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Barrier Busting
The Barrier Busting podcast offers insights, strategies, and inspiring stories that explore practical tips and powerful tools for unlocking our full potential.
Barrier Busting
Rethinking Communication for Better Relationships
What if the key to healthier relationships begins with recognizing the destructive communication patterns we're accustomed to? Dr. Nicole Zmuda, a seasoned social work professor and clinician, helps us uncover the insidious roles of Gottman's Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse--criticism, defensiveness, stonewalling, and contempt in our daily interactions. Witness how these Four Horsemen storm through not just our personal circles but also our professional landscapes, hindering workplace dynamics and psychological safety. Together, we explore practical strategies to mitigate these behaviors, paving the way for greater understanding and respect across the board.
The current climate of societal polarization is heightened by these toxic communication patterns, and we aim to dissect their impact on public discourse. By examining the prevalence of ad hominem and straw man tactics, we shed light on their detrimental effect on critical thinking and dialogue, particularly in political arenas. Learn how these tactics create echo chambers and foster division, while we emphasize the necessity of fostering empathy and understanding to bridge ideological gaps.
We navigate the turbulent seas of social media and its potent influence on our emotions, discussing how platforms exploit our fight-or-flight instincts. Through historical anecdotes, like the friendship between LBJ and Everett Dirksen, we illustrate the potential for compromise even amidst conflict. Dr. Zmuda and I advocate for the power of personal responsibility in communication, urging listeners to adopt respectful dialogue techniques to maintain personal connections, even when disagreements arise. Tune in to discover how embracing accountability and open communication can revive not only personal relationships but also societal discourse.
Are you feeling stuck, trapped by barriers holding you back from reaching your full potential? Well, let's bust through those barriers so that you can live your best life. Hi, I'm Matt Brooks, founder of Matt Brooks Coaching, and I'm passionate about helping people overcome barriers to achieve success. Join me for insights, strategies and inspiring stories as we explore practical tips and powerful tools to unlock your true potential. This is the Barrier Busting Podcast. Okay, so I am back today with Dr Nicole Zamuda If you didn't listen to last week's show, you missed a great show with her and she's agreed to do two with us to talk about Gottman's Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse, which is about killing relationships.
Speaker 1:These are four things that kill relationships.
Speaker 1:Last week, we talked about that in terms of our relationships with our significant others and our family members, but we're going to broaden that today and talk a little bit about our relationships with the world, our relationships with coworkers, our relationships with people in our neighborhood, our relationships with society in general, which there is no one who could tell me that we are not more polarized today than we've been in my entire lifetime, and there's got to be a way that we can start coming together and respecting each other for our differences again.
Speaker 1:So we're going to talk about that a little bit today. Just to recap, if you didn't hear last week's show, my guest is Dr Nicole Zamuda, who is currently a professor of social work at Fairleigh Dickinson University in New Jersey. She holds a bachelor's degree in art and psychology and a master's degree in social work from Marywood University, and additionally holds a master's in education and a PhD in human sexuality from the Center for Human Sexuality Studies at Widener University. Human sexuality from the Center for Human Sexuality Studies at Widener University. She is a licensed clinical social worker with almost 20 years of experience in substance use disorder treatment and behavioral health care, and she is continuing to work as a clinician while she is in her work as a professor. Welcome back, Dr Zamuda.
Speaker 2:Good to be back with you today, Matt. Thanks for having me again.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so, okay. So we talked last week about the four horsemen. For those that didn't listen, give us a brief recap of what these four horsemen of the apocalypse are in terms of relationships.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so the four horsemen comes from John Gottman's work on relationships and they are the behaviors and communication that, as you said, will kill relationships. They are criticism, defensiveness, stonewalling and contempt, and these behaviors, as we talked about last time, are actually quite common. I don't know that there are any relationships that haven't had these manifest at one time or another, even today, but there are ways that, if we can be more mindful that they're happening, there are ways that we can challenge them in ways that we can mitigate their presence and their overall effects. So there are ways that we can work around them and reduce their impact. We can work around them and reduce their impact.
Speaker 1:So and basically it really falls down to even though there's four different horsemen, they're all negative but it falls down to familiarity breeds contempt. We get too close to people, we're contemptuous to those people. We tend to not be able to express our frustrations with the world at work or in other situations, so we kind of take it out on people at home, right? How does the four horsemen affect work relationships? You're on university faculties, which can be. I know you have a really nice faculty there because I went to that school. But I do have enough exposure in my, or I've had enough exposure in my life to academia to know that. You know, henry Kissinger wasn't wrong when he said why are the politics and academia so replete? Because the relationship or because the stakes are so low. That was his line, right, and? But I know that things can get in any work relationship, any place where you're working in tight contact or close contact with people, things can get out of hand. How do these things affect work?
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, Relationships are relationships, no matter what kind of relationships they are, and the four horsemen, which essentially are negative communication behaviors, can manifest in any of those relationships, including the workplace. If they're present, they can do things like disrupt team dynamics, hinder effective communication, team dynamics hinder effective communication. They can even create those hostile or toxic work environments that are certainly drivers of attrition and employee dissatisfaction. I don't know if you're familiar with the concept of psychological safety. There's been a lot in the research around psychological safety, particularly in the workplace, is like how do we create an environment where individuals feel safe to speak up about ideas that they have, to change processes or to address policies, any questions they have, concerns or mistakes, without fear of retribution or punishment? These four horsemen kill psychological safety. They basically create a culture that prevents that open communication and dialogue that's critical to that psychological safety.
Speaker 1:Let me just make the point, though, for anybody out there thinking, oh yeah, I've done these things. Look, these four horsemen are also signs that we're human, that we breathe, that we think, that we have fears, that we have all the emotions that make us human. So they are actually things that are part of the overall package that make us great if we really understand them. And when it comes to the four horsemen in the workplace, a lot of times people are afraid to speak up or speak up too much or whatever, out of paranoia. They're afraid if they speak up too much, they're going to be ostracized. They're not going to get a promotion. They're afraid if they don't speak up enough, they're going to be ostracized and not get a promotion.
Speaker 1:So it's a pretty fine line to walk delicately and have your career not be affected by other people's paranoia in particular. And that's why these four horsemen are so important to understand, because they're not only about your relationship with your significant other, but they do come into play at work, and contempt in particular is a big one, and if anybody listened to last week's show, contempt is the number one killer of relationships, according to Gottman. Does Gottman talk at all about paranoia?
Speaker 2:I'm not so familiar with any of his work as it relates to paranoia, but I think, if I can kind of generalize, he recognizes that the presence of these kind of drivers of unsuccessful relationships they don't occur in a vacuum, right, they have significant effects not just on the relationship but how, you know, someone may enter into other relationships, right?
Speaker 2:You know, we kind of we were talking last time about how defensiveness can manifest, you know, seemingly out of the blue, but what's really going on for that person in terms of their level of defensiveness is that they maybe have been on the receiving end of some criticism or some contempt, whether in the current relationship or the past relationship. And so I think there's something to be said for things like attachment styles and how we interact with people across relationships. And so you know, if this idea of paranoia or this maybe sensitivity to criticism or sensitivity to attacks, that can certainly inform how someone engages with any relationship, including relationships in the workplace, right, If someone's coming from a hostile work environment, they leave that situation and they go into a more productive or healthier workplace environment, that's not to say that they're not going to have that level of sensitivity kind of built in.
Speaker 1:They're still going to be on alert at all times. Once burned, twice shy, right? Okay? Well, let's talk about this now. In terms of our larger societal situation, there's polarization we are having.
Speaker 1:I don't talk politics on this show, so we can keep the politics out of it if possible, but we are very polarized, in particular, with our political dialogues. We seem to be run by our political dialogues now. We don't seem to be able to separate. I know a lot of people my age think back to a time when, you know, we talked politics occasionally, but it didn't, it wasn't on our mind all the time, it didn't inform every decision we made. Now it seems to, and the problem is is that we're clearly 50-50 in this country. I mean, we might go 56-44, blah, blah, but it's roughly split and we're now at a point where if you're on that team, you're wrong. I don't want to talk to you. We got to end this, and these four horsemen, I see, are the critical things in any one of these discussions that destroy any ability for us to come together. Talk a little bit about how this relates to our political dialogue or just our polarization in general.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think you're really onto something, these four horsemen, that can manifest in any relationship we can see in the discourse that we have about larger social and political issues. Right, we take an ideological position and then we find ourselves engaging in attacks or criticism of the folks in the other camp, whatever that other is right. It kind of is a breeding ground for this us versus them mentality which I think is inherent in that divisiveness that you're speaking about. Right, like, I only have a certain number of years on this planet, right, and I don't necessarily have the perspective around how long this us versus them mentality has been with us collectively, socially. You know, political scholars, sociologists might be better to speak about that, but something tells me that, you know, maybe our country was kind of founded on this idea of us versus them. Right, those differences in ideologic views around how things should be run kind of resulted in us separating from, from England, right. So I think that's kind of been part of our foundation, part of our roots. That's a good point.
Speaker 2:But but it. But it doesn't necessarily create an environment where we feel like we can come together with open communication and create meaningful progress.
Speaker 1:Well, I think that's a really great point. I'm glad you brought it up. We should be reminded that we were founded kind of on this, but we still have to be able to work together in a society and communicate with each other. I know there's always been division, but there seems to be something more serious about it now than anything I've witnessed in my life, and I'm hoping that we can, you know, affect some positive change going forward here. There's two things, there's two techniques that are often used that I think could easily fit into these four categories, and I'm not going to lie, these things really piss me off. They really do, and that's ad hominem arguments and straw man arguments. What are ad hominem and straw man arguments and why are they so for lack of a better word, bullshit, I'm sorry. They really are. They're horrible. We all do it. We got to stop. Explain this to us.
Speaker 2:Sure. Well, I can say that the students that I teach research, they hate these things because they don't quite understand them and they think well, why do I need to understand this? And part of it, even outside of the research context, is being able to think critically about arguments or claims that people are making right. They're fallacies and logic about ad hominem attacks. They're attacks made on a person's character rather than their ideas or their policies or their research findings. And we see that a lot in political discourse. Where people point to an individual's history of infidelity is why we shouldn't trust their decisions on domestic policies for example, right.
Speaker 1:One of the simple ones is well, he's fat. So why should we listen to him about anything, right? I mean, why does he get a valid opinion? He's fat? You know what a ridiculous thing.
Speaker 2:Right, right. I think there was some research that talked about JFK's polling numbers because he was so handsome and he got a lot of people to vote for him because people liked the way he looked, right. I mean, that's exactly that kind of character based decision-making that is risky.
Speaker 1:Um straw man is slightly different than that right.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and so the straw man is when we take um a view or an idea and we misrepresent it in a way to more easily dismiss it. Right, and it's we're kind of generalizing their policy or their viewpoint and it's it's indicative of defensiveness, right.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I want to be careful with the examples that I make Cause again, we don't talk politics but right, but you know it's.
Speaker 1:You're basically distorting an opponent's argument by oversimplifying or exaggerating it in some way, Right? So you know you're not actually addressing the argument, You're addressing some, something. You can pull out a thin air that has some little bit of relationship to what you're talking about distracting.
Speaker 1:I call that just deflect and distract, deflect and discredit you know you're deflecting the argument from what it really is and, in doing so, discrediting the person making the argument. So these are things we. I would like to see laws that bad and hominin and straw man tactics. All right, let's go to the four horsemen specifically now and talk about how they're relating to our. You know how they play a role in social polarization. So the first one was criticism. Now, in relationships, we know that this erodes trust and bonds between people. What are the effects of criticism on social polarization and what impact does it have on our public discourse? And, in particular, we have this thing now called social media, which we use all the time for this sort of thing. So talk about criticism in the larger perspective.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so criticism, especially when it's personal and harsh and this is kind of the type of criticism that we tend to see on social media often it essentially deepens those divisions that you spoke about and it really highlights this us versus them mentality where, instead of engaging with differing perspectives and having a productive dialogue or discourse, we're using things like inflammatory comments which quickly escalate into hostility and you know the the it becomes productive very quickly. It kind of fosters echo chambers right where we're just creating and engaging with people who share similar viewpoints as ours and opposing views are dismissed or, in this case of criticism, really vilified.
Speaker 1:It's kind of like comfort food, isn't it? We only want to be around what's comfortable. We only want to talk about what's comfortable. We don't want to be challenged with opposing points of view. Am I oversimplifying that?
Speaker 2:I mean, listen, I like a good oversimplification. I think it helps make things you know, especially concepts like this, accessible. But yeah, I think there's something to be said for that. And it's also oh gosh, I'm never going to eat anything that has Brussels sprouts in it, because I don't like Brussels sprouts, and so I'm going to eliminate everything Brussels sprouts from my diet. And that may not be the case.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, it may not make any sense, all right, next up the one that really does the damage contempt. Yeah, contempt in relationships we discussed last week is the most harmful of the four horsemen, and I'm pretty sure it's the same in the broader picture of our society and polarization, and something that I see a lot of on social media. Talk about contempt in our broader social dialogue.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I'm also seeing a lot of that contempt, especially in the political discussions and social media, the things that are being posted on ex-formerly Twitter. It really fosters this deep-seated disdain and disrespect for people with differing or opposing views, and in the public discourse it manifests that through mockery, sarcasm, belittling language, right the same things that we would see in the romantic relationships that we talked about last time. But it creates an environment where empathy and understanding and compassion don't exist and it creates barriers to, you know, the important collaboration that needs to happen across ideological lines. You know, whatever those are for individuals, it kind of keeps you entrenched in your lane and it makes it difficult to kind of foster solutions that work to everyone's benefit. Right, I'm not going to work with them because X, y, z.
Speaker 1:Yeah and I. A couple of things about this one for me. First of all, you know I had a. My dad was a world war II vet. He was a. He was what we call a hard ass, and you know, his thing was how do you know you're right? How do you know you're right? And I mean no, you're right now. It's important to believe what you believe and fight for what you believe in. But what are you accomplishing when you're just shutting down anybody who doesn't tacitly agree with everything you say? What is being accomplished there? That's my question. Nothing is being accomplished there, right? That's not helping the thing. And if you, you know, if you want to bring someone to your point of view, invite them in. Don't shut the door down. Am I right with that? Would you agree?
Speaker 2:A hundred percent. A hundred percent.
Speaker 1:Stop thinking that. You know. I mean, I had a college professor once tell me when I was in my twenties and I was acting a little uppity one day. He was a college professor with a Swiss accent, so that made it even more profound and he said Matthew, god did not anoint you to do a fucking thing. And it was probably the greatest lesson I got. It was totally worth what I paid for the whole degree, because his whole point was who are you to think that you're 100% right? Believe in what you believe in, fine, fight for that. But don't just walk around assuming that everybody who disagrees with you is wrong. Fight for that. But don't just walk around assuming that everybody who disagrees with you is wrong. Be a little more open to that. Your brain will whine. All right, this is a good place for us to take a quick break. When we come back, we'll have a little more with Dr Nicole Zamuda and the four horsemen of the apocalypse in terms of our general society. Hang tight.
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Speaker 1:Take the first step towards a brighter tomorrow day, take the first step towards a brighter tomorrow. Okay, picking up where we left off. We got through two of the four horsemen. We're going to pick up with the third right now, which is defensiveness. Again, listen to our show last week. You'll get a more thorough discussion about what defensiveness is in a relationship. But let's talk about defensiveness and, in particular, let's discuss it in terms of identity. Okay, because I think a lot of our defensiveness in society manifests from our identity, our sense of identity and sense of other people's differences, and I think it comes our defensiveness comes from when we feel our identities are under siege. And I think it comes, our defensiveness comes from when we feel our identities are under siege. Am I right, phyllis? And what is defensiveness in terms of the four horsemen and how it relates to all this?
Speaker 2:Yeah. So you know bell hooks is, you know, known for, you know her kind of claim that the personal is political. And I think that for many people, when they perceive that a particular issue that is personal to them is under attack, is being criticized, we see that defensiveness manifest, and appropriately so right, because you know people have you, people have skin in the game, as it were. But we also see this defensiveness when folks are engaging in, again, that deflecting responsibility or accountability, and so they experience that defensiveness around a particular position and then they may respond with attacks and criticism themselves and again it all serves to shut down constructive dialogue.
Speaker 1:All serves to shut down constructive dialogue. I want to hammer that because, again back to the question I asked right before the break what good are you doing? What good is going to come of this if you just hold firm, if you're sitting in the sandbox holding your breath because you couldn't get your way? What good is it doing? Right?
Speaker 2:Yeah, exactly, and I appreciate the emphasis on that because really all of this comes down to fostering more productive communication in all of our relationships and I think that you know to your point about the divisiveness. Anything we can do to move the needle forward to foster more productive communication, particularly in these divisive issues, is is a win in my opinion.
Speaker 1:You know, I worked for a while in a state that is fully a different color than my political views and I was raising money as part of my work and so I had to keep my political views to myself, which is fine that's what I prefer to do anyways. But I got to know a lot of people who believe very differently than what I believe, and because I had to work with them on a who believe very differently than what I believe, and because I had to work with them on a regular basis, after a while I started noticing you know, these are good family people, these are good people. These are people who contribute to their communities. They aren't all just fanatics or whatever. Maybe there's something they're seeing that I'm not. It didn't necessarily change my views, but it did open my mind a little bit to say I'm not going to just shut these folks out. I need to pay attention because there's, there were some things that I learned from them and hopefully, some things they picked up from me, and that's how we we, we make our society more productive.
Speaker 1:Okay, let's go to the last one of these four horsemen, again my favorite, to hate this one. I just hate this one. It's called stonewalling. Now, in relationships, we know this is a withdrawal from an interaction and, as you covered last week, it can often be a personal defensive move as opposed to you know, you're not necessarily saying screw you to your partner, you're kind of you need to step back for yourself. Okay, do you see parallels with people checking out of social or political conversations, and is this a bad thing?
Speaker 2:out of social or political conversations, and is this a bad thing? You know? I think that question really hints at the nuance that exists in this area in particular and I appreciate you're picking up on that. When people withdraw from these conversations or these debates, whether through disengaging, ignoring opposing views or just altogether avoiding having the conversation to begin with, avoiding these hot-button topics, they essentially stop participating in dialogue that can be really meaningful and, again, that prevents resolution, that prevents a path forward. But we also have to remember that oftentimes, especially in personal cases, right back temporarily can be productive, but just ignoring it altogether and stepping out completely is not the solution, that's not the long-term solution and that turns into apathy.
Speaker 1:It also seems a little bit cowardly to me. You know, I mean stepping back for a minute to regroup yourself, totally fine, totally fair. Stepping back for a week to regroup, but to walk away completely, it just seems like you know, I'm just, you know, if you believe so strongly in what you believe in, then be willing to stand up for it, even when the going gets tough, even when you're confronted with people with solid arguments against you. For the most part, I think you're both. Both sides are going to come out better for it. But to just walk away, if it's not in a sense of I need to, to just take a take, you know, regroup myself, but if it's, I'm just putting my hand up to these people. I'm never going to pay attention. I find that to be cowardice. I do Now again. I was raised by a World War II vet who I said was a hard ass. So you know, you confront your problems. That's what I was raised with. But do you, am I wrong?
Speaker 2:I don't think you're wrong. I also think that there are folks for whom the disengaging is an act of self-preservation and and it's it's necessary for their survival, and that maybe sounds hyperbolic, but I think that there are some for whom that is true, and so I think it is on kind of like a case by case basis and if, if you're someone who had not engaged because it would, you know, create further harm to you, then you know, find an accomplice who can kind of step in and do that work. But if, if you have the capacity to do it, I agree with you. I think. You know I'm kind of someone who believes that we have a social responsibility. I know I have an ethical responsibility to kind of engage in those discussions, even if they're uncomfortable.
Speaker 1:Well, I'm glad that we're having this conversation because, as you know, I have a real pet peeve with ghosting. I like really think it's like a horrible thing. But in doing some research on ghosting, which I've been doing, trying to learn more about, and I have read that there are times where you ghost people for self-preservation, where you're, in that sense, you're more creating boundaries for yourself and your life, and there are certain people you're walking away from. You know, I might have a few family members who I've walked away from. I know a lot of people who have that. But when you go someone just like who's a friend and then suddenly say you heard something that upset you from someone else and so you ghost that friend rather than confront it, that that's just horrible In my opinion. I really think that's just the worst thing ever. All right, this has been a great discussion, let's. We've touched on this already, but how potent a force is social media when it comes to the four horsemen in our current society?
Speaker 2:social media when it comes to the four horsemen in our current society, no-transcript using the four horsemen more accessible or even referred right. So we see kind of clickbait articles. We see comments on someone's post on social media. There's a criticism right, a harsh personal attack that gets reactions, which drives engagement, which then oftentimes drives monetization right.
Speaker 1:No, it's totally it. Fear is the number one hot button, button, right. You press that button, you're going to get a reaction and if it's on social media, that's going to create more just what you said more engagement, which is going to create more revenue for whoever's doing it. So I'm sorry to interrupt you, but I think we've got to take personal responsibility to realize that in some ways, we're being played. We're being played because of our amygdalas. Our amygdalas are the part of our brain that puts up fight or flight, right, fight or flight, and it's our protection mechanism. Fight or flight and it's our protection mechanism. And there are people purposely messing with it to get us upset so that we'll keep clicking on these things and they can make more money. Sorry to interrupt, but that's my little rant for the day.
Speaker 2:No, I think it's appropriate right, and I'm glad that it resonates right, that you're also seeing it right, we have these structures, these apps, these platforms, and it's really designed to. I mean, there are some good places out there, right, there are some social media for good, but a lot of it, like you said, there are people that design it specifically to capitalize on our fears, our anger, and they make money off of that. And again, it kind of creates that echo chamber and you know the anonymity and distance that is involved in social media, right, like everybody, kind of, most people wear a mask on social media, right, you don't really have to know who each other is. That, I think, gives people license to go hard or go deep with their attacks and their criticisms because there's no, you know, there's no consequence.
Speaker 1:And I just wish people would understand exactly what you just said, to understand that it will allow you to let the worst of yourself out, and maybe letting the worst of yourself out is not such a good thing. I'm just going to throw that out there for people to mull in their heads, but I don't want something like you know. I think a lot about mob mentality. I've done a lot of reading on this over the years. Charles Mackay wrote the first big treaties on this in like 1850. It is so easy to work up a mob. It is so easy Like all you got to do is touch that fear button and everybody's got their torches lit and they're ready to go.
Speaker 1:And I think we've all got to take a little more responsibility to stand up to this because, yes, social media has its wonderful elements, you know, namely reuniting with people you haven't seen in 30 years. You know things like that are wonderful, but we are. Our fears are being played upon or preyed upon, in my opinion. All right, okay, there were antidotes to the four horsemen that we talked about for relationships. How do they play out in this broader context? Are there antidotes we can use?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think the antidotes that are applicable in our romantic relationships and our family relationships are applicable in this broader social context. So things like taking accountability for things that you may have said that are less than polite, less than respectful, right Kind of owning that and doing better, doing it differently next time, those gentle startups, those I statements, can replace criticism with more respectful, solution-focused conversations.
Speaker 1:In case anybody didn't hear last week, talk a little bit briefly about I statements. What do you mean by I statements?
Speaker 2:Yes, thank you for that reminder. So, in the context of debate or concern or conflict, I statements are ways that you can express what you're seeing, what you're noticing, what you're feeling, without blaming or accusing or drawing any conclusions about what the other person is doing intentionally or what might be going on for the other person. So I feel disappointed when you say things like fill in the blank, as opposed to, you're such a jerk, how could you say that? It sounds very different, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1:How we couch it Okay. Yeah, I think we've got a lot. We need a lot of anecdotes. We need, we need some to be flying out of I don't know in our atmosphere, in our water or something. We all need to chill out just a little bit. We just do, we just got to calm down a little bit.
Speaker 1:You know, I remember I used to be really obsessed with studying presidential history and political history and I think it's really interesting that you brought up how our country was founded, might in some way speak to polarization. I think I'm going to really let that swirl around in my brain for a while and think that through. But I do remember that in the past political enemies in quotations I say we're often friends behind the scenes they embrace the idea that politics is the art of compromise, politics is war. You know they, and one of my favorite stories I'm going to tell really briefly has to do with LBJ and Everett Dirksen, who I believe was a Senate majority leader or something back in the time, and they were, you know, everett was a Republican and LBJ was a Democrat, I believe, and they were often opposed to each other but they would get together in the evening and have drinks. They were both Southern boys and they'd laugh and joke about how they were fighting each other all day on TV. But it was, you know, it's all part of the game to them, right? And they would. And there was this great story that Jack Valenti, who was a senior advisor to LBJ, told in some documentary I watched, where apparently they get together and they have drinks.
Speaker 1:And you know, lbj would say now, everett, I need these three votes, you got to give me these three votes, you got to get them for me. And Everett would say well, mr President, I'll take a look at those ideas and we'll see what we can do. And then they'd go back to drinking for a while and then they'd laugh and they'd have a few things. And then, about 20 minutes later, everett Dirksen would say now you know, mr President, I have here a list of three names of people that I'd like to see on the federal bench. I hope you will give them your every consideration and hand over the list. And the president would say I will definitely have these names vetted, we'll see what we can do.
Speaker 1:And the deal was done. In other words, they each got something they needed, they wanted. So they found a way, despite their division. Now some people might say that's corrupt. It's not corrupt, that's that's. Our government is set right now on a two party system, so they found a way to work together to each get something that was important to them. I wish we could get back to engaging each other like that, you know, and I hope we can, because these negative patterns of the four horsemen, I think, are eating us alive and I think we're all walking around angry, am I right? We're all just. It just just seems like there's just anger in the air all the time. Wouldn't it be nice to get back to I'm not talking painting happy little pictures in our studios at home, but we could chill out just a little bit. Any final thoughts on this from you, dr Z?
Speaker 2:Well, I'm a fan of Bob Ross and his happy little trees, so we could maybe do a little bit more with them. But I hear you, I think that there is something to be said about the lost art of compromise and negotiation, and it's not so much that kind of quid pro quo that I think people like to look at with side eye. But it's really okay. How can we come together and how can we work for the common good? It's not just what I want or my agenda, because to your point, you may have a good idea, but that doesn't mean that's the only idea or that is the idea right. We have to find ways to build everybody up.
Speaker 2:And I, you know, sometimes I feel like and this is, you know, maybe maybe just me but sometimes I feel like we're descending into an idiocracy. I don't know if you've seen that movie, mike Judge movie, but I try to do my part, you know, and I think, as a therapist, I encourage folks to, you know, use skills so that they can kind of take care of themselves when they feel like they may be under attack and they're feeling defensive, how they can continue to engage in progressive dialogue or focus on the solution. But you know, I try to employ some of these antidotes into my social interactions, as difficult as it may be.
Speaker 1:And you know, compromise doesn't necessarily mean you're selling out. Compromise shows respect for different points of view. It shows that you know, I think what LBJ and Everett Dirksen were doing was respecting each other's positions. They each had jobs to do. They each worked for a different political party, they each had responsibilities. They were going to help each other meet a couple of those responsibilities. And respect, boy, there is something we got to get back to respect. I respect the fact that people grew up believing something different than me, because who am I to know that I'm right? You know, I think I'm right. I'm going to stick with what I believe, but I'm really not going to bash anybody who feels differently anymore. It's not doing any good, any good at all, all right. Well, dr Nicole Zamuda, you are the best. I hope I'll get you back on one of these shows again in the future for another interesting topic. But a million thanks for coming on.
Speaker 2:Happy to be here and can't wait to hear the episode about news resolutions. I know I need help with that.
Speaker 1:It's a short one too. That's a six, 17 minute one, so, but it's just. It gives you some ideas about why we don't carry through with our resolutions and a few thoughts about how to do it. But the real way to carry through with a resolution is to hire Matt Brooks as your life coach. I'm going to help you with all your resolutions, anyways, thank you all for listening today. Again, if you have an idea for a show that you'd like to hear, please shoot me an email, matt, at Matt Brooks coaching dot com. I'd love to hear from you and get your ideas at brookscoachingcom. I'd love to hear from you and get your ideas, and if it's something that I feel comfortable with, I will be happy to do it. For now, thanks to Dr Zamuda. Thank you all for listening. Be well, and I'll catch you next time on the Barrier Busting Podcast. Thank you.
