- Today we're talking about positive communication skills.
We have a very special guest, Dr. Julien Mirivel,
so let's get into the details.
(upbeat music)
Hey there, welcome back Alex Lyon here,
and today we have a very special guest,
Dr Julien Mirivel he's professor
and interim dean at the University of Arkansas Little Rock,
he's here to talk to us today
about positive communication skills
and you could say, he wrote the book on it.
"The Art of Positive Communication"
it's available on Amazon.
It's a real pleasure to have him here,
talking to us today,
and he's also a really good friend of mine,
so please welcome Dr. Julien Mirivel,
how are you doing my old friend?
- I am doing fantastic,
it's so good to be able to spend some time with you,
and all of your subscribers.
Glad to share the moment,
I'm looking forward to this conversation with you.
- Thanks for being here, I really appreciate it.
I'm glad we finally got you on the channel.
So let's jump right in.
How did you first become interested,
in positive communication
and how did this model come about?
- Okay, you know my whole passion with communication
has always been about how?
It's a big question,
and I want people thinking about that question.
What does it look like when we communicate at our best?
So the first thing really,
was not about positive communication,
it was really about a fundamental question.
What does it look like when we communicate at our best?
What it looks like when we communicate at our peak?
What behaviors exemplify what we're capable of doing
in most of our social life, with our parents,
with our family, with our friends
at work, at home, with our kids?
and I really wanted to know,
what are some of the small behaviors
that we have control over
that can make a big difference
in all of those relationships?
So it really all started with big questions
about the nature of excellence,
the nature of ethical communication,
and what it takes, small concrete behaviors
that all of us can practice
that are gonna help us create positive relationships.
- Wonderful, and this model has six parts see,
six key communication skills
or what you call critical behaviors.
So let's go through all six for our viewers.
The first one is the importance of greeting people,
what is so important about greeting one another?
- You know the reason why greetings are so important
is because they literally
are at the opening of every conversation
we have with other people.
So it's the starting point of every relationship,
the starting point of every friendship,
of every loving, romantic relationship we have.
Even in the morning if you've got children you know,
one of the first thing that takes place,
is your kids, you know, greet you
they come to see you,
and so greetings are at the really starting point
of how relationships happen.
And I find them to be really,
greetings are really critical
because of the functions that they serve,
in this early, early points.
- Yeah I've noticed that myself.
If I'm meeting up with somebody
or if I bump into somebody,
if the greeting is a little off,
if it doesn't have that positive connection
it really sets this strange tone,
for the rest of the conversation.
- Yeah, so the behavior is really about,
and in the model I talk about it
as something that is an encouragement
to kind of to move in towards people.
'Cause greeting is the opening up of connection
and it serves the really critical functions
of creating the beginnings our relationships, right
and we feel it when it's absent.
So, what is the first thing that's going to disappear
when people have a conflict?
Is that they're not gonna wanna greet each other.
They're gonna wanna separate.
So greeting is kind of the opening up of that bridge,
opening up of that connection,
almost anywhere in the world.
Every culture we've ever studied,
people have greeting sequences in place.
You know in France,
it's a couple of kisses on the cheeks,
in Saudi Arabia it's Assalamu Alaikum, peace be upon you.
If you go to China, it's (speaks in foreign language)
beautiful greeting if you go to India, namaste.
You know, I see the light in you
and I start this interaction
with the fact that you have character.
So I find that greetings are really important
in the point of emphasis,
because all of us have the ability to greet
not always in all languages,
but we can certainly learn how to move in,
and we can learn to write
the opening of emails with a warm tone,
we have that capacity,
so it only becomes a point of intention.
- Excellent, alright so start
with a good, strong greeting, a warm greeting,
a greeting that presses in,
and connects with other people.
So behavior number two,
is about asking good questions.
So what kinds of questions really build relationships?
- Okay so the questions that people,
that I like to talk to people about
is being able to learn how to flip your questions.
So maybe I can give you a contrast in example.
You know, you're coming to work in the morning,
you're walking through the hallway
and the first inclination
as it would be for me is, I see my staff
or I see people I work with them like,
did you have a good weekend?
And you'll notice here,
that the only answer is yes or no.
It's a closing off of the encounter.
We call those questions closed-ended questions,
but I could just do the same thing.
I could walk in, and say hello to some of my staff,
and I could say, hey what did you do this weekend?
And it's a small change, but now when I say
what did you do this weekend?
I'm actually putting myself in a position of curiosity.
I wanna discover what went on in that person's life.
So asking questions in the way
of kind of doing it positively,
is making that shift from closed-ended to open-ended,
so that you can open up a little bit more
of that discovery of the other person.
- So this open-ended questions
might start with how or what,
and it invites people to share more detail
and literally they open the conversation
rather than the closed-ended questions
sort of shutting the question down really quickly,
and not really inviting much detail.
A yes or no question doesn't invite much detail,
it doesn't lead to those warm,
positive relationship building moments.
- Yeah and you can, I mean anybody here can go home,
you know with their partner,
their spouse, even their children,
and you can test the difference.
You can say, did you have a good day?
And then just here the response
and probably you'll get something minimal.
Yeah it was not too bad,
but if you ask, you know,
what did you do during the day?
Suddenly the answers, the possibilities,
are going to open up
and people will always take you up on it.
You know, it's not a law, but it's a guide
and when you make that transition
you'll notice you are learning a lot more
about people around you,
and that connects you.
That's where the connection is,
it is the discovery and the learning
about the other people.
- Excellent and number three,
another aspect of positive communication
is helping people to feel good about themselves.
So how can our viewers,
make other people feel good about themselves?
- You know, it's actually really simple,
it's figuring out what are the good things,
the strength, the things to celebrate
about the people around you.
It's really an other oriented move,
where I am paying attention,
and you are paying attention
to what is going well with the person
that you're interacting with,
and being able to bring that to life.
So complimenting is very simple
it's just celebrating that person's strength,
that person's abilities.
To notice what you see in them
that's going so well
and that's really all it takes, is easy
easy complimenting of that person
and it helps to, you know,
in our field it helps to communicate to people
who they are, it affects people
and that's the lesson that we know,
is we know communication affects people.
So complimenting is the decision
to kinda use communication in a way
to bring people up, to celebrate their strengths,
rather than say their weaknesses.
- That's wonderful, so along the same lines,
how can our viewers,
create more closeness with other people?
- So the way to create closeness you know,
in the kind of the fourth behavior of the model
is really about disclosure.
So we create intimacy, it's very simple.
We create intimacy with other people,
by revealing who we are
and the more intimacy we feel,
typically it's because we've been,
we've had the courage
and the willingness to get into that relationship
and say, this is really who I am, you know,
this is really what I'm thinking,
this is really my values,
this is why I believe in,
and the more we can shed away the kind of the masks,
you know, the way we pretend to be
the more we can really connect.
You know, an easier way to think about this
is to think, I like to kinda share people
okay today like right now,
you could just text someone,
you could email someone,
you could call someone
and just tell them, you know I'm thinking of you
and I'm just really grateful for you.
I'm grateful to have you in my life
and you'll notice if you do that,
it takes a little bit of vulnerability, right
there's a little bit of this thing
that you have to overcome.
But the beautiful part of that easy thing
is once you express the gratitude
that's gonna necessarily impress,
the closeness that you have with that person.
It's gonna help you deepen that relationship.
- Yeah and I gotta say,
you practice what you preach.
When you send me texts,
you say hey I've been thinking about you
and you really do that well
and what it does is, it frees me up to reciprocate.
It creates room for me to be authentic in return
and then you do feel closer.
You know I can't tell you,
how many times you've said,
hey man, just thinking about you,
miss you, looking forward to talking soon
and if I'm like hanging out with my wife Erin,
I'll say, oh Julien was just saying this nice thing,
isn't that great?
And it really does create that bond of closeness.
So I do appreciate that
and you're not just writing about it in the book,
you've lived it. - (laughing)
- So it sometimes - Yeah we try to,
we try to do it, can I just share a quick story here?
- Yeah sure
- I once asked people in an audience that I love,
I asked people in an audience like 300 people,
to say, to do that exercise.
So we're in a room,
everybody's sending these beautiful messages of gratitude
300 beautiful messages of gratitude into the world
and then somebody raises their hand
and they're like, I got an answer, I got an answer!
So I said well, what did they say?
and the response was, who the hell is this?
(both laughing)
And so I want people to know
you know, it's not always going to be reciprocated
and people may be confused by that move,
but it is positive communication
to have the courage to send that text
and to say to that person,
I'm grateful for you,
and I love you, and I miss you,
and I value that connection,
I value that relationship.
- Right, yeah there's a little risk involved
in expressing closeness,
but I find more often than not,
if you're around the right people to begin with,
they do appreciate that
and they handle it pretty well.
They maybe do not know how to do it back yet,
but you're leading by example, by trying.
- So number five in the model,
is about when people are enough.
So we're not always feeling great
sometime we're struggling, right.
So what's the best way to communicate
when people are feeling down.
- You know, the first thing I will say here
for people it really is hard,
sometimes we feel like
we don't have the skills to help people
and to say and communicate the right thing,
at the right time, you know.
That's a pretty common human experience
somebody is not feeling good
and we wanna help them
and we don't know what to say.
But the research that we've done,
does show us that the best thing we can do
is to have the willingness,
to even just put a few words together,
to encourage that person.
You know, so even to be able to say,
hey, I'm here with you.
You know, I don't know what to do
but I'm here with you, and I stand by you,
and you're going to overcome this,
and we're gonna do it together,
you can see suddenly the words start to add up,
you know about what the possibilities are,
but what our research has shown us,
is that when people make that move
when they take a little bit of moment,
to say, you know I was thinking of you
and I'm here for you
and I think you have a bright future ahead of you,
whatever the encouragement might be.
Those conversations stick in that person's mind,
literally forever, you know,
our conversations have an afterlife.
So what we're doing is, once we speak the words
it stays in that person's mind
and two years down the road,
five years down the road,
10 years down the road,
people can come back to it.
They can relive that moment,
and they can feel the strength out of that statement
and you can take any ordinary conversation,
any simple phrase can become an extraordinary moment
for somebody who is not doing well at that time.
- Yeah, I like how you emphasize this,
it can be almost anything.
You don't have to say, the perfect statement
or the thing that is so deep and so profound.
It can just be your way,
almost anything you say,
to say you're there for them,
shows them that you are in it with them
that if they wanna say more,
just knowing you're available for that,
is a huge encouragement to them.
You don't have to solve their problem
with a perfect expression.
Just any, just trying to begin with,
is a great move in the right direction,
when people are down.
So number six, we can't get away from this,
without talking about listening.
It's a huge part of good communication,
so what is an easy ways that we can overcome
those common listening barriers?
- Yeah, listening is a is a tough cookie
(laughing) - Yeah
- I mean you know, in the art of communication
it's probably the ultimate
and certainly learning how to listen
deeply to another person, it's a big chance.
Especially when we disagree with them right,
if we feel like we have a stance that is opposite to them.
So, it's very complicated
but I wanna give one little tool,
one little technique 'cause it does help
to think about it very physically right,
when we don't wanna listen,
we tend to close off.
So like we close our hand,
you know, we tend to close our heart,
we tend to just kind of withdraw from the interaction,
but listening is the exact opposite.
So it may be very helpful
instead of to thinking of a skill
to think let me just open up my hand here
and see if I can receive
what this person is telling me,
without judging it without,
you know, I don't have to agree with that
I just have to acknowledge it
as part of that person's experience.
And when you open your hand,
you can see here,
I'm leaning in, I'm already coming into the camera,
so that's a huge shift from, I'm tightening up,
I'm withdrawing to I'm opening my hand, I'm moving in
and I think that openness,
is what's gonna change that little bit
the dynamics that are gonna taking place.
So when I think about listening,
I always think first, can I open my hand?
And can I lean in?
instead of withdrawing, instead of fighting
either internally or externally.
- Yeah and I really like the opening up,
the physical gesture of opening your hands
is more than just a physical gesture.
It puts you in the state of mind of being open
and also I like how you said,
you don't have to agree.
Being willing to listen,
does not mean you're agreeing with the person.
You're just becoming a better listener
and you might just learn something.
You may not agree but at least you appreciate
where they're coming from at a deeper level
and they're going to feel more heard
and that creates a bond as well,
even over a difficult conversation.
They feel respected, they feel valued,
when you really listen.
- Yeah I mean you're absolutely right
and I really think this is the magic
actually of communication and learning communication
is when you have the right technique,
it can really get the knot out of relationship right
because sometimes we have these knots with people
and we can't seem to get out of them,
but listening is one of those things
that's gonna unloosen those knots
and I kind wanna share this story
because I was working with somebody for three years
and we now have this amazing professional relationship,
but also kind of friendship
and in fact, tonight I'll be going to her house
bringing my children,
but three years ago it wasn't like this.
That connection wasn't quite like this
and what really solved our knots professionally
and later on personally
was doing a very simple exercise.
I just said, what do you need from me?
And then to reciprocate this,
so for her to say, you know what do I need from you?
And what do I need from you?
and to be able to listen to one another's needs
changed the relationship drastically
because I was able to voice,
you know, I need this from this professional relationship
and she was able to say I really need this
and for us to slow down and to hear that.
And then to try to work on meeting those needs
really changed a lot in our connection.
So, it's called what I need from you,
as an exercise can be really, really meaningful.
- Awesome, thank you so much Julien.
So let's tell people again,
they can get your book on Amazon,
"The Art of Positive Communication,"
they can find your website on at julienmirivel.com
and your TEDx Talk is on YouTube.
I will put links to all of those resources
in the description below this video.
Julien thank you so much my friend
for being with us today, it was a real treat.
- Thank you so much for having me.
It's my pleasure to share this moment with you
and all of your subscribers
and I really appreciate the opportunity and the moment.
- Thanks and if it is the first time
you're watching this channel Communication Coach,
we have a lot more videos,
so feel free to check out the channel, take care.