Summary
Joe coaches Savannah, who struggles with feeling misunderstood despite her best communication efforts. She falls over herself trying to make people understand her, which creates anxiety and a sense of lost control. Joe reveals that the more she chases understanding, the more people experience her as trying to control them — and pull away.
Through a powerful live experiment, Joe has Savannah say the same sentence five different ways — with armor, ego protection, vulnerability, and finally from a grounded place of self-possession. The differences are striking: the more she chases, the more the listener retreats. The breakthrough comes when Savannah realizes she isn’t seeking understanding at all — she’s seeking connection. And people aren’t refusing to understand her; they’re saying “I don’t feel safe enough to connect right now.”
The deeper teaching: you cannot be seen or heard when you’ve abandoned yourself. Savannah’s pattern is to fully leave herself in order to manage the other person’s experience. Joe’s prescription is radically simple — just listen to yourself. When she does, even briefly, her communication transforms. The state of mind you speak from determines how you’re received, far more than word choice or communication technique.
Key Concepts
- Chasing understanding feels like control to others
- You can’t be seen if you’re not being yourself
- Listening to yourself transforms communication
- What we call “being understood” is really seeking connection
- Self-abandonment makes communication impossible
- State of mind determines how you’re heard
Key Quotes
“You can’t be seen or heard when you’re not in yourself. How could I ever see you — you’re not you. You’re running away from yourself to manage me.”
“The more you try to control that they understand you, they’re just feeling it as someone’s trying to control me.”
“What got revealed is — they’re not receiving it as ‘you don’t understand me.’ They’re receiving it as ‘I don’t want to believe you. I don’t want to be convinced. I don’t want to be controlled.‘”
“If you start strategizing about how to talk in a way that somebody will listen, the emotional content of your conversation is ‘I am trying to control you.’ If you listen to yourself while you’re talking, the emotional content is ‘I am listening. I am here with you. I am present with you.‘”
“It’s this weird thing — you want to be understood but the more you chase it the less it happens.”
Transcript
I’m trying to make sure the table is fully set for us to have this like engaging communicative experience and like yes you’re trying to keep me from putting your freaking silverware on the table right now and all I want to do is put the silverware on the table right right right right yeah intellectually that’s where you are the way it’s being received is someone’s trying to control me hey everybody it’s Joe Hudson and welcome to the art of accomplishment where we explored living the life you want with enjoyment and ease and today we have a very special episode I did a coaching session with a woman and it just was really impactful it was all about not feeling heard and listening and really helping her find out what it is that is preventing her from really feeling heard in her work and in her life and it relates so much to the last episode we did on an on week not one of our off Week episodes and so it just was really important and unfortunately I screwed up I pressed some wrong buttons and I messed up the microphone and so the sound quality is really poor and normally we would never release something with bad sound quality because we just want to treat the audience with more care than that and so we would re-record it but unfortunately we can’t re-record this there’s no way this is kind of a once in a lifetime thing and we thought it was so special that we are releasing it with poor sound quality so if you’re an audio file apologies it’s going to be a little bit painful and and just understand it was something that we didn’t want to do as far as sound quality but we thought it was so important and special that we were gonna release this thing anyhow okay so enjoy and I hope you get a lot out of it hi hey how you doing good so what’s up I I know nothing except for your name yeah so my name is Savannah and what I was hoping to talk about today is I would like to do better with feeling misunderstood so when I make all attempts and use the best communication hygiene I possibly can and the other party seems determined to take different meaning than what I’m giving I struggle a lot with that in many areas of my life whether that’s professionally in my relationship in interpersonal relationships so I think that’s kind of what I would like to to talk through today yeah what the the first question that comes to mind is what’s the problem with being misunderstood well I tend to fall all over myself to try to correct that misunderstanding because if I’m trying to communicate with someone it’s because I want them to understand what I’m saying so if I’m making every effort to communicate with someone then yeah and and that’s not happening then that’s a huge problem for me and I feel a lot of distress around that and then I feel like what yeah so so what if okay somebody doesn’t understand you and you don’t fall over yourself to try to get them to understand you what what’s what would happen then for you a whole lot of anxiety like building myself into a Panic Room of concrete blocks of anxiety okay and then if you fall all over yourself and they don’t understand you my guess is that the more you fall over yourself the harder it is to understand you it’s typically how it works so if you fall all over yourself and then they don’t understand you what what’s the difference there well if I’m falling all over myself I’m at least still trying so that still gives me the illusion of control or a sense of being able to impact the situation outside of like okay I shot my shot and it missed and guess it’s time to go do something else that feels terrible when I’m interacting with someone that I care about or there’s an outcome that I’m trying to reach I want to feel like there’s always something I can still do what makes it your job to be understood what makes it not my job to try to understand you well I feel like it’s my job to make sure that I’m expressing myself in a way that’s clear and it’s my job to make sure that when I’m trying to communicate with someone I’m doing so in a way here to who to who specifically I mean whether that would be communicate something in a way that’s clear to 20% of the people unclear to 80% of the people I might say the exact same thing in a slightly different way and then it’s clear to 30% of the people but not 70% of the people like who who who are you supposed to clear so I would I mean if I’m having a conversation and this is an interpersonal interaction I would like to be clear with the other person I’m having that conversation with if I’m in a professional setting and I’m go ahead control you over that I like to think I have a lot of control over it I can choose my words I can choose my tone but I yeah you you clearly don’t though right yeah but I hate that yeah right but but if we’re just facing reality what it what’s the reality like how much control do you have over somebody understanding you right they might face you in their Prejudice because you’re wearing a green shirt or because you have glasses on or because you’re a woman or because of the color of makeup you have and they’re just never going to be able to hear anything you have to say that’s a possibility the other possibility is that your body processor and they’re a head processor and so you speak from your body and they speak from their head and like there’s just no way that thing is going to happen it also might be that they don’t want to understand you that that’s inconvenient for them in their truth and so they’re just like yeah I mean for instance right now somebody is listening to this podcast and they’re like I can’t understand what Joe is saying that is happening and like so so and if we look at it just with reality what is the reality what how much control do you actually have over people’s capacity to understand you I guess I have no control over other people’s capacity for anything let alone to understand me but I feel like there are aspects of the interaction that I can control and when I control all of those variables that I can and I still get no part of any understanding it’s like what the right okay so let’s just assume I had no idea what you just said I don’t understand at all the thing that you just said I want you to make it my responsibility to understand you how would you do that okay so if you are in a situation and you are trying to express something and the other person doesn’t seem to be picking up on that how would that make you feel okay how much of that was you taking responsibility from me understanding and how much of that was you taking responsibility from my understanding I guess probably all of it because I was trying to be like a guide to get you to get to where we want to be yeah just great now let’s try it with none none you totally putting the responsibility of understanding on me okay like look look at me in the eyes think to yourself this dude is a professional coach he should absolutely understand me and if he can’t that’s his problem like think right and then what do you say I’m yeah so I’m communicating with you in a way that is clear even and with very specific words I’m hoping that as an intelligent human being you are listening with open ears and can at least grock some of my meaning yeah that that’s like not that’s almost like say like it’s almost defensive when I yeah so without defense just like this is your responsibility how do you do that I can’t that’s that’s why I’m here so I’m a pendulum I’m like either I’m gonna guide you or I’m gonna figure out well you better freaking understand man and I that’s not effective yeah so what is it that I’m saying right now that doesn’t make sense you nothing that you’re saying doesn’t make sense I just don’t want to think that there’s nothing I can do to force people to understand what I’m saying so yeah so so I just made you fully responsible for understanding me do it again okay what is it that you’re not understanding about what I’m saying and now notice notice what got revealed when you said it the first time when you didn’t know the experiment was happening what you said was nothing I just don’t want to believe this thing which probably the case with most of the people when you’re trying to explain something to them and yeah so they’re not receiving it as you don’t understand me they’re receiving it as I don’t want to believe you I don’t want to be convinced I don’t want to be controlled and the more you try to control the more they feel controlled the more you you’re just trying to control that they understand you they’re just feeling it as someone’s trying to control me off right yeah so I look at it as like I’m trying to make sure the table is fully set for us to have this like engaging communicative experience and like yes you’re trying to keep me from putting your freaking silverware on the table right now and all I want to do is put the silverware on the table right right right right yeah intellectually that’s where you are the way it’s being received is someone’s trying to control me is that when someone tells you how do you respond well I hate that yeah you do you listen better I listen differently when someone’s trying to control me I listen differently I listen in ways to figure out what they’re actually trying to get rather than what is actually happening right so now go to the last big time when you felt really misunderstood put yourself in the other person’s position and tell me how they were listening to you they were listening to me in a really defensive way in a way that was a lot more focused on protecting their ego than coming to a collaborative understanding yeah and how is it that you’re not protecting your ego by needing to be understood how is that not also protection of the ego if all so the short answer is of course it’s protecting my ego but the long answer is in order to interact as like a fully like present embodied human being my ego is present as well it’s part of me I can’t just exist without that so to have like for me I feel like to have a direction and like a coherency to know what I’m saying is it is it ego to make sure that that is we’re we’re talking about I’m we’re not saying drop ego okay we talked about protecting your your words were protecting protecting yeah so okay there ego you needing to be heard is protecting my ego yeah if you allow your ego but don’t protect it what would you say you notice that somebody’s not grocking you not understanding you you’re like oh I don’t need to protect my ego what do you say I don’t think it ever occurred to me that I was protecting my ego in these situations yeah yeah yeah yeah I’m also noticing that when I ask you a couple questions you’ll go into your head for a minute but you you process a crap ton through your body from what I see so let’s actually try that let’s just okay so I’m gonna ask you the same question and then I want you to instead of going to your head like go into your whole body for the answer and the question is how you notice somebody isn’t understanding you and you’re like oh I refuse to protect my ego and I can’t deny this person doesn’t understand what I’m saying what’s your what do you say in in that situation if you out of your head body wholebody wholebody okay so so what are you getting from what I’m saying yeah wow yeah seems like a really open-ended way to approach that like because ultimately what I want to do is get past egos on both sides and get to where we can get to the stuff right yeah yeah yeah I see what I notice is there’s almost two levels of hurt when when someone doesn’t understand you the first level of hurt is that you don’t feel understood the second level of hurt is like I would say that you don’t feel like the goodness in which you bring is being recognized bro how can you see me like that that’s exactly right yeah like I’m coming into this with truly good intentions with seeking understanding and like you know communication and connection really oh my God that’s what it is I’m seeking connection and when people are choosing to misunderstand me it’s like they’re saying no we’re not they are saying yeah I’m I’m not connecting with you and that hurts or or they’re saying I don’t feel safe enough to connect right now but how can I create okay it’s not my job to create a feeling of safety for them but also at the same time if I’m working towards something where like it’s not just about how I feel it’s about how they feel like I want to make sure someone feels safe when we’re communicating even and especially if it’s about a difficult topic yeah how do I do that without how did you just do it you just did it stop how do I set up a situation where we can both feel safe communicating about this sensitive topic okay so interestingly in this in this situation I have in my mind that that was a major like you just like speed bumped something really like you were like oh my God I like and then you saw it and then you went well so go ahead sorry yeah yeah so if I’m talking to you and I don’t see you fully digest what I’m saying I’m probably not going to feel so safe I don’t me as a person I don’t care but most people are going to feel like oh she just bowed right over that thing that was my main big point that I want to feel heard I don’t feel heard I don’t feel safe what what made you not like digest that moment completely so it reminded me of a moment that like fits this exactly in which I tried to come at it in that way by saying hey what can we do to make sure we both feel heard here and that okay say that say that same thing to me four times and each time you do it I want you to do it from a different place in your head one protecting your ego one not protecting your ego one with like vulnerability and one with a big piece of armor in front of you okay let’s start with the armor and then slowly take things off so armor would be like I’m talking to you do you what why aren’t you hearing what I’m saying same exact words I want the exact same exact words oh okay okay so armor what can I do to make sure that we both feel like we can be heard right now great and then I guess a little bit of vulnerability would be like no a ton of vulnerability okay okay then I’m going to do the ego ones first because I got to go descending so so protecting my ego would be like what what can I do to make sure that that we both feel heard in situation yeah that’s great both of those two make my skin want to crawl I’m out the door yeah put on my best HR lady hat for those so then not protecting my ego would be like what can we do to make sure that we both feel heard in this situation there’s just a desperation coming through and then I guess just full vulnerability would be like what what can I do to make sure that we both feel heard in this situation yeah I want you want you to try one more which is just I want you to be like fully upright in yourself and no it’s not your responsibility and say it from that place no ego no defense just what can we do to make sure that we situation right so those five ways are going to get you five different responses and you can listen to this afterwards but you could probably map how much you’re chasing for my understanding and how much I’m backing away right yeah yeah it’s this weird thing you want to be understood but the more you chase it the less it happens right that’s that’s the first thing and then but there’s another thing which is like how deeply are you listening to yourself so I have a tendency to fully abandon myself when I’m interacting with someone else because I want them to me again and listen to yourself just 10% more same thing just but listen to yourself 10% more as you’re saying which thing the thing I just said about having a tendency yeah okay actually I don’t give a what you say you can just just yourself 10% more yeah I have a tendency to fully abandon myself when I’m trying to interact or make sure that I’m understood in communication yeah yeah so even if they’re not listening to your words if they’re just deeply empathetic people they’re also going to be abandoning you when you’re speaking right if I’m really empathetic and somebody’s scared I’m going to start getting scared that is not required if you’re empathetic but most people when they’re empathetic someone’s scared I’m scared someone gets angry you know what I mean like there’s some way someone goes you’re doing something wrong they go I’m doing something wrong they take on the thing so deeply empathetic people are going to be taking on this abandonment of you because it’s what you’re doing I think I struggle to stay with myself in a way that is not protecting my ego it didn’t when all you did was listen to 10% more it looked like there was no struggle just so tell me if you just listen to yourself 10% more tell me how much of a struggle it is like like tell me about tell me about your favorite thing in the world but just listen to yourself 10% more while you’re doing it my very favorite thing in the world is teaching people how to swim I love to work with kids and adults especially if they’re afraid of the water hard how hard was that not hard at all yeah but that was easy because it’s a topic that I like and I care about so it’s easy for me to like not abandon myself in that ask me about you know how you don’t care about I’m sorry will you say that again what makes you talk about things you don’t care about capitalism my job forces me to do that all of the time but also I mean not I don’t share a brain with everyone I interact with sometimes they’re going to want to talk about things that aren’t interesting to me or I don’t care about or maybe then he just no I care about them so I’m gonna have the conversation well listening is part of the conversation yeah oh yeah and I guess if I’m part of the conversation then I should listen to myself too yeah seems fake I don’t know you want other people to listen to you when you’re not listening to yourself I feel like I’m in my head so much that I already know what I’m saying I already know what I’m trying to get across so I’m more attuned to how other people you just don’t know how you’re doing it yeah I guess it’s the listening when we just did that experiment of five things and you’re like I’ve done exactly that before and it’s how but how you’re doing it is the important piece and communication it’s everything if I was if I was doing this conversation with you and I was like we would be having a very different conversation right yeah that’s true the state of mind is what determines is the best determined of how we’re going to be listened to yeah and also like how I’m expressing myself because I can think that I’m expressing myself one way and if I am in a completely different state of mind and not in tune with that then I’m coming off really different than how I think I am correct and I’ll just say that the the that if you start trying to figure out how you come across then it can go really sideways really quick if you just listen to yourself it all just works out right so if you start strategizing about how to talk in a way that somebody will listen the emotional content of your conversation is I am trying to control you oh if you listen to yourself while you’re talking the emotional content is I am listening I am here with you I am present with you which makes people feel safe it also turns out to make you feel safe because as you listen to yourself you start speaking from safety interesting so that makes a lot of sense but I’m wondering how this ties into like written so how can I make sure that in written communication like for instance say I might be having a disagreement with people that are related to me in another state and there’s they will not take my phone calls they will not engage in any other way except for by writing how can I like that it’s really hard for me to cope with like being misunderstood in writing like the meaning is right there you are looking at words and taking something that is not written and that’s how and like my body language isn’t a factor my tone I guess my tone could still be a factor but like yeah writing’s a trick but the but the thing is the same like how deeply are you listening to yourself when you’re even contemplating writing to them how much are you listening to yourself when you even decide if you want to write to them or want to be heard by them how much are you listening to yourself while you’re writing it how much when you’re writing it are you like oh I’m going to say it this way and this way so that I can get this kind of or that kind of a response or like how much are it’s the same principle in the instance that I’m think nobody can make feel listen to but well I don’t like that is the problem right yeah it sucks but I I think that I have this secret belief yeah let me ask you a question think about the the politician think about a politician and a famous One any famous politician how much are people listening to them getting them understanding them they’re they’re not but like politics is all strategy because you like it’s all about the tone or what you’re wearing or like where you people happen to see you speak so it’s all about the external stuff and almost nothing about the content yeah and all of our politicians are hated more and more than ever like that’s that’s the result of the strategy would you say that nonviolent communication is like a strategy in that way so if you are be taken strategy for sure it doesn’t have to be nonviolent communication is is quite lovely but I’ve seen people use it as a strategy for sure and it immediately stops working when they use it as a strategy it immediately stops working yeah when it’s a state of mind and a vulnerability you know it’s like when we’re teaching our view course which is all about communication our strategy our technique part of it is like two sentences because it’s all about the state of mind interesting so there’s some there’s something just a little bit deeper I want to see if we can touch on which is what would be required for you what would you have to see understand fully what would you have to hear fully so that it would be impossible for you to chase people to listen to you ever again so I guess from someone whose opinion that I valued it would be helpful to hear like wow you communicate so clearly you you know exactly what you’re trying to say you express it in a way that someone has to intentionally work to misunderstand you someone said that and I valued their opinion enough I’d be like everyone else can off like this is it yeah I have not had any problem understanding you to the point that you said bro how do you see me like that that’s true yeah you I don’t know if you respect me but I mean I do I do and and it that is that’s helpful I don’t think anybody on this pod anybody listen well I’m sure there’s some but very few people on the podcast listening would not understand what’s happening they might not want to hear it they might not want to listen but they like they get what you’re saying and they got annoyed they were more likely to be annoyed when you weren’t listening to yourself it’s weird that other people could pick up on that before I can but I’m sure that that’s totally the case absolutely well yeah same you can pick usually pick up on it people before they can as a matter of fact when you feel unlistened to it’s probably a really good signal that they’re not listening themselves so I’m like running through this scenario in my head the one that like all of this is around and each time you say something I’m like oh let’s put it through that filter and yeah so now now beyond communicating like how can I like if if I’m communicating in a clear way what can I do to help people if they’re not if they don’t want to me how like it’s not I guess my question was going to be how can I make what I say palatable for them but it’s not my job to do that so how can I communicate me what makes it what what makes you not want to understand me oh yeah but that feels almost like an accusation okay what makes you not understand me or how’s this conversation going for you now or how would you how can I communicate with you in a way that that that you might like that would be better for you the way that you operate or but I don’t really I don’t think really any of it’s necessary you’re the the obsession is still the same the you’re trying to figure out them and the control rather than figure out how to listen to yourself so even in that moment ask that question but listen to yourself fully see if you can even ask it yeah how can I communicate this in a way that feels good to both of us that like when I tuned back into myself that was what came out yeah yeah but you were like you were in yourself and then you literally you went what well that doesn’t make sense yeah so so wait until it makes sense like if you’re really listening to yourself what’s the question if there is one yeah so the real question is how can how can we resolve this with us both having such different feelings that beyond everything is the question yeah look at that like makes me want to cry yeah yeah all that’s required is you yourself I want to believe that you stopped listening to yourself I for the parts that I can control I believe that but I don’t wait hold still listen to yourself like I’m happy to have the conversation with you but I’m gonna call you out when you like when you run out and try to like manage the world and you’re not in yourself whatever you want to say from the place of being in yourself because now I’m I’m with you you can’t by the way you can’t be seen or heard when you’re not in yourself how could I ever see you’re not you you’re running away from yourself to manage me that’s like I can’t how could I see you in that it’s impossible yeah it’s not me yeah it is scary it’s scary yeah yeah no no way around that to fully listen to yourself is a scary thing you would think it wouldn’t be because I feel like I Know Myself pretty damn well you think you would think yeah not the case it honestly it it’s interesting because it makes me think about when I’m afraid to ask for something from someone that I care about turns out I’m even afraid to listen to my own self to see what I even need yeah that’s right that’s right it’s right the deeper thing is is that you the deeper thing which we can’t go into today but this is in this is the answer to that is that you think you’re you got taught sometime in an early time that your happiness was dependent on other people’s reactions and the person whose reaction you thought your happiness was dependent on was having reactions for reasons that were completely not about you whether it’s like alcohol or mental illness or or blood sugar or you know what I mean there was some something that was and you weren’t in control of it and so your whole lesson in life when you were young was how do I find my happiness by trying to make them happy and I can’t really make them happy that’s the deeper thing that’s happening yeah and the answer to all of it is how do I listen to myself seems fake that it’s so simple yep yeah how do I listen to myself better yeah you just changed it better is just a way to please it’s just like maybe it’s not even how do I listen to it’s just like oh you know I’m listening or how how do I listen now I just got like a Frasier Crane in my head I’m listening that’s what I gotta be my own Frasier Crane yeah that’s right okay you know what that’s actually easier to imagine in my head than like my own self listening like yeah okay I’m gonna be my own Frasier Crane yeah in like the best way not in a shitty way also the other thing is you could receive my listening that’s true some everybody who’s responding to you is listening to you on some level you don’t choose to see that part you choose to see the part in which they don’t see you or don’t hear you but like right now I know it’s a weird thing to say but just try it out right now focus on my listening to you okay notice how it feels a lot like listening to yourself like there’s like a there’s a quality to it kind of expansive slows things down a little bit awareness becomes more front and center yeah there’s not like an outcome in mind it’s just like you pay attention to the details more that’s right yeah one of the things when we teach is to let go of outcomes we call it impartiality but it is to let go of the outcomes and that usually makes for much better outcomes as it turn oddly turns out yeah so what makes it what makes it that you can’t let this be easy it’s just like this one little itty simple thing listen to myself which makes life more enjoyable every moment I do it what makes it not what makes you not allow it to be that easy oh what makes you not listen to the fact that your body already knows it’s that easy well my brain has spent like 33 years tying knots around itself and like figuring out ways to exist and listening to myself was never one of those ways so cool then let’s do something cool let’s do something real quick I want your listening to speak to your brain what does it have to say I know it’s a weird one but just put your attention you’re listening listen to yourself put your attention on that and then let that speak to your brain bro my listening is exasperated turns out just a brief checkin lets me know that my listening is exasperated with my brain brain goes all the time zoomy zoomy so many that and I can’t help but think that that’s part of why I can’t listen to myself there’s so much I am neurodivergent so heavy on the ADHD so I’m constantly making connections having like half imagined metaphors in my head I feel like listening to myself would be exhausting is that why people can’t understand me am I exhausting little bit okay little bit okay all right good know okay we’re gonna integrate that and feel fine about it I am too I don’t have a problem yeah that makes sense yeah it just happened did you see that it just all happened really naturally you just without even trying without even the thought I need to listen to myself you just naturally tuned in checked in with yourself felt you didn’t even have to remind yourself to do it it just happened you got a taste of it and less than five minutes again your body knew what to do and did it that’s so interesting and weird being a human is weird tell me piloting a meat suit there’s so many different parts no one gave me the manual for this nope just anytime you’re feeling unheard and generally in any time just listen to yourself just spend couple moments listening pretty soon it just becomes a way of life do you think that journaling at the end of each day is a great way to like ritualize listening to yourself yeah it’s great it’s a great way and also just listening to yourself if you want a hack there’s just a there’s a simple hack which is right now while we’re sitting here just put your attention in your inner ear so all you have to do is put your attention your ear I’ll talk and that that’s it that’s all you have to do super easy seems fake I like to make things very complicated and I don’t trust when they’re yeah and that also makes it hard to listen to makes it hard for you to listen to yourself which is all the same thing just at that boom that’s interesting and when I like tune in to myself I feel so sometimes when I feel anxious I get a lot of tension in my chest and even when I don’t feel anxious it’s not that I feel the tension but when I tune in to myself and I’m conscious of it it’s like I feel like my chest is floating yeah yeah like it’s not even just like the absence of tension it’s helium yeah wow yeah that simple yeah people can just breathe this yeah yeah yeah that’s my reality man that’s cool like I’m like digesting it all awesome thank you thank you thank you yeah thanks so much what a pleasure