14 Characteristics of High-Performing People: Fear and Love

Talk, Talk, Talk!

Relationships work best when people talk, when they talk a lot.  When they talk about ideas.  When they ask questions.  One of the best ways to connect with people is through questions – genuine questions – not judgmental ones.  When you talk with someone, listen to what they are saying, then stop to reflect on what they’ve said.  Then, if there’s something you’d like to know more about, ask them a question.  This is how deep relationships are formed.  That said, some people just like to talk and they’re ready to go before the other person finishes his or her sentence.  But it’s better to let them finish before you respond with a thoughtful comment or a reasonable question. 

There will be a pause…they may even think you are stuck or stumped, but they will soon learn that you are formulating a curious question or an intelligent reply.  When you're in a relationship, when you're genuinely curious it’s also communicating to the person that you genuinely care about them and value them within the context of the relationship.  Now, the shadow side to that is that there may be people in your life that care about you and love you but aren’t curious enough to override their own assumptions.   When people make assumptions, it stems from fear of the outcome of the conversation.  “What if I don’t like the answer I get?” Or “What if I don’t get an answer I like?”  It’s better to just think I know what you are thinking than to ask you to say it out loud.  Have you ever walked into a room, and someone was not doing what they were supposed to be doing there?  It triggers you to make an assumption about their intent because you fear the possible answer to the question, “Why did you do that?”  You have a negative feeling or fear about their intent – they are lazy or negligent – rather than being curious and asking them what’s going on. 

Behaviors are Attached to Fear or Love

Most of us come into a situation with the perception that the glass is half empty, which is based on our fears.  Then we make assumptions that are not based on positive intent.  It is better to notice that we don't have positive intentions and recognize that our assumptions will not be favorable toward that person.  That’s how you can shift out of that mindset: Allow yourself to pause, then start asking curious questions.  Used properly, curiosity is the antidote to assumptions because at the very basic level it allows you to check in and communicate with them: Here's what I think is true, am I right?   

Now, you can ask questions without being curious and then they become justifying questions, they are righteous questions, and they are judgmental questions.  During a conversation, I can ask you, “Am I right?”  If I'm expecting that the answer is, “Yes” then it’s not really a question.  Any other answer to my question will set up retribution because it wasn’t really a question.  Most of us can sense those traps and because we've been conditioned to expect those traps, we're really good at spotting them.  This gets in the way of people trying to be curious because we have a society that promotes fear of reprisal.  We are fearful of being genuinely open when we disagree or refuse to conform with a higher authority’s viewpoint opinion. 

It’s a rumination on the state of society: We have to embrace these character elements and realize it’s inside us.

Think about Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs: It starts off with physiological needs, but the next level up is safety without which we are fearful.  Until fear is conquered, we cannot seek belonging (including love).  Being curious creates a secure environment and moves us beyond punishment to love.  Curiosity (based in love) does not seek to punish; it doesn’t presume an answer, but it accepts the answer it receives.

Conditioned Responses

Are people born with a “glass half empty” perspective?  It doesn’t seem so, but Lynn said that we acquire a conditioned social response to respond to fear – we are afraid that we won’t get what we need or want, or we will lose what we have.  When a toddler runs out the front door, Mom screams out because she’s afraid the child will get hurt.  The child doesn’t know that; they just wanted to run around outside.  However, the child becomes conditioned to avoid Mom screaming, and doesn’t yet understand the safety concern.  It doesn’t lead to the child making better life choices through self-autonomy, they just want to avoid the screaming (fear of authority).  Ben believes that our default setting is love, but we’re conditioned to behave in certain ways.  If the fear of punishment was bypassed, people will act in a more positive way, a more loving way of being and belonging as social creatures. 

In the workplace, your staff may fear feedback because it is usually negative.  The boss is afraid that something bad will happen if they don't continually give feedback to staff that is more corrective than constructive.  So, the staff fears a loss of employment, salary or status at work and are conditioned with an “Us vs. Them” mentality.  This is exacerbated by the fact that Human Resources departments traditionally protect the company at the expense of the worker.  Here is a secret: Companies are just big groups of people.  So, if you are protecting the company (the bureaucracy, the hierarchy) at the expense of the people who are you protecting?   

It’s amazing what you discover when you seek to understand somebody.  Kids are a great laboratory for this, but kids are just mini-adults.  Kids push boundaries, adults push boundaries, and kids don't stop when you tell them to stop.  There are some adults who don't stop when you tell them to stop.  They may have developed some coping skills, but haven’t outgrown childish, knee-jerk reactions.

Ben has three kids: Yet, he’s a pretty enlightened guy.

“I'm not saying I’ve reached full enlightenment, but you know we talk about this stuff at a higher level, and still at the end of the night, I'm snapping at my kids.  My youngest doesn't want to listen, she wants autonomy at the expense of maturity and wisdom.  She will be doing something innately well-intentioned where I see the danger of harm to her.  Yesterday, she knocked a lamp off her nightstand three times.  She didn’t do it on purpose, but she was tired, and she was floppy.  She got out of bed and stepped on the lamp cord.  The lamp fell off the nightstand.  We had the soft conversation, “You need to stay in bed, you‘re tired and floppy and it’s unsafe.  The lamp might break.”  Later, she got out again, grabbed her cup which was too close to the lamp, and her cup hit the lamp and it fell off.  Honestly, she didn’t have it in for the lamp, I knew she wasn't trying to break it!  At that point, I found myself doing the parent’s “sigh” and she picked up on it.  She started justifying her actions to me.   Why?  Because she was afraid that she was going to get in trouble!  I realized she was reacting to her social conditioning, so we cleaned up that behavior base and I said, “You're not in trouble.”  I explained why it's important to stay in bed and I put the lamp back on the nightstand.   Aaaaaaannnnd, she got out of bed to put her cup back on the nightstand and knocked the lamp off again.  Then, she got yelled at because I was just like, “What is wrong with you?!”  

It's so easy to fall into that cycle, even when you're good at this stuff. 

There are a lot of times when to be curious you must be assertive so that your boundaries are honored and valued.  It’s both give and take, and then it allows you time to be curious.  If you’re riding in a car with someone, and you yell, “Stop!” the driver would probably stop.  You better mean it, because the driver assumed there was a good reason, like the deer you saw coming out of the woods.  You’ve interrupted their regular driving pattern, but if the driver stops but doesn’t see a reason why, they are going to ask you about it.  They will be naturally curious about such odd behavior.

The Fear ← → Love Spectrum

Lynn said that since most assumptions are based on fear, genuine curiosity allows us to cross over into love.  Fear and love are on opposite ends of the spectrum, characterized by how much energy you spend on each one in your relationships.  Do you resist or master the elements of fear and love?  For example, exercising fearfulness looks like passive or aggressive behavior, and the more you exercise love your behavior becomes more assertive.  You can't really respect, honor, and value other peoples’ boundaries until you love them.  Otherwise, it's superficial and something will happen at some point to expose your insincerity.  You're not really honoring and valuing them; you’re just putting on airs.   Sometimes, it’s hard for us to see whether people are sincere or not but over time their actions speak louder.

Fear and love are on opposite ends of the spectrum.

It cuts both ways, fake love and fake fear, but you can’t do both at the same time.  Ben’s vocation is acting, but he just can’t play an evil or manipulative character.  He won’t be a believable abusive spouse or father because he can’t wear that veneer.  Other actors may have the mental discipline to raise that mindset; a method actor can fall into a role even if it’s not in their spirit.  For example, Heath Ledger wasn’t a bad person, but his performance as the Joker was one of the best villains ever.

Curious? Seek an Authentic Answer

Lynn thinks an authentic answer is better than a good-better-best one.  When she talks to her directors about an initiative or a problem, she may have an idea of how to address it, but she starts with curiosity.  Leaders listen to many points of view and acknowledge there may be a better answer than their own.  At home, she takes the same approach, asking questions and seeking the best resolution.  When a family member makes an assumption about her intent, it signals fear, “You don’t trust my judgment?  I already decided which lawnmower to buy, why are you questioning me?”  Lynn is curious, seeking the best decision or outcome, not seeking to be right, remaining humble.

We talked about this in the blogs we posted on Assertiveness.  With some people, it’s helpful to use the phrasing, “I’m genuinely curious.  I’m not questioning you, I just have a question.”  Sometimes you have to preface your question so that they will perceive your honorable intent.  It’s very powerful, but with great power comes responsibility.  You must never use this technique and then follow up with a disingenuous question – here are a couple of examples: Someone who says, “I’m just curious…how can you be so wrong (or naïve, or stupid)?” Or, they say, “Why did you do that, you should have … “.  They want to dismiss your defensiveness right away by a not-so-subtle attack, indicating they are not interested in your response.

One of Ben’s pet peeves is the ubiquitous “Communication Tips for Practicing Active Listening”.  These are prescribed behaviors that allow you to act like you’re listening:

• Make eye contact
• Paraphrase what you heard
• Ask a random question
• Nod sincerely and say, “Thank you”

You can follow these steps perfectly and walk away and within minutes you will forget the whole exchange.  You were not paying attention, not interested in what they said, and not curious in the least.  You were, however, “practicing” active listening!

Here’s another example.  Some K-12 schools use clapping to control students in the classroom or at an assembly.  The teacher claps in a certain rhythm, and the students respond with that clapping rhythm.  In theory, it should interrupt their activities and get them focused on the teacher.  Sadly, the same clapping rhythm is used every time, so the students are conditioned to respond with that same clapping rhythm.  What happens?  They do the clapping as a rote exercise and continue what they were doing before.  Then the teacher has to follow up with another interruption technique to get their attention.  Here's a tip – use random clapping patterns so that the students notice something different.  This breaks their concentration and causes them to think and engage consciously because they refocus their attention.

That’s No Lady!

In the example above, the students have become robots.  They clap in response because they fear the outcome if they don’t do it.  Instead of understanding the relationship between their teacher’s need for their attention, and their response to the clapping, they mindlessly follow the drill.  They are doing what they are expected to do (the clapping) rather than being focused on being attentive to the teacher (the relationship).  The doing is observable, the teacher can see and hear which students are clapping.  The being is more important but is not readily measured because it is mindset-based behavior.  It’s not the clapping that is important but rather the character of the student who acknowledges their relationship of love and respect for the teacher. 

People in positions of authority live authentically through a mindset that creates a consistent pattern of behavior over time.  Margaret Thatcher said, “Being in power is like being a lady.  If you have to tell people you are – you’re not!”   Being a person of high character competence is like being a lady too – if you have to tell people you are – you’re not!