Summary: Bestselling Author Mark Goulston started as a clinical interventional psychiatrist and UCLA professor of psychiatry. He learned to “hack” into the minds of suicidal and potentially violent individuals to prevent acts of destruction to others or themselves. He next went on to train FBI and police hostage negotiators. Mark has written several books on effective communication that teach you how to get your message heard using a powerful communications secret – listening.<br> Mark began his career as a psychiatrist with a specialty in crisis intervention. There are many instances where a patient will be admitted to a mental hospital because they’re suicidal and then in order to get discharged a psychiatrist on the outside needs to agree to see them because they still require treatment outside the hospital setting. Mark helped many patients abandon their suicidal tendencies. It was while seeing these patients that Mark developed the skill of “listening into” somebody. He drew from these experiences to write his first book, Just Listen. <br> Our conversation was fascinating and covered many topics including: psychology, how to develop a book title that grabs your audience, and techniques for communicating. Here are a few of the takeaways:<br> <br> * The power of listening into somebody. Listening into somebody means looking at the conversation from their point of view.<br> * The difference between listening and listening into.<br> * The power of listening and how it delights us.<br> * The key to listening is to care about what the person is saying when they’re talking to you. If you care about what people are saying and you are truly present with them in that moment, they will let you take them anywhere.<br> * It’s important that you don’t do a bait and switch. If you’re listening to a customer simply to try and sell them something and you don’t genuinely care about them itwill show through.<br> * The importance of staying true to your values.<br> * Use the Think like Steve Jobs Formula to come up with great book titles.<br> * Writing thoughtful reviews can be a great way to network with authors.<br> * How to network using LinkedIn discussions.<br> * How to be truly present in a conversation.<br> * Be a first-class noticer.<br> * The purest form of listening is listening without memory or desire.<br> * The importance of letting go of your own personal agenda when you’re listening to people.<br> * The value of Purposeful Agendaless Listening<br> * When networking get the person you are networking with to talk about something that is important to them. If you can have a conversation with someone that helps them be a clear on something important to them they will be grateful to you and you will form a strong connection.<br> * Be more interested than interesting. Be more fascinated than fascinating.<br> * Boredom occurs when I fail to make the other person interesting.<br> * Write what it is you would like to read. Whenever you get stuck staring at the screen just ask yourself, “what would I like to say here” or, “what would I like my character to say here?” Even if it’s not exactly right at least he gives you a jumping off point to make it better.<br> * The difference between should and want and why it’s important.<br> <br> How to Calm Down Irrational People with the FUDN Approach<br> The FUDN approach stands for:<br><br> <br><br> Frustrated<br><br> Upset<br><br> Disappointed<br><br> Now What<br><br> <br> It works like this. Imagine you are talking to someone who is very angry. When they take a break from ranting you say, “you sound frustrated what’s that about?” And then you listen to what they have to say. When you’re listening you need to listen for four things: hyperbole (exaggerated statements or claims,
