not going to be helpful.

So this whole thing about talk to people, that's cool and all.

But if we're spent socially, it's actually going to hurt us because we need to recover.

Be like working out after you've already worked out.

It's not wise.

So get to know your social battery when it's on E, and then how to charge it back up.

Number 10.

Here we go.

Number 10.

Use these rules when you're at your best so that there's a chance you use them when you're at your worst.

The more you think about this, the more likely, whenever stress is super high, you're going to recall one of these and tap into it when you need it.

This makes me think of the conversation we had with Jared Otten, who trains people on how to talk to people who are considering taking their own lives.

That is when stakes are at an all-time high.

That is when stress is crazy.

It's a crisis moment.

But he trains the people who are talking on the phone to learn these formulas so that whenever stress is so high, there's a chance we may remember them.

Most of the time, whenever crisis pops up or whenever things happen in our relationships or conversations, we revert to something.

So challenge yourself to make whatever that's something you revert to something that's constructive, so something like this.

So number 10 was, use these when you're at your best so that there's a chance you use them when you're at your worst.

That's good.

All right.

That's it.

Psych, I got one last one.

Number 11.

If you have space, time, and energy to build relationships and to talk to people, then go harden the paint.

The more availability that you give yourself and the more you do it, the better it's going to be for you.

Not all relationships are going to work out.

Not all conversations are going to go well.

You're going to get your heart broken.

But if you withdraw yourself, one, you're not getting that social interaction, especially if you need it.

If you're already at full, that's great.

Hang out.

Read a book.

Chill by yourself.

Go on a walk.

Pet your dog.

But if you're not at full, if you have space, time, and energy, go fill up your social battery.

Because if you're withdrawing, that's one less person for everybody else to talk to.

And we need to be giving others that opportunity to talk, just like we need that opportunity ourselves.

Okay, so now I'm officially 11'd out.

I also think it's that last one.

I think everyone's very interesting.

People are very interesting.

So if you think yourself not interesting, you're lying to yourself, because you are very interesting.

Or you're like, oh, I'm just a normal guy, or I'm a normal person, whatever.

It's just like, well, yeah, but your normality might not be the same as my normality.

So when I look at you, I see someone completely unique and special, something like that.

So when people say, oh, I can't, don't talk to me.

But I want to talk to you.

Like, be that person who wants to talk to people, you know?

Yeah.

Like again, like you said, regard the awkwardness of a conversation, because that's just we're just human.

We're going to be awkward.

That's going to happen.

It's going to happen.

We're going to be awkward.

Yeah.

Expressing that interest in the people, because they are interesting.

Yeah.

And one of the most dehumanizing things is for someone to act like you have nothing to bring to the table.

That's messed up.

And I hope that none of us do that, but it's a good way to turn things off and to shut things down.

But there we go.

Eleven.

Yeah.

That's pretty tight.

You got me there with eleven.

I was expecting eleven.

Right?

Yeah.

I lied.

What better way to build a successful podcast than lie?

Yeah.

Than lie.

We should cover deception one day.

Yeah.

Deception.

But that's ten.

This next solo episode, we're going to be doing asking questions.

So send in the questions that you got.

These questions.

Let's pick a focus here.

These questions are like, what are things that you'd like to know about communication, about building relationships?

What are relational challenges that you face currently?

What are challenges you face in the past?

I'm not an expert on this, but I am curious about it.

So I have a lot of want to know more and to help people out and really to grow in this.

So I want to answer this.

Other questions could be like, for your current community where you're at, what are things that you'd like to discuss to build more on that?

What else could we ask?

If you all have questions about podcasting, I'm always here for that.

But for the most part, let's talk about friendships, let's talk about relationships, let's talk about becoming better communicators.

We could do public speaking, question asking.

I was going to say even like conflict in relationships too.

Conflict navigation.

The navigation conflict, yeah.

Yeah, if there's conflicts, you all want to hop in.

It'd be like Jerry Springer up in here.

Logan and I can act out the conflicts.

Yeah, do a little role play.

No, but sending questions will be here.

Back at it again.

Thank you again for listening.

If you get a moment, subscribe to the YouTube channel.

Review on Apple Podcasts.

Leave a rating on Spotify.

Thanks for rocking with this.

And other than that, we are signing off.

We'll see you next time, folks.