E116 - What If Communication Is A Combination Lock?

Two people can talk for ten minutes, agree with their heads, and still miss each other completely. That exact moment, when words are being exchanged but meaning is not, is where an uncommon communicator steps in and takes ownership of the conversation instead of letting it drift into confusion or conflict.

I’m James Gable, and I’m kicking off a brand new season by breaking down the core framework I use to navigate tough conversations and reach mutual understanding. We start with self-awareness and the four common communication styles: passive, aggressive, passive-aggressive, and assertive. Then we go deeper into a piece most people miss: how the other person listens. Are they analytical and fact-driven, relational and connection-first, critical and evaluative, or task-focused and efficiency-minded? When you can spot the listening style in real time, you can choose a better approach and stop talking past each other.

We also get practical with communication tools you can use today, including authentic curiosity, labeling (“It seems like…”) to confirm what you’re hearing, and mirroring to prompt people to expand and clarify their real meaning. If you want better communication skills at work, stronger relationships at home, and simple conflict resolution techniques that actually work, this season opener gives you a clear starting point. Subscribe, share the show with someone you communicate with daily, and leave a review so more people can find the tools to make conversations work.

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Transcript

The Enlightenment Moment In Conversations<br>

Communication Is A Combination Lock<br>

Ownership And Self Awareness<br>

Four Communication Styles Explained<br>

How People Listen And Decide<br>

Curiosity Labels And Mirroring Tools<br>

Season Preview And Ways To Support

SPEAKER_00 0:01

Welcome to the Uncommon Communicator Podcast. I am your host, James Gable, and this is where we bring enlightenment to the topic of communication. Are you ready to take ownership of your conversations? Are you looking to possess the skills to navigate and facilitate conversations to a mutual understanding? Then grab your growth mindset and let's go. Welcome to the Uncommon Communicator Podcast, where we bring enlightenment to the topic of communication. And right here we are kicking off our brand new season with a little bit of a recap of what is an uncommon communicator and really what brought me on this journey to be able to share communication tips, tricks, advice, uh hard lessons, uh easy lessons, things that will bring enlightenment to you and to the listeners to make our world a better place. That's really my goal is to give a voice to those who don't have a voice. And to do that, you really got to learn to become a better communicator, become a better listener, maybe become a better human. Some of those things we're gonna work on. But what I want to do is talk about what makes up an uncommon communicator. That is the individual that has the enlightenment to know if communication is truly happening. And I like to use that word enlightenment because it really is a light bulb moment. When you've sat in a situation, and I have done this, this is what created this was I was watching two people have a conversation with each other, and I knew that they were not communicating. One was saying these words, the other was saying some other words, and they were both kind of shaking their head, and they were not connecting the dots. So being able to realize whether or not that communication is happening that requires a little bit of enlightenment. Now, the other side of this truly is having the skills to navigate a conversation all the way to a mutual understanding. And to do this, this takes ownership and enlightenment. And that's what we're going to talk about today as we kick off this new year, this new season. We've got a great lineup of guests that are going to be joining me and sharing all these incredible principles of communication, their lives, their stories. Now, what I found on this journey is, and it did start out with me thinking I could come up with a key. I was going to have a key that was going to unlock communication. But how hard could it be? We've got the internet. I was going to figure this out. And what I discovered is it truly is a combination lock. Being able to unlock communication with a combination of items to be able to at least help you navigate through conversations was the thing that I discovered. I'm going to share some of them with you today. A lot of them are uncovered and have been unveiled in previous episodes. We're going to dive into more in future episodes. But for you, the listener today, what is it? No, unlocking that communication. Again, it was a it was a combination lock. So here's a couple of things we're going to look for today. How do you communicate? How do they communicate? Asking well-designed questions. I like to use labels and mirrors, and then having a little bit of curiosity. So let's dive right into it. First and foremost, it starts with ownership. You have to own the conversations. You have to realize that if that conversation isn't happening, you may be the only person in the room that can facilitate it. So you have to take ownership. You can't let it go. And I've been there many times where I knew it wasn't happening. I didn't want to put the effort in. And sometimes that might be you. But in this case, to be the uncommon communicator, you have to take the ownership to recognize it and then help facilitate that communication. So it starts with self-awareness. You have to know who you are, how you communicate, and how you show up. That's the first and most important thing that you can do is really be self-aware. And how do you do that? There's some pretty common communication devices, I guess, or I guess this is how they have identified uh how people communicate. And they are uh four things. Are you a passive communicator? Are you aggressive? Are you passive aggressive? And if you are, you're probably not going to admit it. And are you an assertive? Now, when I talk about being passive, that's when you don't say the things that you really want to say. That's being passive. Now, when you do that, you're often not sharing what you truly think. You're just kind of getting through to get to the end. That's the passive communicator. Are you an aggressive communicator? Sometimes when you express your feelings in ways that often might come off harsh, disrespectful. If you're aggressive, you need to know how you are coming off from that. Now, let's talk about the passive aggressive. That's kind of acting nice on the surface, but your frustrations kind of come out through indirect words and comments and actions. That's passive aggressive. And the final one is assertive. That's when you clearly and respectfully state what you need or feel. Now, when I've studied this, I have found that it seems like everybody favors the assertive as being better. But sometimes we're not always in the better. And I would agree that being assertive, clearly stating your needs and wants, being respectful for others, that would be the best style to sit in. But know where you're coming from, know how you're showing up and how you're presenting is the first thing that you need to do when you are communicating and beginning to open up these conversations. Now, when I say that, that is probably the key to starting any conversation is knowing that. So, how are they communicating? Are they being passive? Are they being aggressive? Are they passive aggressive? Are they assertive? But the other thing that steps a little bit deeper is how do they listen? And that's something that you can break down into four categories as well. Let's talk about the analytical. They're the ones who are problem solving focused. They want to know what all of the facts are in making that decision. Are they relational? Do they want to make a connection first? Are they emotion-oriented? Those are two kind of different types of personalities that present. So you have to know is how are they going to listen? Are they critical? Are they going to be very evaluative, very judgment-based on the information that's being presented to them? Or are they task-focused or efficiency-driven? I've been around a couple of these people. And when you enter the room with them, they're typically your type A or your D in the disc identification, where you go in, you're going to present some facts. And when you present them, they have to be quick, they better not be emotion-based. And that individual is going to make that decision quickly. So knowing how they listen is just as important in knowing how you are going to present to them. And that comes under that level of enlightenment. Now, using those four categories, that's a great way to start. The other thing is to have really true curiosity. And that is something that is a skill that you can develop. And it's also a mindset. It might even make you a better human. If you truly are curious for those that are around you to know about them, to know what they're saying, you really can't fake it. And uh being authentic is one of the most important things that you can do as well. But being truly authentically curious is going to be able to help you connect with people. Now, when you go into these situations, I also like to use uh another uh tip would be labels, labeling. When you're having a conversation with somebody, it doesn't matter what style they're in, but when you can label what they are saying with words that help say that you are listening, like it seems like it feels like you are expressing this to me, it makes you be able to connect with what they're saying and with how they're saying it. Sometimes it's a yes, but other times it's like a no. And you might have got it wrong. So, in being able to label, that's part of having that true curiosity. And the other thing is mirroring, and that's something that I do talk about in previous episodes, but the mirroring isn't just the typical, I'm gonna mirror your posture, however you're you're doing your conversation, but it's about mirroring words as well. And I've often heard this uh called by Chris Foss that this is a Jedi mind trick. And often it's just simply stating the last meaning or the words from that individual, the last couple of words, stating that at the end of their statement. Like uh they might say something like, uh, I'm really angry. And you might just repeat those words, angry? And then they're gonna think about it. Well, I'm not really angry, I'm more frustrated with those types of mirroring helps you understand how that person is expressing what they are doing. So those are some of the most important skills that you can have as an uncommon communicator. You know, first thing we talked about ownership, own that communication, own your self-awareness. The next thing is enlightenment. How do they communicate? How are you listening and how are they listening to what you're doing? Most important thing, though, is have curiosity. And there's plenty of other things that we talk about in the Uncommon Communicator podcast that are going to help you in your communication. These skills embody the uncommon communicator. So this year we are starting off with a brand new season with an incredible lineup of communicators and influencers. And I am inviting you to explore past episodes as we kick this off. Share them with your friends and family and coworkers. This really helps communicate it to the world when you like and when you share. And what we're here to do is to make the world a better place. And that's all I've got. See you bye. Congratulations. You made it all the way to the end. You're officially a one percenter. Thanks for tuning in to this episode of the Uncommon Communicator with me, your host, James Gable. Make sure you like and share this episode. This helps spread the message of communication to the world. Check out our website, the Uncommon Communicator, for more and connect with me on LinkedIn to keep building those communication skills. See you next time.