Mark Goulston > Quotes

“Unlike simple stress, trauma changes your view of your life and yourself. It shatters your most basic assumptions about yourself and your world — “Life is good,” “I’m safe,” “People are kind,” “I can trust others,” “The future is likely to be good” — and replaces them with feelings like “The world is dangerous,” “I can’t win,” “I can’t trust other people,” or “There’s no hope.”
― Mark Goulston MD, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder For Dummies

“One absolutely crucial element in moving your brain from panic to logic is to put words to what you’re feeling at each stage.”
― Mark Goulston, Just Listen: Discover the Secret to Getting Through to Absolutely Anyone

“Don’t be afraid of sharing your vulnerabilities. Vulnerability doesn’t make you weak, it makes you accessible. Know that your vulnerability can be your strength. —KEITH FERRAZZI, AUTHOR, WHO’S GOT YOUR BACK”
― Mark Goulston, Just Listen: Discover the Secret to Getting Through to Absolutely Anyone

“So when you encounter problem people, realize that there’s a reason they’re behaving the way they do. It may be a new problem: a health scare, money problems, or job pressures. It may be a long-term problem: anxiety about not being good enough for a job, anger at not being respected, fear that you don’t find them attractive or intelligent. And, yes: It may be that they’re actually just jerks (but they’re usually not). Open your own mind and look for the reasons behind the behavior, and you’ll take the first step toward breaking down barriers and communicating with an “impossible” person.”
― Mark Goulston, Just Listen: Discover the Secret to Getting Through to Absolutely Anyone

“To strengthen your interpersonal influence, don’t win arguments. Instead, win hearts and minds.”
― Mark Goulston, Real Influence: Persuade Without Pushing and Gain Without Giving In

“Perpetually needy people suck the life out of you, because no matter what you do for them, it’s never enough.”
― Mark Goulston, Just Listen: Discover the Secret to Getting Through to Absolutely Anyone

“Emotions are built on layers. Beneath hatred is usually anger; beneath anger is frustration; beneath frustration is hurt; beneath hurt is fear. If you keep expressing your feelings, you will generally move through them in that order. What begins with “I hate you” culminates in “I’m scared. I don’t want to lose you, and I don’t know what to do about it.”
― Mark Goulston, Get Out of Your Own Way: Overcoming Self-Defeating Behavior

“I need to talk to you about something. I was so busy feeling upset with you and then acting impatient and irritated that I stepped on your toes instead of walking in your shoes. When I stopped to do that, I thought if I were you, I’d feel frustrated (scared, angry, etc.). Is that true?”
― Mark Goulston, Just Listen: Discover the Secret to Getting Through to Absolutely Anyone

“People who were abused as children tend to get angry and strike out at the world. People who were neglected tend to feel defeated and withdraw from the world. People who were not given guidance tend to lack confidence and self-reliance. Each pathway leads to different forms of self-defeat.”
― Mark Goulston, Get Out of Your Own Way: Overcoming Self-Defeating Behavior

“Perceiving is believing. Misperceiving is deceiving— And worse yet, prevents achieving.”
― Mark Goulston, Just Listen: Discover the Secret to Getting Through to Absolutely Anyone

“These people work hard and do their best, and they want the world to acknowledge that they’re intelligent, valuable, and creative.”
― Mark Goulston, Just Listen: Discover the Secret to Getting Through to Absolutely Anyone

“These elements of the Side-by-Side approach—asking questions during a shared moment, and then deepening the conversation with more questions—are as powerful as communication gets: so powerful that they form the core of the Socratic Method. Socrates never told anybody anything; he just walked around town with people asking them questions until they figured out the answers themselves, and in the process he helped create Western civilization.”
― Mark Goulston, Just Listen: Discover the Secret to Getting Through to Absolutely Anyone

“What Got You Here Won’t Get You There.”
― Mark Goulston, Just Listen: Discover the Secret to Getting Through to Absolutely Anyone

“Mark Twain once said, “Most conversations are monologues in the presence of witnesses.”
― Mark Goulston, Real Influence: Persuade Without Pushing and Gain Without Giving In

“Those who are comfortable taking chances know that the best way to grow is to reach beyond their grasp. Their sense of direction comes from the heart. They don’t shy away from surprise; they might even seek it out. And they seldom die with regrets. In the end we regret not what we have done but what we have not done.”
― Mark Goulston, Get Out of Your Own Way: Overcoming Self-Defeating Behavior

“Understanding a person’s hunger and responding to it is one of the most potent tools you’ll ever discover for getting through to anyone you meet in business or your personal life.”
― Mark Goulston, Just Listen: Discover the Secret to Getting Through to Absolutely Anyone

“Making someone “feel felt” simply means putting yourself in the other person’s shoes. When you succeed, you can change the dynamics of a relationship in a heartbeat. At that instant, instead of trying to get the better of each other, you “get” each other and that breakthrough can lead to cooperation, collaboration, and effective communication.”
― Mark Goulston, Just Listen: Discover the Secret to Getting Through to Absolutely Anyone

“While the simple act of naming the emotions you feel at each stage in a crisis is part of the solution, it’s just the first step.”
― Mark Goulston, Just Listen: Discover the Secret to Getting Through to Absolutely Anyone

“If you want to have an interesting dinner conversation, be interested. If you want to have interesting things to write, be interested. If you want to meet interesting people, be interested in the people you meet—their lives, their history, their story. Where are they from? How did they get here? What have they learned? By practicing the art of being interested, the majority of people can become fascinating teachers; nearly everyone has an interesting story to tell.”
― Mark Goulston, Just Listen: Discover the Secret to Getting Through to Absolutely Anyone

“A communications expert once made this distinction: “A know-it-all who doesn’t know what he is talking about is a jerk. A know-it-all who does know what he is talking about is just an ass.”
― Mark Goulston, Get Out of Your Own Way: Overcoming Self-Defeating Behavior

“That is what learning is. You suddenly understand something you’ve understood all your life, but in a new way.” —DORIS LESSING Ordinary”
― Mark Goulston, Get Out of Your Own Way: Overcoming Self-Defeating Behavior

“Remember: You can’t always change the people around you. But you can change the people you’re around.”
― Mark Goulston, Talking to Crazy: How to Deal with the Irrational and Impossible People in Your Life

“Inside every person is a real person. Who is just as afraid or nervous or in need of empathy as anyone else. Make a person feel felt.”
― Mark Goulston, Just Listen: Discover the Secret to Getting Through to Absolutely Anyone

“Life is a series of steps into the unknown.”
― Mark Goulston, Talking to Crazy: How to Deal with the Irrational and Impossible People in Your Life

“Something I know about seemingly confident people, and especially people who work in large companies, is that often they’re more afraid of making a mistake than they are of wanting to do something right.”
― Mark Goulston, Just Listen: Discover the Secret to Getting Through to Absolutely Anyone

“The key to fixing a big problem is to select the right tools.”
― Mark Goulston, Talking to Crazy: How to Deal with the Irrational and Impossible People in Your Life

“You’re in trouble if you’re trying to gain buy-in from someone who’s feeling angry, defiant, upset, or threatened because, in these situations, the person’s higher brain isn’t calling the shots. If you’re talking to a boss, a customer, a spouse, or a child whose lower brain or midbrain is in control, you’re talking to a cornered snake or, at best, a hysterical rabbit.”
― Mark Goulston, Just Listen: Discover the Secret to Getting Through to Absolutely Anyone

“Empathy is a sensory experience; that is, it activates the sensory part of your nervous system, including the mirror neurons we’ve talked about. Anger, on the other hand, is a motor action—usually a reaction to some perceived hurt or injury by another person. So by taking people out of anger and shifting them into an empathic behavior, the Empathy Jolt moves them from the motor brain to the sensory brain.”
― Mark Goulston, Just Listen: Discover the Secret to Getting Through to Absolutely Anyone

“That is what learning is. You suddenly understand something you’ve understood all your life, but in a new way.” —DORIS LESSING”
― Mark Goulston, Get Out of Your Own Way: Overcoming Self-Defeating Behavior

“anger and empathy—like matter and antimatter—can’t exist in the same place at the same time. Let one in, and you have to let the other one go. So when you shift a blamer into empathy, you stop the person’s angry ranting dead in its tracks.”
― Mark Goulston, Just Listen: Discover the Secret to Getting Through to Absolutely Anyone