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Transcript

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Pema: I have thought a lot about, the blue flight, how, very simply spoken, The center of the country is red and the perimeters are blue, and it’s like,I feel like I’m part of the camp who has fled to the edges, where people will accept me, where we can be authentic, where our lives are not threatened as much. I’m speaking specifically from a queer point of view, how we often move for actual safety. And once we’re in a place of physical safety, the emotional safety starts to come in with people around us, incidentally, in our bubbles, I, I began to relax around and began to understand more about myself with.

Tania: Yeah. And I think it’s understandable that people wanna be surrounded by folks who have some similar values, who with whom you feel like you can be true to yourself, and have that reflected back.

Pema: That’s what you’ve done in your life more broadly, but there are still times when you choose to engage with your family or with people whose values or lives are very different from your own.

There are and the, and so I had to come from. Going away to turning around and coming back So I find in those times, I want to be there. I want the connection.

Tania: Welcome to Ready to Be Strong. I’m Tania Israel.

Pema: And I am Pema Rocker

Tania: Together we’re broadening our minds, opening our hearts.

Pema: and strengthening connections in a politically charged election season and beyond.

Tania: In this episode, we are talking about engaging effectively across the divide. When I wrote Facing the Fracture, I intentionally waited until chapter eight to talk about engaging effectively. Everything we’ve done up to this point in the podcast has, been about our own individual journeys. We’ve been looking about how we interact with media and social media and our own cognitive biases.

We’ve been building our internal resources like resilience and intellectual humility and compassion, and. Maybe, you know, that’s all people need. A lot of what people are struggling with right now has to do with, uh, their internal turmoil. Some of what people are dealing with has to do with how do they actually engage with other people in their lives, in their communities, in their world.

And so now we’ve built a very strong foundation so that we can get here if people choose to take on this next task of actually interacting with other human beings.

Pema: let’s interact. So, um, what I realized reading this chapter is I’m such a listener and I will listen, listen, listen.

And then I will just handle it, handle it, handle it over here in my silence and, uh, in my questioning that goes in different directions. But I, I won’t, or I haven’t anyway inserted myself or my thoughts into the conversation if it even is a conversation at that point versus a spouting statements

Tania: And I am noticing in this chapter like, oh, this is potentially an invitation to me to notice my passivity. Notice that the conversation is never going to go my way either from an equal perspective or from a, Hey, wanna hear what I have to say, or what makes me up as a person? I’m never gonna get that benefit because I’m not speaking to it.

Can you pick one of those conversations? Like, like, or one of those, let’s say interactions to, to, that we can unpack a little.

Pema: So one of them, I was getting a ride to the airportfrom somebody in the neighborhood, and we were chat-chat-chatting.

And as we’re talking—well he’s talking, this thing he’s saying is accumulating and accumulating. I’m totally interested. He’s a business person. So, and I got a small business myself. I’m listening to, yeah, all the things that he’s saying. And then I start to realize the things he’s saying are actually very, they’re political slogans and they’re starting to quote, really wrong media.

And when I say wrong, I mean the kind of media that is actual lies. Uh, like straight up, made up. And all of a sudden I was li— actually, I was listening from this marketing perspective and from this business perspective. And then when he started to say things that were completely against the laws of marketing. Like, wait a minute, why would, why would anyone want to kill half the population when they’re trying to make money from that same population? You know, I don’t know if we were talking about covid or what, but it got that extreme and I’m like, this, this, this doesn’t make sense from a marketing perspective. I go wait. Are you sure? So I was really engaged and then all of a sudden it surprised me what he was believing and how he was so slanted in his beliefs. And I reacted like, wait a minute. Wait, what are you talking about? That’s kind of insane. Do you realize that from a business perspective, that that doesn’t calculate.

Tania: Is that how you reacted in your head or out loud?

Pema: Out loud. It was out loud. And with him, he has this personality that’s kind of bombastic and everything just kind of slides off him anyway, so I can do that with him. But, I only do it to a certain degree with somebody else kind of in the same tribe I am. I have spent years being very careful, very compassionate, very loving, like I do not agree with any one of the incredible slants that come out in our con— my conversations with him and I think they’re really harmful. And also, I feel like I’ll get shut out and I won’t have access to him anymore. I won’t get to talk with him anymore. And that feels really important to me to be, for him to have access to me and me to have access to him.

Tania: Yeah, 

So it sounds like you are really struggling between your authenticity and your relationship with somebody who’s important to you.

Pema: I am and I have been noticing that this comes up again and again. So I have been learning to, I have been learning to show up more in the conversation, even while I haven’t been asserting my opinions or how I am in my life or what I’m doing. I’m not asserting myself yet, but I’m actually showing up.

Whereas before I was just kind of in the wind ’cause I felt like I didn’t belong or I felt like I wasn’t. Accepted or I was something like that. 

Tania: Yeah, you know, I’m often talking with people who, their initial reaction is to share lots of facts, figures, and sort of get into this debate kind of mode. And you know, then I talk about how important it is to listen and to develop that warm, caring relationship and, and to really try to understand. I think a lot of people are also in the kind of place that you are, where it’s like, okay, I know how to sit there silently and take it all in. And it’s not like I don’t understand that perspective. That’s what I grew up with. It’s, it’s, you know, what, um, I’ve been surrounded with. But then, then what do I do? 

Pema: Then what do I do? So I have been learning, uh, in the last few years that the showing up itself is textured. So I needed to go back home because something tragic had happened. And in the background there was stuff happening that was really troubling to me. And I was counseled by my therapist to change your focus. Pema, anytime you start to perseverate on that thing that you can’t control all the stuff that feels troubling to you, change your focus to why you’re there.

The second you start to think about details about that troubling thing, bring your focus back. And I remember thinking at the time, isn’t that denial? Am I not just denying the situation and, and hearing her say, just try it. You’ve gotta focus on being there for the tragedy in your family. Don’t get caught up in the noise in the background and I tried it and it calmed my nervous system over and over again and it allowed me to focus on showing up versus, oh my God, how am I even gonna show up? There’s so much going on in this moment and I have a practice and a habit of dismissing myself from the situation because of my prior experiences and my passive response.

How am I gonna show up here? So my showing up is textured in that way with let me practice being here and changing my focus. Let me practice saying one thing and taking my other needs to support that I have set up with friends outside the bubble, um, over time. 

Tania: You are going in with intention, really thinking about what is it that I’m trying to do here? And, and I think, I think that’s beautiful, you know? ’cause when I ask people like, why is it that you want to even engage with people who have different views than you do? Uh, the, the number one reason that comes up is people say, there’s somebody in my life who I wanna maintain a relationship with.

And, you know, some people say they wanna persuade or convince someone they wanna find common ground or heal the divide. And some people just, you know, can’t fathom people who are in a different place and wanna gain some insight. So. You were going in there with an idea of, okay, my goal is to show up and there’s, there’s this thing happening that I, I wanna be present for.

Um, and in order to do that, I might need to keep my focus on that thing and not on all these other things going on that I find troubling or that really rub my values, uh, the wrong way. 

Pema: Yes, exactly.

Tania: Yeah, I, I think it’s a great example of the fact that we have multiple wants. we want to show up and we wanna be there with and for our family. And at the same time, we want to be authentic. Sometimes we want to, be allies to other populations that, that we feel are treated badly.

Sometimes we want to just not hold back anything of ourselves, um, and want to be genuine and authentic and really fully seen. Sometimes we wanna feel validated, so. We’re complicated because going in with intention means going in with saying, okay, this is my goal and I have all of these other things that are driving me, but maybe I can’t satisfy all of those in this moment.

Pema: I’m thinking about that from several different moments in my lifetime. So from this really young perspective, I’m thinking, I need you to accept me. I need you to see who I am and for that to be okay. And then from a more progressed perspective, that flavor might still be in my system, but I’m negotiating with it.

I’m, I’m attending to that myself, accepting my, doing my own self accepting, no matter who else is accepting me. And I am showing up with an ability to show and feel some, some really true authentic engagement. Some really, true interest, like what’s happening in your life, what makes you tick, even though I’m not asserting the same for me, myself, and my own life.

And then from another progressed perspective, I’m thinking, okay, we gotta, we gotta relate. I get my needs met elsewhere. Doesn’t really matter who I am here, but let’s, we gotta engage together. Let’s focus on this one topic.

Tania: Yeah. So, I’m curious about like when, when you’re, when you’re listening, you know, there are ways that we can listen where we are just like, I’m just gonna be silent and I’m not gonna say a thing and just, you know, give the other person space. And that’s actually an important thing in listening to give somebody uninterrupted time to speak.

But then there’s a question of what do you do when they stop or when they pause. and when we talk about active listening, you know, one of the things that we can do is we just reflect back what we heard and we summarize a little bit of what they said. And that can be helpful for two reasons, both because it keeps us focused on really what are they saying, rather than on whatever kinds of reactions we might be having internally.

I mean, it’s important to pay attention to our reactions and, and calm ourselves as you were doing, but also to maybe understand people on a little bit deeper level and to say, okay, this is what I’m hearing is, is that right? You know? And that can also help the other person to feel heard in a way that just sort of having the empty space doesn’t necessarily do that.

So, so that reflecting can be helpful. And, but then one thing that we, that we don’t often do is, uh, when, when somebody’s values are in conflict with ours is to encourage them to say more, you know, um, but not, not to encourage ’em to say more like, some people in this sort of, you know, debate mode will be like, so where did you get those statistics?

Like, what are you reading? Like, you know, that, that sort of in a challenging way. But, tell me how you got there and what’s the meaning that that issue has for you? What is it about that, that that hits you so personally when it’s something that may not have anything to do with your life, you know, or maybe it does, but if it doesn’t, so there are ways that we can be active even as a listener.

And I’m kind of curious, if that’s something that you do, and if so, how does it work or how does that sit with you?

Pema: I have a long practice of active listening because I want to relate and I have had the experience that I can relate if I listen actively and if I nourish the conversation with my questions. I can bridge what feels like is missing for me in my, often my physical distance.

I can bridge it with my listening. But like I said earlier, I leave myself out.

Tania: Mm-Hmm. So then the question is, okay, you’ve, you’ve got the intention, you’ve got the act of listening skills. How do I share myself in a way that feels authentic and fulfilling and can also hold that relationship?

Pema: Yes, because I want to understand them. I want to, I want for my heart to be warm in connection with them. And when I actively listen and I ask engaging questions that lower defenses and welcome people into the conversation, that feels good to me. That feels like connection. But I’m realizing that what’s missing in our connection is me and me sharing. And I’m in, I’m, I’m experiencing this on a broader level too. When I think about politics, like how many of us shut down when it comes time or when it, there’s an opportunity to express, to engage across the divide. Are we just shutting down to not deal with it?

Or is there a way that we can take an opportunity to not just listen actively to somebody and what they, in some cases spouting in other cases sharing with us with an open heart, but also can we listen actively and bring in what’s meaningful to us as well? 

Tania: Mm-Hmm. 

Pema I think one of the challenges to this is, um, that the idea we have of what that looks like to share where we’re coming from, especially like in a political realm, we often have these images of, you know, what we’re seeing in the media and it looks like debate and it looks like sharing lots of facts and figures. And, we know that that’s not very helpful to do.

Tania: Like the research shows, that’s not very helpful to do from even a persuasion perspective. So then the question is, all right, well what does that look like if we’re trying to be relational? And also, sharing values or political views and stories are actually a really powerful. Uh, tool that we can use to share where we’re coming from, that isn’t about focusing on, here’s this thing I just read or whatever, but it’s like, how did you come to see things that way?

Whereas there’s somebody who you encountered in your life who, uh, shifted things for you, like, what was it that,made this issue meaningful for you or put it on your map. So those kinds of stories, if we can share those, not only are they more relational, but there’s this funny thing where, stories actually seem more true to people than facts do.

So sharing the stories is. Is not only gonna maintain the relationship, but it’s also gonna be more effective for all those other goals that we might have, whether it’s persuasion or common ground.

Will you talk about that a little bit more about how stories are more effective than sharing the data? So. If somebody’s sharing data, and especially in this polarized environment, we’ve talked about how, you know, people are really immersed in different narratives with different kinds of information, supporting that. So somebody says, well, you know, there’s this study that says this. And I say, oh, well I know this other study that says this.

And we get into an argument about facts. You know, people always say, how can I have a conversation with somebody when we can’t even agree on facts? And it’s like, well, what if the conversation isn’t about agreeing on facts? Because, so it’s easy to fall into. That is one of the things. But also story, because it, it has, um, personal meaning.

Somebody’s interested in hearing more about you, Pema, um, like especially a family member. Somebody who’s in relationship with you. They wanna hear more about you, they wanna understand you better, ideally. They don’t necessarily wanna hear a bunch of facts and figures, and so people are more receptive to story.

And if there’s an emotional component, it tends to be easier to remember. It tends to be more impactful, and so it actually serves multiple purposes when we can share those stories.

Pema: One of the things that you’ve talked about is, Hey, why don’t you practice this stuff with people who think the same thing that you do for the sake of practicing it and seeing what it feels like to deepen the meaning of the conversation, understand where they’re coming from.

I love how you pointed out that I might be assuming that they’re thinking exactly the same thing as I am because we’re on the same side. But when I get into conversation about them, I realize the diversity of their views and experiences and opinions and, and how different they are from mine, even as we’re on the same side.

I love the thought of practicing with those folks, seeing how it feels, kind of getting that practice in my body, the kind of the lived experience of engaging and then taking that safe, lived experience into other, um, you know, outside my bubble conversations. You know, bringing my safety into those other conversations.

Tania: Yeah, absolutely. I, I think sometimes when we imagine engaging in dialogue across political disagreement, we imagine that we’re gonna be talking to somebody who’s The most different from us, uh, in terms of our views and having those conversations with people who have similar views. One, it’s great practice.

You know, it sort of, uh, feels like it’s a safer place to start trying on these skills than to do it in, in a situation that’s going gonna be more conflictual. But also, oh my gosh, there is such nuance to where people are coming from and how they got there. I, I don’t think I understood as much nuance to, uh, where people are coming from on the pro-choice side.

Then when I started doing these dialogues, uh, when I brought together people to have dialogue across, um, you know, pro-choice and pro-life people, and then I was talking to the Pro-choice people, you know, Hey, we’re doing these dialogues, and we started sort of getting into these conversations about where we were coming from that we had never talked about before.

Pema: And I was like, oh, I do not agree with some of these people. You know, it helped me to see actually some of the range of views and experiences on my own side. And that’s really helpful also, because it, it also helped to kind of break down some of that us versus them. It was like, oh no, there’s, there’s this whole like multidimensional spectrum of where people are with this and, and you can’t fit any of it on a bumper sticker. Right. know this being a writer who’s tried to fit things into tiny spaces, fit words into tiny spaces, so I mean, that makes me think about crafting an argument in other people’s values.And so there is a technique or an opportunity to craft your story to fit the other side’s values. Can you talk about that a little bit?

Tania: We often think that if we are trying to persuade somebody, we should just tell them the arguments that resonate for us and that we find convincing. But people on the left and right tend to have different kinds of moral frameworks where people on the left tend to, emphasize, nurturance and justice, and people on the right tend to emphasize, responsibility and traditions.

If we can actually frame the arguments more as they would appeal to somebody on the other side, rather than how they would appeal to our own views. And this is part of the reason why that listening part and really understanding where somebody’s coming from is so important because it, this is also true if we look at the literature on persuasion.

So, it says that if you can really listen to somebody and understand them, then you’re gonna be able to tie into something they said. And I, I seem to think you have a story about this. Can you share that?

Pema: Yeah. Yeah. So I was, a server at a restaurant, and the manager I came in for the lunch shift. He had put in a life-size, cardboard cutout of a model. I don’t know, she’s probably holding a beer mug or something like that.

And she was very scantily clad. I don’t know, it is just pushing all my buttons. When I told my manager about it, I was like, hey, what do you think of maybe moving that or a way out of the entryway?

Like, if I’m having this reaction, maybe other people will too. And he’s like, well, what do you mean? What’s your reaction? Why are you reacting like that? And I was like, oh boy. Not only is he not going to understand, uh. Not only is he going to understand me here, but I’m gonna have to walk by that thing a hundred times today while I’m carrying food to all of our customers. So I was like, “Hey, listen,The longer you keep this cardboard cutout of a scantily clad female body in the entryway and you sell burgers and beers for lunch, people are going to be buying salads and you’re gonna be losing money on your cheap french fries, by spending more on the salads.”

And he’s like, “oh”, haha. And he took it down and put the thing in the office.

Tania: So you were like, it’s gonna make more of a difference to him. What the bottom line is that’s he’s running a business, that’s, that’s his job and he’s not gonna care as much about if you feel like this is sexist and, um, and it makes you uncomfortable. So, so although that’s legit also part of running a business. Um, so, so that was you in all of this.

You’re very skilled at being able to, be intentional, to listen to other people, to be able to identify what their priorities are and really tie into that, which is great.

And I’m just gonna say, I recognize like, we don’t always do all of those things all the time.

Pema: Yeah, that authenticity paired with strategy. I mean, I see politicians and media doing that all the time by having representatives tell stories about what was so important to them. And therefore, like that opens our heart a little bit. And then the policy points are driven through on a story.

I see that happening all the time. Um, when I think about it in my own life. Yeah, it’s um, less mythic maybe, but proportionally valuable.

Tania: Yeah. And you know, the one other piece I wanna bring in is people ask me a lot, you know, what, what am I supposed to do when there’s a real power imbalance? Or when somebody doesn’t think I should exist? Like, do I have to talk to those people? And you know, my answer was always, well, no, of course, like you, you don’t need to do that.

Dialogue is a, is an opportunity. It’s not a mandate. So just because you have these skills and just because you’re able to do these things doesn’t mean you have to do it at every opportunity. And at the same time, it’s really important that we have these skills so that we’re making that choice of. If we’re gonna do it, we have the skills, not, well, I’m not gonna do it because I have no idea to how to go about doing that, which really disempowers us.

So empowering ourselves with the skills and then also empowering ourselves to make the choices about what we wanna do and when. 

Pema: It makes me notice that here I have these skills that are all accruing and that I practice all the time knowing it or not knowing it. And that maybe a good one for me to be aware of about myself is kind of a, a fear response and that, that maybe, uh, a default or automatic. And how can I bridge my fear response?

I had a therapist a long time ago who had a troubling relationship with her, one of her parents, and she and her sister had a deal, like of course they loved their parents and they loved their mom and they wanted to talk to her, but it was always, um, hard. And so they had a deal, she and her sister to call each other before calling their mom.

Call their mom and talk for a set amount of time and then call each other after one of them had talked to their mom and this became a pattern for them. This was their way of supporting each other through an a hard thing that they knew they had to do, but also that found their way to relating to a hard relationship.

Tania: Yeah. That’s where it can be important to have our people who we feel like are on the same page as we are and will validate us and who we can share with in ways that will help us to regulate ourselves a little bit more so we can go into the hard situations and then we can come back and have that touchstone again.

I think that’s a, that’s a beautiful example of how to do that.

Pema: I know that I’m often thinking that I have to do everything all at once. I have to know all the answers all at once, and hearing you say that in response to that story makes me remember like, yep, just take on one thing at a time and then, and then once I kind of understand how to address that one thing, my other skills kind of come in on their own.

Tania: It’s beautiful. Pema, you’re doing great.

Pema: Thank you, Tania.

Tania: I’m Tania Israel, professor, psychologist, and author of Facing the Fracture.

Pema: And I’m Pema Rocker, creative coach and author of Ash and Spirit.

Tania: Make your choice.

Pema: Are you ready to be strong?

Tania: And edited by Haley Gray. Our theme music is by Jeff Mercel at Premium Beat. 

Pema: Bring this conversation into your circles. Rate and review the show wherever you’re listening. And most importantly, share this episode with a friend.