10 ways to have a better conversation

"Ideas worth spreading" 다양한 분야의 연사들의 스피치를 모아놓은 것이 TED다.

https://www.ted.com에서 무료로 볼 수 있으며, 국가별 자막이 모두 지원된다.

영어 공부를 위해 시작했는데, 좋은 아이디어까지 공유할 수 있어 일석이조다.

1. 10 ways to have a better conversation에서 와닿았던 부분을 정리한다.

1) listen

Stephen Covey said it very beautifully. 

He said, "Most of us don't listen with the intent to understand. We listen with the intent to reply."

굉장히 와닿았던 말이다. 우리는 진정 이해를 위해 듣는 것이 아니라 대답하기 위해 듣는 것일 수도 있다. 

나의 경우 경청을 위해 노력을 기울이지만, 머리 속에는 얼릉 답변하고 싶다는 마음이 들 때가 많다. 

2)  be brief

"A good conversation is like a miniskirt; short enough to retain interest, but long enough to cover the subject"

말을 간략하게 하는 것이 굉장히 중요하다. 전역하고 얼마 되지 않을 무렵, 나는 내가 느끼기에도 서론이 굉장히 긴 타입이었다.

지금도 말이 적은 편이 아니라서, 짧게 말하는 연습을 해야겠다..

말을 짧게하라는 메세지를 미니스커트에 빗대어 재치있게 표현했다!

3) Bill Nye: "Everyone you will ever meet knows something that you don't." 

    I put it this way: Everybody is an expert in something.

처음 대화하는 누구라도 무언가의 전문가일 것이라는 기대감에 대화를 이어나가는 것이 중요하다.

사실 배울점 없는 사람을 몇 번 만나보아 크게 공감할순 없었지만(슬프다..)

앞으로 만날 그 어느 누군가에게 기대를 걸어보고 실망하지 않기를! 그리고 나 역시 누군가에게 expert 이기를!

발음도 좋고 배울점이 많았던 연설이었다.

[ Full script ]

I want to see a show of hands, how many you have unfriendid someone on Facebook because they say oppensive something about politic, religion, childcare food, And how many of you know at least one person to avoid because you just don`t wanna talk to them. you know, it used to be that you know that polite conversation we just have followed advice of Henry Higgins in "My Fair Lady": strict to the weather and health. but these days with climate change and anti-vaccine those subjects are not safe either. so this world that we live in, the world which every conversation has potential to devolve into an argument. where politician can speak to one or another and where the even most trivial of issues have someone fighting both passionately for it and against. it`s not normal. few research did a study 10 thousands American adults, they found at this moment we`re more polarized and more devided then we have ever been in history. we`re less likely compromised which means we`re not listening to each other. And we make decisions about where to live who to marry and even who our friends are going to be based on what we already believe. again it means we`re not listening to each other. A conversation requires a balance between talking and listening and somewhere along the way we lost a balance.

Now, part of that is due to technology. The smartphone that you all either have in your hand or close enough that you could grab them really quickly. According to few research about third of an American teenagers send a more than hundreds texts a day. And many of them almost most of them a more likely text their friends than talk to them face to face. There`s great piece of the Atlantic. It was written by high school teacher named Paul Barnwell. And he gave its his kids communication project to wanted know how to speack a specific project without using note. And he said this " I can`t realize that conversational competence might be the single most overlooked skill we fail to teach. Kids spend hours each day engaging with ideas and each other through screens, but rarely do they have an opportunity to hone their interpersonal communications skills. It might sound like a funny question, but we have to ask ourselves. Is there any 21st-century skill more important than being able to sustain coherent confident conversation?" So I'd like to spend the next 10 minutes or so teaching you how to talk and how to listen.

 

Many of you have already heard a lot of advice on this, things like look the person in the eye, think of Interesting topics to discuss in advance, look, nod and smile to show that you're paying attention, repeat back what you just heard or summarize it. So I want you to forget all of that. It is crap. There is no reason to learn how to show you're paying attention if you are in fact paying attention.

 

Now, I actually use the exact same skills as a professional interviewer that I do in regular life. So, I'm going to teach you how to interview people, and that's actually going to help you learn how to be better conversationalists. Learn to have a conversation without wasting your time, without getting bored, and, please God, without offending anybody. We've all had really great conversations. We've had them before. We know what it's like. The kind of conversation where you walk away feeling engaged and inspired, or where you feel like you've made a real connection or you've been perfectly understood. There is no reason why most of your interactions can't be like that. So I have 10 basic rules. I'm going to walk you through all of them, but honestly, if you just choose one of them and master it, you'll already enjoy better conversations.

 

Number one Don't multitask. And I don't mean just set down your cell phone or your tablet or your car keys or whatever is in your hand. I mean, be present. Be in that moment. Don't think about your argument you had with your boss. Don't think about what you're going to have for dinner. If you want to get out of the conversation, get out of the conversation, but don't be half in it and half out of it.

 

Number two, Don't pontificate. If you want to state your opinion without any opportunity for response or argument or pushback or growth, write a blog. there's a really good reason why I don't allow pundits on my show: Because they're really boring. If they're conservative, they're going to hate Obama and food stamps and abortion. If they're liberal, they're going to hate big banks and oil corporations and Dick Cheney. Totally predictable. And you don't want to be like that. You need to enter every conversation assuming that you have something to learn. The famed therapist M. Scott Peck said that true listening requires a setting aside of oneself. And sometimes that means setting aside your personal opinion. He said that sensing this acceptance, the speaker will become less and less vulnerable and more and more likely to open up the inner recesses of his or her mind to the listener. Again, assume that you have something to learn. Bill Nye: "Everyone you will ever meet knows something that you don't." I put it this way: Everybody is an expert in something.

 

Number three Use open-ended questions. In this case, take a cue from journalists. Start your questions with who, what, when, where, why or how. If you put in a complicated question, you're going to get a simple answer out. If I ask you, "Were you terrified?" you're going to respond to the most powerful word in that sentence, which is "terrified," and the answer is "Yes, I was" or "No, I wasn't." "Were you angry?" "Yes, I was very angry." Let them describe it. They're the ones that know. Try asking them things like, "What was that like?" "How did that feel?" Because then they might have to stop for a moment and think about it, and you're going to get a much more interesting response.

 

Number four: Go with the flow. That means thoughts will come into your mind and you need to let them go out of your mind. We've heard interviews often in which a guest is talking for several minutes and then the host comes back in and asks a question which seems like it comes out of nowhere, or it's already been answered. That means the host probably stopped listening two minutes ago because he thought of this really clever question, and he was just bound and determined to say that. And we do the exact same thing. We're sitting there having a conversation with someone, and then we remember that time that we met Hugh Jackman in a coffee shop. And we stop listening. Stories and ideas are going to come to you. You need to let them come and let them go.

 

Number five If you don't know, say that you don't know. Now, people on the radio, especially on NPR, are much more aware that they're going on the record, and so they're more careful about what they claim to be an expert in and what they claim to know for sure. Do that. Err on the side of caution. Talk should not be cheap.

 

Number six: Don't equate your experience with theirs. If they're talking about having lost a family member, don't start talking about the time you lost a family member. If they're talking about the trouble they're having at work, don't tell them about how much you hate your job. It's not the same. It is never the same. All experiences are individual. And, more importantly, it is not about you. You don't need to take that moment to prove how amazing you are or how much you've suffered. Somebody asked Stephen Hawking once what his IQ was, and he said, "I have no idea. People who brag about their IQs are losers." Conversations are not a promotional opportunity.

 

Number seven: Try not to repeat yourself. It's condescending, and it's really boring, and we tend to do it a lot. Especially in work conversations or in conversations with our kids, we have a point to make, so we just keep rephrasing it over and over. Don't do that.

 

Number eight Stay out of the weeds. Frankly, people don't care about the years, the names, the dates, all those details that you're struggling to come up with in your mind. They don't care. What they care about is you. They care about what you're like, what you have in common. So forget the details. Leave them out.

 

Number nine This is not the last one, but it is the most important one. Listen. I can not tell you how many really important people have said that listening is perhaps the most, the number one most important skill that you could develop. Buddha said, and I'm paraphrasing, "If your mouth is open, you're not learning." And Calvin Coolidge said, "No man ever listened his way out of a job." Why do we not listen to each other? Number one, we'd rather talk. When I'm talking, I'm in control. I don't have to hear anything I'm not interested in. I'm the center of attention. I can bolster my own identity. But there's another reason, We get distracted. The average person talks at about 225 word per minute, but we can listen at up to 500 words per minute. So our minds are filling in those other 275 words. And look, I know, it takes effort and energy to actually pay attention to someone, but if you can't do that, you're not in a conversation. You're just two people shouting out barely related sentences in the same place. You have to listen to one another. Stephen Covey said it very beautifully. He said, "Most of us don't listen with the intent to understand. We listen with the intent to reply."

 

One more rule, Be brief. number 10, and it's this one: Be brief. A good conversation is like a miniskirt short enough to retain interest, but long enough to cover the subject. All of this boils down to the same basic concept, and it is this one Be interested in other people. I kind of grew up assuming everyone has some hidden amazing thing about them. And honestly, I think it's what makes me a better host. I keep my mouth shut as often as I possibly can, I keep my mind open, and I'm always prepared to be amazed, and I'm never disappointed. You do the same thing. Go out, talk to people, listen to people, and, most importantly, be prepared to be amazed. Thanks.