1KHO 744: Anyone Can Become a Supercommunicator | Charles Duhigg, Supercommunicators

Summary

Podcast Summary: The 1000 Hours Outside Podcast Episode: 1KHO 744: Anyone Can Become a Supercommunicator | Charles Duhigg, Supercommunicators
Date: March 20, 2026
Host: Ginny Yurich
Guest: Charles Duhigg

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Main Theme / Purpose

This episode explores the power and science of effective communication, inspired by Charles Duhigg’s book, Supercommunicators: How to Unlock the Secret Language of Connection. The conversation focuses on how anyone can significantly improve their communication skills, deepen relationships, and foster more meaningful connections—within families, workplaces, and broader communities. The discussion is rich with research insights, practical tips, and stories about what happens when people truly connect.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. The Science of Connection: Neural Entrainment

• Duhigg explains “neural entrainment”—the phenomenon where people’s brains, heart rates, and even eye dilation synchronize during meaningful conversations, physically aligning us and making us feel closer.
  • “Communication is Homo sapiens’ superpower… our thoughts become more and more aligned, more synchronized. That makes sense when you think about it. Because if I tell you about an emotion I'm feeling, you actually feel that emotion a little bit.” (Charles Duhigg, 01:21–02:06)
• Activities such as singing, humming, or tapping together also trigger this entrainment, highlighting another benefit of real-world interaction over virtual connections.

2. The Role of Asking Questions

• Duhigg shares that “supercommunicators” ask significantly more questions than average, including both inviting (surface) and deep (values-driven) questions.
  • “High centrality participants… tended to ask 10 to 20 times as many questions as the other participants.” (Ginny Yurich, 04:09)
  • “A deep question… asks us to talk about our values or beliefs or experiences… What made you decide to go to medical school?” (Charles Duhigg, 05:09–05:15)
• The “Fast Friends Procedure”: A study where strangers asked each other a series of increasingly deep questions, resulting in 70% keeping in touch—and even marriage between some pairs.
  • “If we've been authentic… if we've been a little vulnerable… we feel closer to each other, even if we're strangers.” (Charles Duhigg, 09:32)
  • Memorable story: Some participants, after 45 minutes answering 36 questions, tracked each other down and formed lasting friendships—or more.

3. Reciprocal Vulnerability and Matching

• Closeness is built when people not only share something about themselves but also match each other's vulnerability.
  • “Reciprocal vulnerability is just saying something to another person that they could judge… when they say something about themselves that you could judge, then we will feel closer to each other–even if we disagree.” (Charles Duhigg, 15:04–16:21)
• Matching doesn’t need to be dramatic; even small admissions or emotions count.

4. Handling Awkwardness & Emotional Conversations

• Duhigg shares a personal story about his father’s funeral, noting people often avoid deep or awkward topics when empathy is what’s truly needed.
  • “I was desperate to talk about what I've been through… the eulogies, what it feels like to know I won't be able to call him with good news… No one asked me any questions. Instead, they quickly moved on.” (Ginny Yurich, 17:03-17:28)
• Advice: If you feel awkward, acknowledge it and ask the question anyway—it provides permission for the other person to open up, but doesn’t obligate them.

5. Practical Advice: Preparing for Conversation

• Duhigg references experiments showing that simply jotting down 2–3 possible questions or topics before a conversation with a stranger dramatically increases confidence and outcomes—even if those questions aren’t used.
  • “Most people said, ‘No, I never asked those questions, but I just felt so much more confident because I knew I had them in my back pocket.’ Oftentimes when we feel anxious about a conversation, it's because we have not prepared.” (Charles Duhigg, 25:31–27:59)

6. The Three Types of Conversations

• Effective communication requires “matching” the type of conversation someone else is having:
  • Practical (solving problems, making plans)
  • Emotional (sharing and empathizing with feelings)
  • Social (exploring identity, status, group dynamics)
• Miscommunication often results from people having different types of conversations at once.
  • “If the two people… are not having the same kind of conversation at the same moment… they cannot fully hear each other, and they definitely will not feel really connected.” (Charles Duhigg, 28:55–30:54)

7. Personal and Family Impact

• Duhigg discusses applying these insights in marriage and family life, highlighting conscious conversation shifts.
  • “My wife… will say, ‘Do you want me to help you come up with a solution, or do you just need to vent?’… And I just want to complain… then… she empathizes, and then at some point she says, ‘Can we talk about some solutions?’” (Charles Duhigg, 32:09–32:48)

8. Big Benefits of Being a Supercommunicator

• Wider social networks, happier life, professional and personal success; anyone can develop these skills.
  • “Nobody is born a super communicator… we become super communicators by thinking about communication, by learning and practicing these skills until they become habits.” (Charles Duhigg, 19:57–21:02)

9. Memorable Story

• When asked about an outdoor memory from his childhood, Duhigg recalls hiking the La Luz Trail in Albuquerque, New Mexico—highlighting the sense of accomplishment and family connection.
  • “You're literally walking up a mountain… halfway through, you think ‘I can never do this.’ And then you get to the top… that's one of my favorite memories: this sense of persistence.” (Charles Duhigg, 34:05–34:37)

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On neural entrainment:
  • “Communication evolved to bring us closer to each other.” (Charles Duhigg, 01:21)
• On asking deep questions:
  • “Asking deep questions is easier than most people realize, and it's more rewarding than we would expect.” (Ginny Yurich, 05:56)
• On reciprocal vulnerability:
  • “Vulnerability is what happens… when I say something that you could judge.” (Charles Duhigg, 15:04)
• On preparing for conversations:
  • “Take out a piece of paper and just write down three things you might want to talk about.” (Charles Duhigg, 25:31)
• On matching conversation types:
  • “If someone seems emotional, allow yourself to become emotional as well. If someone is intent on decision making, match their focus.” (Ginny Yurich, 30:58)
• On the learnability of communication:
  • “Nobody is born a super communicator. We become super communicators by thinking about communication, by learning and practicing these skills until they become habits.” (Charles Duhigg, 19:57–21:02)

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Timestamps for Key Segments

• Neural Entrainment and Connection: 01:21–03:18
• The Power of Asking Questions & “Fast Friends Procedure”: 04:09–09:45
• Reciprocal Vulnerability: 15:04–16:35
• Handling Awkwardness & Deep Conversations: 17:01–19:27
• Supercommunicator Benefits: 19:38–21:31
• Preparing for Conversation: 25:08–28:04
• Three Types of Conversations & Matching: 28:55–32:09
• Applying the Concepts in Family Life: 32:09–33:25
• Duhigg’s Favorite Outdoor Memory: 34:00–34:39

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Practical Takeaways

• Ask more, especially deep, questions; gently match the depth and vulnerability of your conversation partner.
• Prepare for conversations, especially if anxious, by jotting a few topics or questions beforehand.
• Recognize which kind of conversation you’re in (practical, emotional, or social), and match your partner for meaningful connection.
• These techniques are learnable and teachable—beneficial for parents, kids, and professionals alike.

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This episode is a treasure trove of practical advice, backed by research and illustrated with vivid storytelling. Whether for family dinners or complex workplace dynamics, Charles Duhigg's insights on supercommunication can transform how we connect.

Transcript

[A]

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[B]

My name is Judy Ertz. I'm the founder of 1000 Hours Outside and I've been a huge fan of Charles Duhigg for so long and he is here. He has written incredible books about communicating and our habits and productivity. Welcome.

[C]

Thanks for having me.

[B]

We're going to focus today on Super Communicators, which is a book about how to communicate better and build better relationships. But you also have smarter, faster, better. This book about productivity and I read the Power of Habit so long ago. This is about keeping the cue and the reward, but changing the middle part. So if we get there.

[C]

Yeah, the behavior.

[B]

Yes. And that, I mean, I had no idea that that's how you kind of make the change. So I learned a ton from all of your books. But talking about communication in a day and age where people's relationships tend to be suffering more than they used to, I would love if you would explain this concept of neural entrainment about how we synchronize with other people.

[C]

Yeah, it's really interesting. So if you think about it, communication is Homo sapiens superpower, right? It's. It's the thing that, that we have evolved the capacity to do that sets us apart from every other species on Earth. And what's interesting is that communication evolved to, to bring us closer to each other. The fact that we can use communication to transmit information is like a side benefit. It's not the, the reason why communication evolves. And so when you and I are in a conversation, if it's a good conversation, if we're really like, connecting with each other, there will actually be these changes in our bodies and our brains. Right. So even in this conversation, even though we're separated by distance and we're on zoom together, our breath patterns throughout this conversation will increasingly become similar to each other. Our heart rates will start to echo each other. The dilation of the people, of our eyes will start to look similar. And, and if we could see inside our brains, what we would see is that our thoughts would become more and more aligned, more and more synchronized, and that Makes sense when you think about it. Because if I tell you about an emotion I'm feeling, you actually feel that emotion a little bit. Right. Or if I tell you about an idea, you feel that idea. And within neuroscience, this is known as neural entrainment, that our brains become similar to each other, and as a result, we feel closer to each other, even if we disagree with each other, even if we're talking about something contentious. If we start to entrain with each other, we will feel closer and more connected to each other. And that's actually why communication exists.

[B]

I mean, it's remarkable. And even it works with music. You talked about guitarists, and they. They studied their brains. So in the book, it's called Super Communicators. Their minds merge and the linkage flows through their body. You know, like you talked about the breath rates in their eyes. And it happens if you hum together, and it happens if you tap your fingers together and you're. If you sing together. And so all of this is helping people to connect in a.

[D]

In a.

[B]

In a deeper way. So it's just an. Another benefit for being off your screens, I think, a little bit more.

[C]

Yeah, well, and. And people feel this in their own lives. I think back to the last time you had a great conversation with your best friend, right?

[D]

You.

[C]

You hung up the phone and you just felt fantastic afterwards. You felt so good. And the reason you felt good is because your brain was releasing dopamine and endorphins and all these other serotonin floods that. That exist to help us synchronize with each other and exist to help us feel good.

[D]

Yeah.

[B]

So the book, which is called Super Communicators, is. It has its premise, though, that sometimes our conversations do not go very well, and sometimes we're not very good at catching other people's cues.

[D]

Like, are they really listening or are

[B]

they just nodding along? And so this book, is this the four rules of good, you know, of good communication. How can I become a better communicator? And one of the concepts that comes up so often is question asking.

[D]

So you wrote this.

[B]

High centrality participants. So this was, like, in a study, tended to 10 to 20 times. It wasn't even 10 to 20 more questions. It was 10 to 20 times as many questions as the other participants. I actually think that this book is worth buying, even if it was just for the 36 questions that lead to love.

[C]

Yeah, the Fast Friends procedure. No, it's wonderful. And you're exactly right. And what's interesting is that. So next time you're talking to someone who. Who, like you, really look forward to talking to you. Like, you just enjoy talking to them. Notice how they ask you questions, because I guarantee you what they'll do is that they'll ask more questions than everyone else. And some of the questions will be questions designed to invite you into the conversation, like, oh, what'd you think about that? Or, oh, did you see that movie? But some of the questions are what are known as deep questions. And a deep question is something that asks us to talk about our values or beliefs or experiences. And that can sound a little bit intimidating, but it's as simple as if you meet someone who's a doctor, instead of asking them, oh, what hospital do you work at? You can ask them, oh, what made you decide to go to medical school?

[D]

Right.

[C]

That second question. That second question doesn't appear like it's overly personal or like it's too probing, but it's a deep question because what it does is it invites that person to talk about their values and their beliefs and their experiences. They talk about, you know, that they wanted to be a healer, that they value helping other people, that they grew up, you know, with their father being a physician, and so they always looked up to their father and they want. Or their mother being a physician, and they wanted to become a physician themselves. And I think. I think what. What. What Super Communicators do is they're just in the habit of asking these deep questions, which doesn't mean that they're asking things that seem overly personal, but it means that they're asking questions that invite the other person to say something real,

[B]

and you teach people how to do it. There's actually like a whole section in the book Super Communicators about how you can take this question and just adjust it a little bit. It's a little bit of adjustment, and it will become a different type of a question. So you just gave an example, but there's a whole bu. A bunch of them. You know, what do you do for a living versus do you love your job? Or do you have something else you dream of doing? And there's this whole list of taking a more shallow question and turning it into a deep question. You wrote, asking deep questions is easier than most people realize, and it's more rewarding than we would expect. So can you tell people about this Fast Friends procedure, about how the questions didn't. What was surprising to me is that it wasn't like they were questions that they'd studied, you know, or, like, put in all this Research. It was like they grabbed these random questions and then a couple ended up getting married.

[C]

Yeah, no, that's exactly right. So, so Arthur and Elaine Aaron, who are these two research psychologists who are, who are married to each other, they came up with this experiment. They wanted to try and figure out if they could find a technique that would make two strangers into friends. And so they tried all kinds of things. They had people go on hikes together, they had them do puzzles together, they had them like, hum together. And basically none of it worked. Like, some people became friends, others didn't. It just, it didn't seem to have much impact. And they almost were going to give up on the, on the project. And, and so they decided, okay, we're going to try one last thing. We're going to come up with a list of 36 questions. And what we're going to do is we're going to have people come into a room and just two strangers sit down from, across, across from each other and ask and answer those questions back and forth. And so, so that's what they do. And it takes about 45 minutes. And the first, the questions, the first couple of questions were pretty easy, but it was like, if you, if you could have dinner with anyone in, in history, who would you have dinner with? Right? That's not that probing a question. But like by question seven, it's things like, do you have a hunch about how you will die? Question 23, I think, is something like, tell me about your mother. Right? And question 35, the second to last question is this question. When is the last time you cried in front of another person? And so people would sit down, I would ask you the question, you would answer it, you would ask me the question, I would answer it back and forth, all 36 of them only took 45 minutes. Then afterwards, people would just go their separate ways. And everyone kind of assumed that the experiment was over, but actually the experiment was just beginning because seven weeks later, these two researchers, they call everyone who had been in, those in the, who had sat in that room and done the experiment, and they asked him this question. Did you ever talk to that person again, the person that you did that thing with? And people would say things like, yeah, you know, I didn't catch his name. I knew his first name was John and that his last name started with an R. And so I got out the directory and I called every John R in the directory until I found him. And another, another couple sort of said, or another, another few people who'd done this said, you know, we went, we went and we got a beer afterwards and about a week later we saw a movie together. And when those people got married, they invited everyone in the lab to come to the ceremony and to, to, to participate in sort of seeing their, their relationship. And the reason why this is, I think, so powerful is because what they found was that about 70% of people ended up seeking out the person they had done this experiment with. And what it shows is it shows the power of these deep questions, right? That if, if I am in a place where I have asked you a question that is meaningful and you've asked me a question that's meaningful. If we've been authentic with each other, if we've been a little vulnerable with each other, we feel closer to each other, even if we're strangers, even if we have nothing in common, we will feel closer to each other and we'll want to seek out that closeness. This is actually known as the pro social instinct in psychology. And it's really, really powerful.

[B]

What a story. The book is filled with fantastic stories. And you go through, we don't have time to dive into them, but you go through like a negotiator who works for, you know, like an FBI, CIA type situation. And you go talk about a surgeon who learns how to communicate better with his patients and the surgery numbers fall, which is what he's wanting to happen, and they fall. And you talk about people who have really gotten this right. And so questions comes up a lot. The actual questions from the questions that lead to love is in there. In the book.

[D]

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[B]

so that's super exciting. And what a thing. They sought each other out and had to put in so much effort to do so based off of just 45 minutes of spending time together.

[D]

You.

[C]

But we've all been in that place, right? There's times when we've met someone and we think like, oh, I just like this person. I feel good around this person. I really enjoy being. Spending time with them. That's that pro social instinct. That's that neural entrainment. And asking deep questions is one way to, to jumpstart it.

[B]

Yeah, because this was random. You know, you kind of think it's got to be a particular type of person. Or if in you're like, oh, we just didn't connect. But, but so many of these people connected because of the good questions. You brought up something really important, Charles, that's in the book. Part of this is that you also have to open up the. I thought it was interesting that they had tried a similar situation with a bunch of questions, but if one person answered all of them and then the next person answered all of them, it wasn't the same thing.

[C]

Yeah, that's exactly right. So, so what's interesting is it's the back and forth that matters. Right? It's the, it's the, the, the table tennis of it. And what's interesting is that what we've discovered is that it's. Because when what's known as reciprocal vulnerability and this word vulnerability, we tend to misunderstand what vulnerability is. We think of vulnerability as like crying on each other's shoulders or talking about our moms or something like that. But actually vulnerability is what happens. It's a neural cascade that occurs within our brains. When I say something that you could judge now, it might be something really dumb and simple. Like I might say, I like Star Trek better than Star wars. And you think that's a really dumb opinion, right? But when I tell you something and I don't care what you think, it's just kind of a funny throwaway thing. But when I tell you something that you could judge, my brain automatically, this is an instinct we all are born with, will pay very close attention to how you react. And if in that moment, instead of judging me, if you withhold judgment, or even more importantly, if you tell me something in return that I could judge about you, then we will feel closer to each other. We will feel like we are more connected to each other. That's what vulnerability is. Reciprocal vulnerability is just saying something to another person that they could judge. And you might not care about their judgment, it might not matter. But simply saying something they could judge when they don't judge you in return, when they say something about themselves that you could judge then. Then we feel closer to each other, even if we disagree with each other.

[B]

Oh, this is so great. Parents. A lot of parents listen in. Wouldn't this be a great book to do?

[D]

And then you can practice it over the.

[B]

At the dinner table, you can practice with your kids. And there's tons of ideas of types of questions and like I said, of how to take a, you know, a more shallow question and turn it into a deep one. These are really good skills to teach your children. What do you do when it's awkward? So to ask a question. So you have brought up a situation in the book which I think is

[D]

relatable for a lot of people, that

[B]

your dad passed away.

[D]

And here you are, you're at the

[B]

funeral and you really want to talk

[D]

about your dad and you want to

[B]

talk about the eulogies and you want to talk about these memories. And you said almost no one asked me any questions. Questions. Instead, they quickly moved on to other subjects. The truth was I was desperate to

[D]

talk about what I've been through, about

[B]

my dad, about the eulogies that had made me so proud and sad about

[D]

what it feels like to know I

[B]

won't be able to call him with good news.

[D]

You wanted people to ask, what was your dad like?

[C]

Yeah. Yeah. And I think. I think we've all been in that situation, right, where somebody says something and it seems so personal and so. So open and. And instead of. Instead of matching them, instead of recognizing what's happening and sort of leaning in, we sometimes lean away and we say, like, oh, I'm sorry, my condolences. Now let's talk about that, that meeting next week. Right. Just because it's uncomfortable, we don't know what to say. And yet anyone who's been on the other side of that conversation knows it doesn't matter what you say. What matters is that you show that you are interested, that you show that you, you see what this person is feeling and you want, you want to acknowledge it. And so what I would say to anyone listening is when you're in a situation where it feels awkward to ask a question, it's okay to say, you know, I feel kind of awkward asking this, but what was your dad like? Right. Acknowledging the awkwardness oftentimes makes it, makes it easier and makes it better. But even more importantly, if this person is clearly thinking about this thing, they're thinking about it so much that they've brought it, they, that they've brought it up apropos of very little in conversation with you, then, then it's something that they might want to talk about. And the nice thing is if you say, like, this is kind of awkward, but I'm just wondering, like, what was your dad like? It's, it's a, rather than being a mandate for them to share with you, it's an invitation. Because they could easily say, oh, he was great. You know, it's, it's really sad that he's gone. Or they could say, oh, let me tell you about my dad. Like, he was the greatest guy. Like, I remember this one time, right, when we, when we invite people to share with us, rather than mandate that they have to share with us, what we're doing is we're doing a kindness to them. And it's not awkward, it's not inappropriate. It shows that we are actually listening and paying attention to them and that we want to understand how they see the world. And that feels like one of the best things on earth.

[B]

Yeah. I mean, this book, it will change your life. It will really deepen your relationships because you talk about that. The benefits of being a super communicator are so vast.

[D]

They tend to have larger social networks.

[B]

They're. They're more likely to be elected. I don't know. I don't know what I would be elected to. But, you know, they're a person that

[D]

they're easy to talk to.

[B]

People want to come to you, and the benefits just go on and on of, of learning these things, and they

[D]

are happier because they have warmer.

[C]

And one of the best examples of that is I'm sure anyone who works in an office, I'm absolutely certain there's some meetings you go to and you sit down and there's one person in the meeting and you're like, oh, man, thank goodness Rachel is here. Like, like a meeting with Rachel in it is always a fun meeting. Like, I don't mind this meeting now there's other meetings you walk into and you're like, oh, Greg is here. God, this is gonna be, this is gonna be terrible. Right? Rachel is a super communicator. If you were to pay attention to what Rachel's doing, it's not that she's funnier than everyone else or that she's more intelligent than everyone else. It's that she's doing these skills. She's doing these things that draw other people out. She's asking more questions. She's. When somebody says something sort of revealing, instead of pretending like it didn't happen, she's leaning in and inviting them to explain more. These are all things that we can learn to do. Nobody is born a super communicator. We become super communicators by thinking about communication, by learning and practicing these skills until they become habits. And that's, that's the people that you love to see in a meeting or that you love to call because they, you consider them such a good friend.

[B]

Yeah, And I love that you went through the jury. There was a story about a jury in the book. And you, you actually go through, like,

[D]

what was the conversation like? Because these people are divided.

[B]

And what does a super communicator do in that situation? It's not like they take the reins and, you know, shout out their opinion. They're really good at kind of maneuvering the conversation. One of the things that you talked about is just matching, you know, you're

[D]

matching the other person.

[B]

And so the whole example there really

[D]

showcases what's going on.

[B]

So there's super big benefits of being a super communicator.

[D]

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[B]

And you go through the four rules of learning conversation. We kind of just briefly touched on one which revolves around the question asking. And one of the things that you talked about was to prepare. I mean, nobody ever thinks about that. So you say that researchers found that simply preparing a list ahead of time can make conversations go better. This is great advice for kids. Can you give an example of what that might, what that might look like?

[C]

Absolutely. Because, because, so this, this comes from an experiment that was done at Harvard Business School where they brought a bunch of students in and they were like, okay, look, in about 10 minutes you're going to have a conversation with a total stranger. And this is like one of the most anxiety producing things you can ask someone to do. Right? You got it. You have to go talk to a stranger. And they said, but before you do, here's what we want you to do. Take out a piece of paper and just write down three things you might want to talk about or three questions you might want to ask. Like, oh, you know, I. Did you see that movie? It was really good. And like, and, and oh, you're from Ohio. Like, do you know my friend Dave? Right? Just write down like three things that might come up in the conversation or three questions you might ask. And then go ahead and put the piece of paper in your pocket and let's go have the conversation. So they go, they do this. It takes about 45 seconds for people to write down three things. They stick it in their pocket and then they bring them over and they introduce them to a stranger and say, take it away. And people have these conversations, and afterwards they ask them, how did that go? And people say, you know what? That went so much better than I thought it was going to be. Like, I thought this was going to be awkward and awful. But, like, actually, actually, I really like this person. Like, it's really fun to talk to them. And then they said, just out of curiosity, did you ever ask those questions or talk about those topics that you had written down? And most people said, no, no, it never came up. But, you know, I just felt so much more confident because I knew that I had these questions in my back pocket. I could pull them out anytime I wanted to. And what it gets to is it gets to the fact that oftentimes when we feel anxious about a conversation, it's because we have not prepared for that conversation. Right. Like we're going to a party, and we know there's going to be all this small talk with our spouse's work friends, and we don't know what to talk to them about. But if you just take 30 seconds and you're like, I guess I could ask them about, like, you know, where they go on vacation or, you know, my wife is always complaining about, like, the cafeteria. What do you think about the cafeteria? Then all of a sudden, those conversations are so much easier. And then it's easier to ask that deep question. Right. To say, like, oh, you know, what do you do for the company? I'm an accountant. Oh, did you always want to be an accountant? Is that what you planned on being when you're a kid? Right. That's a deep question. And inevitably someone's going to say, no, no kid wants to be an accountant. I wanted to be an astronaut. But now you're having a real conversation about, you know, why you became an accountant instead of an astronaut.

[D]

Yes.

[C]

And that's. That's really. That's a real conversation.

[B]

Yeah, I love that. 45 seconds. And what, especially for if they're, you know, parents and their kids have a little bit of social anxiety? I don't think anybody thinks, because conversation is so part of everyday life, no one considers, oh, I should maybe have

[D]

a little bit of preparation for this situation.

[C]

Yeah.

[B]

And that's a fantastic idea.

[C]

And by the way, that doesn't mean you have to prepare for every conversation, except that oftentimes you do without realizing it. Like, when you call a friend, you're thinking to yourself, oh, I really want to find out, how'd that date go? I know she was going on a Date, like, I wonder how it went. You're preparing for that conversation. It's very natural. And if that. We just make that a habit that we do on a more regular basis. We'll. We'll find that we're connecting with people much more easily.

[B]

It's so practical. Here's a couple of the examples that are in the book. Super Communicators. What are two topics you want to most discuss? What is one thing you hope to say that shows what you want to talk about? What is a question you will ask that reveals what the other people want to talk about? I mean, it is just beyond practical. So there's four rules of learning conversation that's in the book. People can find that, and super communicators find the other rules. Let's talk about the fact that most discussions are three convert three different types of conversations. I've never heard this. And you gotta try and match up.

[C]

Yeah, that's exactly right. So what researchers have found is that when we're having a discussion, we think we know what that discussion is about, right? We're talking about our kids, or we're talking about where to go on vacation or next year's budget. But actually, if you look inside people's brains as they're having those discussions, what researchers have found is that they're having many different kinds of conversations all at the same time. And in general, these conversations, they tend to fall into one of three buckets. There are these practical conversations where we're making plans together or we're solving problems. But then there's also emotional conversations where I tell you what I'm feeling, and I don't want you to solve my feelings. I want you to empathize with me. Right? And then there's social conversations, which is about how you and I relate to each other, how we relate to. To society, the identities that are important to us. And what researchers have found is that all three of these conversations are all equally important. And all three of them will probably happen during a long discussion. You'll start emotional and go to practical, and then go back to emotional and then to social. But what's interesting is that if the two people talking to each other are not having the same kind of conversation at the same moment, then they cannot fully hear each other, and they definitely will not feel really connected to each other. Right. And that's because these different kinds of conversations use different parts of our brain, so that neural entrainment is harder to achieve. And so what researchers have found is that what's really important is that we match each other, that I match the kind of conversation you're having or I invite you to match me. That successful communication requires having the same kind of conversation at the same time. And then once we're aligned, once we're both, we're both sort of in an emotional mindset, then suddenly it's going to be a lot easier for us to move together into practical or move together into social and then back to emotional. Once we're aligned, we tend to stay aligned. But it's achieving that alignment. That is what super communicators really do. And that's why this leaning in, if you hear someone saying something vulnerable, leaning in and asking them a question about it is an act of matching them. It's known as the matching principle in psychology. And that's why it's so powerful.

[B]

There is so much to learn from this book you wrote. Miscommunication occurs when people are having different kinds of conversations. I never learned about this. You say on a very basic level, if someone is. Seems emotional, allow yourself to become emotional as well. If someone is intent on decision making, match their focus. If they are preoccupied by social implications, reflect that back to them. So the practicalities here, I mean, this is a book where you're going to get sort of advice after advice, different things to try, plus a list of amazing questions at the back. So you're a journalist and you know, obviously there's so many different things that you could study. And you talked about at the beginning

[D]

of this book, Super Communicators, that you

[B]

picked this because it was something that

[D]

you personally struggled with.

[B]

And you were surprised because you're like, look, I'm a journalist. I communicate for a living. You're like, I have this MBA from Harvard Business School. And I, you know, but then you get this spot where you're like, supposed to manage people. And you were like, wait a minute. And then people are kind of complaining. So can you talk about has that come full circle? Like, then you go down the rabbit hole and really it's for your own life and for your own relationships, for your own family. And have you found that it has

[D]

really affected your relationships?

[C]

Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. So, so just to take like, you know, when my wife and I are talking about something, we'll often start, I'll start complaining about something and she'll say, look, do, do you want me to help you come up with a solution to this, or do you just need to vent and get this off your, your chest? In other words, do you want to have a practical Conversation or do you want to have an emotional conversation? And inevitably what I'll say is like, no, no, no, it's not that big a deal. I just need to like, get this off my chest and vent. I just want to complain to you. And so she'll listen to me complain and she'll say, oh, that's really hard. She'll empathize. And then oftentimes at some point she'll say, you know, now that I understand how you feel, can we talk about some solutions that like, maybe we could improve this? In other words, do I have your permission to move together from an emotional conversation to a practical conversation? And anyone who's married who's listening to this, you probably do something similar with your spouse when you're, when you're, when, when things are good, right? When you're having a good conversation. And I think the more that we just think about that as a, as a skill, right? Because sometimes it just happens accidentally. But the, the more we recognize it as a skill that we can practice and we can make into a habit, the more that we can teach that to our kids, the easier it is to do. And that's why this is really powerful, is because just knowing what skills are important makes those skills within easier reach.

[D]

Yeah.

[B]

What a life changing read. So super communicators, that is how to unlock the secret language of connection. These are phenomenal books.

[D]

Books by journalists are always the best

[B]

because they're good writers and good researchers.

[D]

Then the power of habit, why we

[B]

do what we do in life and business and smarter, faster, better.

[D]

The transformative power of real productivity, which is super.

[B]

I mean, look at all these, look at all these.

[D]

Charles.

[B]

New York Times bestseller. New York Times bestseller. New York Times bestseller. Phenomenal books is an honor. Honored to get a chance to talk with you. I've been a fan for such a long time.

[C]

Well, thank you.

[B]

We always end our show with the same question.

[D]

What's a favorite memory from your childhood that was outside favorite memory.

[C]

So I used to walk. I grew up in Albuquerque, New Mexico. And I would hike up this thing called the La Luz Trail with my brother and my dad and, and it was this like switchback. It would take like three or four hours. And when you're a kid, a three or four hour hike, that's all switchbacks. You're literally walking up a mountain, the Sandia Mountains. Like, you're like halfway through, you're like, I can never do this. This is impossible. And then when you get to the top, you think to yourself, oh, my Gosh, I'm amazing. And so that's one of my favorite memories is just this sense of, sense of persistence that we made it happen.

[B]

It was triumphant at the end.

[C]

Exactly.

[B]

It's incredible. What a memory. Thanks so much for being here.

[C]

Thank you. Take care.

[A]

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[E]

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