Stop Talking About The Weather

10 out of 10 liability. — Yeah. What are you doing if you're trying to get 10 out of 10? — I am completely focused on them. — Good. — Um I'm attentive. I'm complimentary. I'm going to flatter them. — Y — um — do you think it will seem obquous? — I don't know if I get it right. — Okay. — Um cuz I'm going to mean it. — Yeah. Cuz it's going to be sincere. — really sincere. — Yeah. — I'm going to crack a great joke. — Yes. — Knock-k knockock. — Yeah. Who's there? — I don't know. You guys like I don't know. My family, didn't you? — Exactly. So yeah, I'm going to flatter them, crack jokes, be very attentive, get their name right, ask them about their grandchild. — Good. Okay, let's pause. I want to in that description already, you're moving quite quickly through topics as you're interacting with them. You know that you can't be circling the drain talking about the weather for long periods of time. So just briefly, let me say we don't need to avoid small talk. In fact, it's a very important social ritual for people who are strangers to each other, people who haven't seen each other in a long time. It's where we land and say, "Oh, we're doing conversation now. " The mistake that people make is they stay there too long. Way too long. Any more than like one beat of, "Oh my goodness, the weather's really warm. It's like summer in California. " Then you need to make it more personal and move up this topic pyramid towards medium talk, deep talk quickly, right? So small talk is at the bottom. These are topics anybody can talk about. Tailored talk is more exciting, more personalized, more relevant to your interests. Deep talk is the peak of this pyramid. Only we can talk about this thing in this special way. Not every conversation is bound to get to the deep talk, but when it does, we should feel very appreciative. It's one of the most magical things about being humans. Um, so we don't need to get to deep talk with like the barista at Starbucks or with your neighbor when they're taking out their trash, but it does happen sometimes and it's quite lovely. — I think I used to put girls off when I was 11 because I used to ask them like the meaning of life too quickly on my mother's stolen phone. — Yeah. — And so they would stop texting back. — Yeah. — So I think I learned early that like some people just don't like — Well, the joke's on them now. Now you get to do it for your life's work. No, but I think we you were on to something there. It's not that you asked them about the meaning of life at all. You asked it too quickly. So getting it's about the pacing as we move up here. Most people stay too long at the bottom, but we also cannot jump to the top often. You kind of have to do the ritual of climbing to feel like you get there in a natural way. — And is that where relationships are built? Deep ones — for sure. — At the top — moments at the top probably. Right. This is where vulnerability takes you. Um, often asking lots of questions, especially follow-up questions, gets you up the pyramid more quickly.