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Speaker 1: Now in our last two toolbox episodes, we talked about how

Speaker 2: To make small, talk more compelling and open up a world of opportunities with anyone that you meet today. I'm joined by Johnny here in Las Vegas and Michael all the way in Vienna. And we're going to break down how to take small talk and turn it into meaningful conversation. Or as we call it smart talk, that's right. How do we transition out of those surface level conversations into something deeper that can create that opportunity for a relationship?

Speaker 3: You know, it's all about relationships. So w where are these relationships that we're talking about? Well, we're talking about relationships at work. We're talking about leadership. We're talking about sales, talking to your prospect and all of these cases, you need to be obsessed with your audience, with your prospect in order to get the information that you need in order to give them value, to be able to solve their problems, to offer solutions. And you can't do that without having an understanding of who you're talking to. Now, we've been discussing this for weeks now. And my favorite thing about this, and we've said it before, if you're somebody who hasn't taken the reins of small talk, you find it boring, or does it go anywhere that's on you? Because it is an opportunity to set a foundation for you to allow comfort and trust, to be built and vulnerability to happen from that point.

Speaker 2: Exactly. And if you're struggling with small talk, we put together a cheat sheet, that's right. A phone wallpaper with our conversation, formula compelling questions to use in conversation. And some quick tips for you. If you'd like to learn more and get that free cheat sheet from us, go to the art of charm.com/smalltalk and grab that download today after we've initiated smalltalk. Well, as Johnny said, we have to take the lead. We have to take it somewhere, but there's a huge myth. And that myth is that it's binary, right? Michael,

Speaker 1: Most people think that you leave small talk and you jump into the deep end and you go like full on vulnerability, full on big topics, talking, you know, vulnerable stuff. Um, Eben reality. It's a small and gradual process. And we're going to show you guys how you can slowly transition by adding just a tiny little bit of vulnerability. See how it's received, how it's reciprocated, and then move on from there. So really in baby steps, going from small talk to the really big

Speaker 2: Stuff. Now we see this blind spot in our bootcamp participants all the time. They think that if they just have a bunch of little small conversations, then naturally something is going to come out of that. And as we know, hope is not a strategy. You can't just rely on your small talk to create connection in your life. You have to be able to transition out small, talk into our meaningful conversation. And the way to do that is with vulnerability. Now here's where that blind spot comes in because many of us think that vulnerability is sharing our deepest, darkest secrets, the things we're afraid of, the things that make us anxious. And that's just not the case. In fact, vulnerability is a lot easier if you shift your perspective on it. But first we want to share with you a metaphor that we use that hopefully will help you understand how important vulnerability is and how you can lead. And that's our cave metaphor, right? Johnny

Speaker 3: Poor is built on disclosure and disclosure happens when two people risk vulnerabilities. It is that risking of vulnerabilities is showing investment into the other person and that you trust the other person. And you're going to have to leave that if you expect the other person to be vulnerable, to risk in that relationship. So the cave analogy allows us to look at it objectively and paints a good picture of what it looks like. So Michael was talking about lateral conversation, lateral questions, where are you from? What do you do? Do you enjoy that line of work? And these are basic. We hear them all the time, and this is how conversations get started. You could say that they're, they're almost as if they're icebreakers, but where are we going? Well, if you're in the cells, if you are building a team, if you're trying to get people to buy into your ideas, you have to lead them into being vulnerable and lead them into hearing your ideas and accepting of those ideas.

Speaker 3: So we're going to use those icebreaking type lateral questions to walk up to this cave, the mouth of the cave. So I'm talking to him, asking him where he's from, what he does for a living. And he's following along, he's answering there. Isn't much in the way of vulnerability to answer those questions on a surface level. And you could say that we've walked up to the cave. Now I may ask a J on a vertical question. Now, what is it about that line of work? You like so much now for AGA to answer that question, he will have to take a step into that cave. Now, as you could, as you can tell from the analogy, if he's nervous about it, if he has any discomfort in this idea of being vulnerable, he's going to look to me and he's going to be hesitant and walking in. I have to be the leader here to show that going into that cave, that nothing is going to happen. That risk is great, and that vulnerability will lead to us enjoying the conversation and having more fun and being more vulnerable together as we build this rapport. So I'm going to answer those questions. I'm going to start to become vulnerable. First. This allows me in the analogy to walk into the cave, shine a flashlight around to show AIJ that it's okay. That he's welcome to come in. And the way

Speaker 2: We do that simply is through sharing emotion. In fact, emotion is the single commonality that's universal amongst all humans. You may not have the same family experience. You certainly most likely don't have the same occupation. Maybe you don't enjoy the same things to relax and unwind, and maybe your dreams are completely different. So when we're using the Ford acronym and we're talking about data in that exchange, it's a great way to get started and to move laterally. But vertically is on emotions and emotions have a scale. So when we're trying to take small, talk into smart talk, we want to start focusing on positive emotions and sharing our own positive emotions because emotions are also contagious. So if we're bringing energy and emotion into the conversation like that cave analogy, we're taking that first step into the dark cave. And of course, they're going to be ready to follow behind you and start sharing more emotion.

Speaker 2: And I know we've used this Maya Angelou quote on this show constantly because it is so impactful. People don't remember what you say. They don't remember what you do. They only remember how you made them feel that's right. Your sales prospects only remember how good you made them feel. Are you able to solve their problems and feel supported? Do they really believe that you understand that, right? Those are the feelings that guide our decision-making that guide our ability to purchase something that guide all of our behaviors. We like to backwards rationalize those behaviors, but it all starts from an emotional place. So what we're doing is we're adding emotion into the conversation. You can think of it as sharing what your excited about at your job or why you're fired up in the morning to do what you do, and then asking, what is it about your line of work? That's so exciting for you. We've walked a step into that cave. We've created an opportunity for the other person to add emotion into the conversation. And what do you know? We've started to transition out of boring, small talk and into smart talk. The way

Speaker 1: That I like to describe this is lateral communication versus vertical communication. So I think about small talk, like throwing a skipping stone over lake, and it's like touching the surface again and again and again, but it never goes steep. It always stays on the surface. Those other small talk questions, like where you from, what do you do? What do you do for fun? Right? It always stays on the surface. Now, how could we bring in emotion? How can we bring in just a little bit of vulnerability to test the ground and to shine the light into that cave? Well, we go vertical by saying, what do you like most about it? Like, if I were to ask you, what do you do? And you say, well, you know, I'm a barista. I make coffee. I could ask where you're from, or I could go deeper, bring in that emotional component and ask, what do you like most about being a barista?

Speaker 1: And now we're going just, it's just a tiny little step, but it's me bringing emotion in, by showing you sincere interest about your work and you bringing emotion out in the answer that you're going to give. And this is where this entire process that we're talking about of going vertical is so Bulletproof, because you make that first step into the cave by asking an emotionally charged question, like, what are summers like in Toronto? What is that like now here's the cool thing. So you make that small little step. And if the other person doesn't want to follow, because that is not something they like to talk about, maybe the summer is in Toronto. I have never been either. Maybe they're always like really rainy and they don't want to talk about it. Guess what? They're going to give you a very short answer, and they're not going to follow you into the cave, which is perfectly fine.

Speaker 1: You just move to the next lateral question. And maybe now they're talking about their favorite hobby. And again, you're like, Hey, what do you like most about wakeboarding? Like what's what do you find? So amazing about that. And so, again, you're probing deeper, you're going vertical and maybe they bite there. Maybe then they're like, oh no, this is a cave I want to go in. So, so you you're leading all follow let's. Let's go that route. So, so this is the slow transition into vulnerability that is really Bulletproof because if the person doesn't want to follow you, just go to the next

Speaker 2: Question. That's right. That's the family, occupation, recreation and dreams, or the Ford acronym, which you probably heard on past small talk episodes that leads to very surface level conversation. And what Michael was talking about is it's okay to go surface until you can find some emotional context to relate on. And then we go vertical and let's be honest, not everyone is ready to go vertical all of the time. Not everyone is ready to get vulnerable. So we like to think of it as like casting. If you're fishing, right, you throw the hook out there, you see how they react. If they're not interested in that conversational hook or those vertical questions, you simply skim over the top and move to another one of those subjects until you can really find that emotion to connect and resonate on. And how do we find that emotion? You know, we hear this time and time again from our bootcamp participants. I'm boring. I don't have interesting stories. I don't know about these emotions. It made me happy. It made me sad. And we like to think of emotions as painting with watercolor. You want to add more emotion to your conversation, more emotion to your storytelling. That's the magic. So how do we do that,

Speaker 3: Johnny? Before we get there, I want to go over the idea of casting. And I want our audience to look at it as casting you, every time you cast your, your line into lake doesn't mean just because you cast it in that you're going to get a bite and you're going to throw out, go use one of those ice breaker questions. You'll use the Ford acronym of family, occupation, recreation, and dreams. And that doesn't mean that because you've thrown it out there, that you're going to get a return on that that's that that other person is going to bite, but that's okay. Anytime you've been out fishing, you give it a few times or you go there to use the baseball as another analogy of going up, add that. Sometimes you're going to get a hit and sometimes not. But what's important is that you throw your line out a few times, testing the waters to see what comes back.

Speaker 3: If we're looking at our conversation to go from lateral movements to vertical movements, right? We want to enhance the good feelings that are already happening. And we do this with yes, and we do this with matching the energy. And we, we allow the questioning. I mean, ag brought up the Ford acronym, family, occupation, recreation dreams. Those are questions about those subjects are easy. They're relatable. And they're, they're very exciting. So we're going to be discussing the subjects in the Ford acronym or any of the icebreaking questions that get small talk movement. It's apparent that when you are looking to go vertical, you're not using why questions. You're asking questions that will enhance the emotions that they're already feeling and allow them to open up and continue being vulnerable. Going deeper. If you ask a why question. So for instance, we were using the barista, um, job, right? So what is it that you do? Oh, I'm a barista. Why do you like that line of work? Or w why did you get into that line of work? Well, that, that triggers them into now rationalizing their behaviors and thoughts and actions around that line of work. And this is what we're trying to avoid, right? So w skipping the why questions and go to, what is it about that line of work that you enjoy so much? What is fun about a regular day going into making everyone's most favorite, most important drink of the day.

Speaker 2: And we know that those vertical questions will break anyone out of their autopilot. So don't be discouraged if it takes a beat for someone to answer your vertical question. Like what's so fun about being a barista, guess what? They probably haven't heard that question before. So it's going to take them a second or two to really think through that answer. But those are the magical moments in compelling conversations where people snap out of their autopilot and they actually engage with their emotional sense. And they start to think about what's truly enjoyable and exciting in their life. And then they share it with you. So now they've shared something, that's excited them, and they're going to remember that feeling of excitement tied to you. And we've just created a compelling, captivating, charismatic conversation out of a simple, small talk strategy that everyone has heard

Speaker 3: Before. So let's give a few examples here. AIG, what do you do for a living?

Speaker 2: Oh, I run a restaurant.

Speaker 3: Ah, and how do you enjoy it? Yeah, that's pretty fun, man. I can only imagine sitting down thinking of decor and the food and the emotions that you want to elicit, and the experience that you want to give people goes from not only the food, but walking into there, into that restaurant. And if you can turn them on through the, the core, the food, the energy you are going to not only have a patron for life, you're going to have a friend for life.

Speaker 2: There's nothing better than watching our customers leave the restaurant, smiling after the great experience they had with the atmosphere and the food.

Speaker 3: No, here's what I wanted to pull this, this interaction apart. I gave a J the question, a J answers restaurant tour. I give them another question. What is that line of work? This is now the vertical right now. And the answer I got back was, ah, I like it. And what happened? I realized that I wasn't going to get much from AAJ. So I go ahead and answered that question. I used excitement emotions, and I built a narrative of what that sort of work would mean to me. And now, because I shared, I walked into the cave that, that evokes emotions from AAJ, and now he feels compelled to share what he likes from it, because I've, I've already added to how I felt. And this goes back to a few episodes ago where I talked about the imaginary jelly bean jar between me and the person that you're speaking to in this case, it's going to be Aja.

Speaker 3: And I threw a jelly bean in as a question AGA just threw a jelly bean back, and it wasn't very much to go on. So I threw another jelly bean in hoping that he's going to throw some more in and he did. And he just matched that jelly bean. So I started throwing in the verticals, right? I started throwing it more and more jelly beans tilled. It got to the point where now AIG felt compelled to give me his position, his side, why he enjoys it so much. And we got to that place because I shared

Speaker 2: That's so key. If you find that you're ending up in conversational, dead ends, or you're not getting a response, answer your own question and share that excitement and enthusiasm. And you will see that actually powers through any moments of silence. You might be thinking it's awkward. You can pay for that right over with some excitement and some energy. And you will not miss a beat conversationally. As we say all the time on the show, the stronger frame dissolves the weaker one. So if you're bringing the energy, you're bringing the enthusiasm, you're answering your own questions. Sure enough, the person you're having a conversation with is going to start to pick up pace, pick up speed and match you because you're adding to, and when we're giving value, we're adding that energy and emotion into the conversation. That's how we transition out of small, talk into compelling conversation in

Speaker 3: Order to lead in any conversation, you first need to find the gift of gab on your own. Now, I love using that term, the gift, the guy, because for a lot of people, their first responses, I don't have the gift of gab. I wasn't gifted with gap. And, and I can understand why you might say that. And when I was younger, I would say the same thing about myself. And I know AIJ here has said it about himself. However, you can develop the gift of gab and how do you develop the gift of gab in a meaningful way so that when you are talking, people are going to listen and it's just not. You bragging and boasting about yourself. Well, it's about processing your experiences and it's not about how do I Bullhorn my experiences. So everyone knows about the things that I've done. It's not about the things that you've done.

Speaker 3: It's about what you have gotten from the things that you've done, what you've learned from the things that you've done. How are you a better person because of the things you've done, which means that you've sat there. You thought about those experiences and you extracted the good from them, the lessons, the insights, the takeaways. If you were to have that experience again, what would you be doing differently? This is how you've known. You processed your experiences and you've gained something from them. And here's, what's great. This is what the gift of gab comes down to. If you do the work to process your experiences, and there's many different ways of going about that, and we'll get to that in just a bit, but once you've done that and you have your answers and you have what you gained, your insights, your takeaways, you will feel compelled to share them with your friends and family and anyone who will listen. And now you're not only, you're not talking about all the cool stuff you did and how cool you are. You are talking about mistakes, blunders, uh, everything that is under the experience umbrella that led you to this moment and why you have the value that you do and why you're going to be able to lead or a holder solution for the person you're talking to. These

Speaker 2: Experiences all have emotions tied to them, and that's why processing them and taking out the good from them allows you not only to have stories to add, but also to start understanding the different emotions that you felt and experienced. And when others express those emotions, you now are instantly relatable. And when you're instantly relatable, that's how you create compelling conversation. That's how you build your charisma. That's how people remember you. And we hear it from our clients all the time. And that's, what's so amazing about bootcamp is at some point during the weekend, they find their gift of gab. It's always been inside of you, but for whatever reason, self judgment, the inner critic, imposter syndrome, whatever it is that monologue going on inside of you, that said, that's not interesting enough. Oh, I shouldn't say that. Oh, that's probably not going to receive the laugh that I thought you've created a shell.

Speaker 2: And that shell has kept you from the compelling conversations that you want to have. That's right with you not looking inside and you not processing these experiences, you've robbed yourself of the ability to communicate them effectively, to create the relationships you're looking for to close the deals, to get promoted, to get the date. So it's so important that you process these experiences pull out the good, the learnings and the emotions. So as your laterally, casting those questions, and you start to take one of those topics, vertical or deep, you have a motion to add that conversation. So Johnny, you mentioned one or two of the ways that we can process these experiences in a meaningful way as mindfulness and journaling. How do either of those really help us unpack and dig into all of the gold in these experiences

Speaker 3: For myself? I like journaling. It has been a latest addition to my experiences and how I process them that, and I've been doing that for years now. And I keep a open pages just on my phone for that very thing. When I get overwhelmed with emotions, I jot them down. What I feeling, why am I feeling, uh, how, how I might go about dealing with I'm, what I'm feeling in that moment. And of course I could go back to that, look at those emotions and then pull from it, what I had learned so that I am better moving forward. Journaling is a great way to do it. You can also process your experiences by prac with mindfulness practices, so that you are allowing yourself a view of your experiences as they, as they rush past and in your stream of consciousness, and basically reliving that experience and then pulling from it, your learnings, the things that are going to allow you to be better and what you were feeling, all of these things, the lessons learned, the emotions you were feeling. They are the verticals in which you are going to connect with other people. Why? Because everyone experiences learning, everyone, experiences, being overwhelmed, everyone experiences being scared, and everyone kidding can discuss the experience of failing. And there's nothing better than a redemption story. The Phoenix rising from the ashes. Here's how I blew it the first time. Here's what I took from it. And here's why I'm able to help on this subject because I now have that experience.

Speaker 2: And here's the thing reliving these experiences, whether journaling or mindfully can pull up emotions that maybe you didn't even feel the first time, or you didn't even recognize in that memory. You know, there's a silly video up above of me being deathly afraid, lining into loom. And now when I think about that experience, different emotions come up for me and different thoughts about pushing through discomfort and realizing that the payoff on the other side of that zip line is the exhilaration of flying through the air. Had I listened to my internal voice in that fear and I didn't clip in, I wouldn't have had that shared experience with our bootcamp alumni in an amazing city. Every single moment in your life is worth reflecting on that's right. And the more you spend time in self-reflection, the more you understand the experiences and the emotions you've been through, the easier it is to share the easier it is to take a step into that cave. It's supercharging your light bulb inside of your flashlight so that you can allow other people in conversation to feel those emotions, to get excited about what's being shared and to relate to you. And the more expressive you are, the more relatable you are and

Speaker 1: Your role also building happiness, not only in yourself, but also in the person that you are talking with and the group standing around you, that's listening in to that great conversation you guys are having, and actually found a really interesting study that was done in 2010. I was done by Martinez male and his team. And it's called eavesdropping on happiness. Well-being is related to having less small talk and more substantive conversations and substantive conversations. That's a fancy linguist term for bigger talk, going deeper. That's where the happiness lies, not when the stone skips over the lake, when everything becomes more emotional and more charged with good emotions and experiences and personality,

Speaker 3: There will times where you might think that you're not getting a bite on your questions, and you're going to have to answer them yourself. You're going to have to walk into the cave to show that it's totally okay. And this is what it's going to be about. That we're, it's, it's about discovery and it's about us discovering together. And you're going to need in leading, you're going to have to start expressing and processing and talking about your experiences. Now you may feel that you're the only one doing the talking and you, and that might freak you out. You might think, oh, I'm just here bragging, or it's coming off as boasting. It's just be talking about myself. And the other person is standing there and they're looking at you, they're engaged. They just don't have anything to offer. Number one, not everyone is able or has done the work to process their own experiences to where they are compelled to share them.

Speaker 3: And if they're at that point, that's fine. They're only going to learn and get more comfortable by you sharing your experiences. And if leading the charge may seem awkward and it may seem difficult, but it may just be what needs to be done. And this is an opportunity for you to practice this. And just as a side note, how do we understand this? And see this in our daily lives, as somebody who handles all of the art of charm social media, I get messages all the time from people who enjoy the work we're doing and who liked the videos that I make, or who's, who's going to be listening to this podcast or how this YouTube video struck them in a way and change their way of looking at a problem they've had. And they, and it is gave them the answer. And I will have not have recognized these names.

Speaker 3: And these people say they've been listening and watching us for years. So how come we're not exposed to them? How come we don't know these people? Well, because their rate of engagement is that of what we call and online world is the lurkers. And there's plenty of people who engage, but who are maybe a bit intimidated or fear. They have nothing to add. That's okay. We need those folks as well. And there is a lot of them and we want all those people to find their voice. And it's going to take different amounts of time. The thing that you can do is to make sure that you're leading your sharing, and then when they do contribute, right, they are rewarded. They get confirmation, right? They see your excitement.

Speaker 2: And that's one of the reasons that I love bootcamp so much because over the weekend we simulate these high pressure social interactions. So you are going to be in conversation and challenge in bootcamp where someone doesn't have a lot to add someone isn't being expressive, someone isn't taking those vertical questions. And how do you handle it in those moments? And in bootcamp, we believe and ascribe to the idea of train hard, fight, easy. We do these drills and exercises inside of the bootcamp all weekend long so that your putting yourself out there becoming more expressive, but you're also handling all of the tension and pressure and anxiety that comes with that stressful sales call that comes with that pitch deck meeting or that job interview, or that first date. You've practiced it in a safe environment, got feedback from me, Johnny and the coaches. You've also practiced it with your classmates who are working on developing these same skills.

Speaker 2: And then we go out in Las Vegas and you practice it with everyone else you're meeting on the street or out and about. And by the end of that weekend, you have over 200 plus experiences of going through these exact questions, understanding vertical versus horizontal questioning and how to make that small talk smart talk. So if you're interested in joining us for a weekend in Las Vegas, we have three on the calendar this year, check out the art of charm.com/bootcamp and apply today. Now understanding the importance of small talk. It creates opportunities in your life. It's not to be skipped over, but those opportunities come from your ability to transition out of small talk. So the biggest myth that we dispelled today was that it's just something that happens binary, that you're either in small talk or you're in deep talk. And that's just not the case.

Speaker 2: Instead, we taught you a simple strategy of horizontal questioning versus vertical questioning and allowing the conversation to get more vertical through vulnerability. And that vulnerability starts with you sharing emotions and becoming more expressive in your conversation. So if you enjoyed this show, smash the subscribe button, stop lurking, add a comment or two, or ask us a question we're so excited to hear from you. We want to keep dropping more amazing toolbox content like this. We want to hear how you put these small talk in transition on a small talk strategies into practice in your life. And if you're struggling with small talk today, head on over to the art of charm.com/smalltalk for our cheat sheet, with that incredible conversation, formula and great questions, you can ask to strike up a conversation anywhere, anytime with anyone.

Speaker 4: [inaudible]

Speaker 2: The secret to captivating smalltalk, head over to the art of charm.com/smalltalk to grab our free cheat sheet full of strategies and tips to help you have more captivating, small talk, and create more opportunities in your life. Thousands have already downloaded this free cheat sheet@theartofcharm.com slash small talk. Now this week, we want to give a shout out to Catarina Albrecht for taking our charisma code live stream from our Facebook group into politics and using AOC principles to improve her community

Speaker 3: AGA and I have been going live weekly covering lessons directly from our programs and podcasts to help you unlock your X-Factor so that you may begin the track, the right people, opportunities and lifestyle that you've dreamed for yourself.

Speaker 2: Last week, we discussed our charisma code, the three factors that build and grow your hidden charisma and how you can boost it to become a magnet of curiosity and interest in any room. Imagine how you will handle a presentation, a networking event, or even a date when your, the prize in everyone's eyes, join us today and check it out inside of our private Facebook group@theartofcharm.com slash challenge, we are excited to kick off more toolbox episodes this year. And we want to hear from you, what topics do you want us to tackle on an upcoming podcast episode? Let us know inside of our Facebook community, join today@theartofcharm.com slash challenge. Before we wrap, could you do us in the art of charm team, a huge favor, head on over to apple podcasts and rate this show. It means the world to us, and it helps us bring on tremendous guests each and every week. The art of charm podcast is produced by Michael Harold and Eric Montgomery go out there and have an epic week

Speaker 4: [inaudible] [inaudible].