Ep. 183: Elite Communication Skill with Ty Hoesgen

Hey everybody, welcome back to the You Winning Life podcast. Today's guest is Ty Hoskin, and he's the CEO of Advanced Growth Institute, where he's helping entrepreneurs and professionals master the art of communication. He is a communication expert, and he's written the book Elite Communication Skills. Where he helps professionals communicate more powerfully so you can earn more money and advance your career faster than your peers. Today we're going to have some really insightful conversations about his own journey of his communication style, what he learned about his strengths and weaknesses, as well as takeaways in which you can master for yourself. And like always, if there's anything that you benefited from in this podcast or you think someone else will, please feel, feel, feel free to share it out. And, uh, if you want even more so to leave us a review on anywhere you can do so. And we would love to hear from you directly. So please give us a shout out on Jason Wasser LMFT 🎗️ on Instagram. And we look forward to hearing from you soon. And as always, thank you for joining us on this journey. Ty, welcome to the show.

All right.

All right, my man.

Welcome. Thank you, Jason. Pleasure to be here.

All right. So we had a great pregame. And you know what I love talking about pregame is sometimes these organic conversations that I have with guests turn into, crap, we should have recorded these things, right? So, so I want to go just right off the bat. We can go into the history of what you do. We can go into how you discovered what you do. But I think the first thing that people know from the introduction is that this is about communication. This is about bringing the best, most authentic version of you to the table. And people don't even realize what they're capable of because of the story that they have of themselves. And you're a person that went through that for yourself, which led you to becoming an expert in this area. So I want to just, you know, not having to do the redundant, tell me about who you are and where you grew up and where you're from, all those things. But the component about where communication became so important for you and how you figured out, oh, I may not be playing at my greatest and most authentic version of myself.

You know, growing up, I was very much a shy, awkward farm kid. Actually, I grew up on a small farm in Western Canada, and I remember being 10 years old, I climbed to the top of the highest tree that I could find in our yard. So this is pretty dangerously high for a 10-year-old to climb. And I remember just looking out in this vast prairie landscape. I grew up in Western Canada. I remember just thinking, it'd be really nice if I could just stay up here. And I wanted to stay up there because I just didn't want to be around people. I didn't want to have to talk to anyone. I just wanted to avoid people at all costs. So it was really that in that moment, that was kind of the first time that I was like, I just would love to be alone. Mm-hmm. Now imagine if I had stayed that way decades later, right? Where would my career be? Where would my social life be? My relationships, my friendships. So I mentioned that just because wanting to avoid people as much as possible, having an older sister who would answer questions for me, to now teaching communication for a living, teaching people how to speak with more confidence, more charisma, more clarity. Working with hundreds of people, really is just a good example to show that none of these traits that you have are fixed, right? Nothing is set in stone. You can really become anything that you want. So it's something that pretty much every client that I work with at the end of a coaching program, they always say, oh, I didn't even know I could change this. I didn't know I could be more charismatic. I didn't know I could speak with more influence. I didn't know I could change this shyness or this awkwardness in these high-pressure situations. So I think a really good way to open this up is just to remind everyone that no matter what trait you have or what you label yourself as, introvert, extrovert, ambivert, everything is changeable because everything's just a set of thought— thoughts and behaviors. And we know that those can be changed.

So I can see so many people out there listening to this have already defined themselves as who they are. This is who I am. Not going to change. I don't know, even, right, I wish I was, or maybe I don't even care that I was. I don't even know that I could. Where would some of the inkling come in? Like, where were some of those, like, even for you, right, in your own journey of like noticing like the little voice of reason or the doubt in a positive way, doubt that started saying something's— something can be different for me, something can be better for me. And then maybe that self-doubt kicked in. Nah, that's a bunch of BS. Or no, that's not who I can be. Or that's gonna take a lot of effort. Walk us through a little bit of some of those, you know, moments for you that I'm sure would make sense where everybody else out there listening who might be hearing this saying like, oh yeah, I can relate to that. And what do I do with that? What do I— what does a person do with that?

Yeah, I resisted the change for many, many years, and I was really stuck in the, oh, why am I like this? Why am I not good at this? Why aren't I naturally an exceptional speaker? And it wasn't until I hit a really low point. It was when I just finished university. The only job I could get out of university was selling life insurance. So imagine you know, I'm in my early 20s, I'd be afraid, Jason, to say, hey Jason, how's your weekend? That would make me so nervous. And now my whole income was based on saying, hey Jason, let's talk about what's going to happen if you die young. Let's talk about death, disease, disability. And now that's what my income and my livelihood is based on. So I got to a really low point just because I struggled so much with it. I remember There were times I'd be throwing up before meetings, just thinking, why is this so hard for me? Why am I so anxious and nervous? And so with that, it really got to a point where I just, I was laying in bed one night and I remember just thinking to myself, this is no way to live. You know, I'm not trying to be super successful at that point, but I know that things could be better. There has to be a way for things to be better. So that's what kind of sparked that initial moment where I knew that there had to be some things I could look up. Maybe I could do some research, maybe I could start looking into things. And so it's kind of in that moment where I'm not sure if it was a glimmer of hope, but it was a moment of, I gotta do something. Yeah. So hopefully if you're listening, you don't have to get to that low point. To spark something inside of you. Maybe things are just kind of okay. Maybe there's certain situations where you're like, mm, around these important people, it's tough for me to speak the way that I want to, or in these big meetings with these types of people or in presentations, I'm not speaking as clearly and confidently as I'd like, no matter what it is, recognizing kind of the gaps first.

Okay.

I'm speaking this way. Now, this is the way I'd like to speak. And then building that awareness. And then from there, we can talk about how do we actually fill in those gaps and get better.

So when you share that, it reminded me of a dining experience 2 weeks ago, and I was doing takeout, and the person who was most responsible for making customer care contact at the end of the receiving line looked miserable. They were put together. They looked like a kind and nice person, but their, their countenance was just unhappy. And I remember noticing that, and I remember noticing what an opportunity, right? You're, you're the last person that this customer is going to make contact with. And I was wondering what was going on, right? I wasn't playing therapist. I wasn't going to go like, hey, are you okay? Right? Type of thing. But, but what a missed opportunity for a young person. Like you said, this first job potentially, right? College kid or right out of college. To not know who they authentically are, what's authentic, right? What's, what's in them, what's capable of them, and to be a) stuck in a position that doesn't serve them, or 2) know how to take themselves to connect with other people and missing out on all of those opportunities. And it hurt me, like it hurt me, like feeling like that, like seeing that as— and they may not even be aware of it, but like that pain that, that probably that person might have been in. And I see it throughout my whole life of being, you know, I was a naturally shy person growing up too. And I used to— I've told this story before, but I used to not speak in any public presentations in classes. And I'd rather get the F all through elementary school and early middle school. So I know exactly. So I'm the perfect person to be talking to, right, in this conversation. Such as your experience, where it was radically painful to see myself and the amount of anxiety-provoking experiences that I have. So I have such compassion for this topic. And I think it's so important for those who are listening to this or know someone who's going, you know, they may know someone who's going through this, why our conversation today is such a life-saving concept.

Appreciate you sharing that. Yeah, it's, it's truly powerful stuff, and there's so many layers to this. There's that person who had the last bit of contact with you and you're getting takeout, who really would benefit from probably just some basic conversational skills, learning how to connect, learning how to just have a better experience, even if it's something quick like small talk.

Right.

And there's others all the way up at, you know, the executive level or they're entrepreneurs. And what's interesting is I work with a lot of those people and a lot of times they feel the same way at times, but they just don't talk about it and you can't see it on their face. So what's interesting is that I've learned throughout my years of coaching, a lot of our stress actually comes from people, right? Yes. Heavy workload, other things going on certainly adds to it, but the interactions that we have with people and the way that we feel showing up to communicate, the way that we're speaking to people and the results that we get from that, oftentimes that's one of the biggest sources of our stress and our anxiety. So I always will rate, or rather measure and get somebody to rate themselves on a scale of 1 to 10 in terms of their level of stress when they start a program. So average, they're starting at like 7 to 8, sometimes 9. And then when they finish, it's usually 3 or 4 months, they end up at a 3 or a 4 on average. Now they haven't changed their workload, haven't changed their job, but we've just changed the way that they communicate with others. So imagine if instead of having these stressful conversations, people pushing back on you or people not responding the way that you want, things were just now more smooth, more easy. They flow. Communicate your ideas in a way that makes sense to others. You know how to gain a deeper understanding of what the other person is saying. You know how to connect and ask the right questions and say the right things so that both people get the results that they want. So no matter where you're at, so if you're starting off, it's the first job, or you know, you're a C-suite role, you're a big-time entrepreneur, just learning how to communicate better so that you can have smoother, more peaceful interactions with everyone that can be such a game changer in terms of how you feel, even just waking up and starting every day.

I see this day to day in my practice, right? Couples, let's just say, or parenting. And like, so many times, like, I'll have parents reach out to me and wanting to do family therapy with their kids. And then through asking them a set of questions, finding out that we don't necessarily need to do family therapy, we need to restructure how the parent is communicating and expressing both their body language, verbal, nonverbal, right? And I remember having this conversation with a potential client and finding and hearing them just as they're expressing their, their, their challenge with their adult child with me. And I said, I just want to challenge you to hear that you use a certain word to describe the situation you're going through. And I know, because I'm not invested in the emotional dynamics of your family, I can hear that word neutrally. But my guess is your adult child is hearing that and cringing every time you come from that perspective. And there was silence on the other side of the phone, right? And we— this is why this is on some level so simple and yet so profound, because what I, what I, what I know you and I are both in alignment on is it's not what you're saying, it's the meanings and the layers of complexity. It's the beliefs, the assumptions, the expectations embedded in someone's communication or non-communication. And that's where we get stuck a lot of times.

Yeah, it's such a good example because the case of your client there is probably what they said, and using that word, it's also probably a little bit how they said it. What's their voice like? You mentioned the body language too. These are all layers. Those are really The 3 big ones, 3 big areas is the words, what you're saying, the voice, how you're saying it, and then your body language, how you're presenting yourself, the signals that you're sending nonverbally. So if you can get all of those lined up, and then we add in, you know, you putting yourself in a good state of mind before that interaction, calming yourself down so you're actually in a state that allows you to easier implement a lot of this stuff, that's really the success formula. Right there. And then once you do that, everything just becomes really a lot smoother. We should probably add listening to that as well, because you could be doing all those other things right, but if you're zoning out and not paying attention, then it doesn't really matter what you say or how you're presenting it. I had one client who all we did was we got her to start using "it sounds like" and just paraphrasing whatever she heard. I love the, it sounds like one of the best tools that if you're listening, you should definitely start repeating your understanding of what someone just said back to them by saying, okay, it sounds like this. And two things are, one of two things is gonna happen. One is they're either gonna confirm you and they're gonna say, yes, you're right. Or they're gonna correct you and they're gonna say, well, it's kind of more like this, or no, it's actually this either way. You get that really good deep understanding of what they're saying. So even just doing that, you'll be amazed because people will feel like, oh, they're really trying to listen to me, they care, and you get to learn exactly what they mean. So then you can respond accordingly because you actually know what they meant.

Yeah, I like the one down languaging. I remember in my graduate school, so the marriage and family therapy field actually didn't come out of traditional psychology. It came out of cybernetics, systems theory, right? A whole different like, recursive patterns and homeostasis, right? So very different than psychology diagnosis, that lens. And one of the first semester professorial guidances was, we're not here— yes, we're experts because we're licensed and we have master's and doctoral degrees, from that perspective. But we're not here to be experts on their worldview, and our job is to take that one-down stance and ask questions that they've never been asked before, from perspectives they've never been asked before, with a one-down stance. So when you're, right, sharing that phraseology, it's so impactful of I'm, you know, the same thing as I'm curious if, I'm wondering if, this reminds me of, does this resonate, right? That open-ended, right? Non-definitive. And what I love about what you said is that it also distills, helps the person who may think they're being absolutely accurate in what they're sharing with that person. It may help them to distill it and chunk it down even better. Because they're saying X but it's really about Y.

We're absolutely right, because sometimes the person, even though they think that they're being clear, they don't even really realize they're kind of saying one thing but kind of meaning another thing, which definitely happens. And I always tell people when I teach this, don't worry about paraphrasing and saying, "It sounds like," and then you're wrong. That doesn't mean that necessarily you did a bad job. Sometimes it's actually just maybe they weren't that clear and it doesn't really matter. So just throw out the "it sounds like," because the goal here is just to gain the understanding, right? The goal here is not to be right and have people say, "Yes, amazing. You labeled that perfectly. You are awesome." That's not the goal. The goal is to really learn what they actually mean. And all those other examples you gave, there's really that underlying theme of curiosity. Right? Having that curious tone, it's so disarming and really just allows a person to stay calm, not get as defensive. So if you can approach this, or even most conversations really, with that curiosity, that's gonna go a long way.

Absolutely. And I know people talk about, especially in entrepreneurial circles, right, you want to be the most interesting person in the room. And I push back and I said, no, you want to be the most curious person. In the room. And that alone will make you interesting because you're creating that connection, that space, and people do want to talk about themselves. But I see it where we just had this, I think, with, you know, the vice president nominee was just picked here on whatever— today's August 7th, so yesterday, right? And they said the difference between why the vice president is now picking her running mate was because one candidate came in saying, "Tell me what you need me to do." And the other person came in and said, "Here's where I'd like to," right? And even though those are both accurate and both important for both of those positions, we didn't know which— the candidate who was picking her vice president, we didn't know which one she prefers personality style. Was it the person who's saying, "Here's what I'd like to have happen," or, "Here's where I can see myself, and what do you think, and where would that play out?" Or would it be 'Hey, tell me what you want. Tell me what you need.' And even though both are not wrong, it was a little bit of reading a room situation.

That's such a great example. Wow, what a powerful example to show that, hey, this will get you the vice presidency versus not getting you the vice presidency. Yeah, I just got an email yesterday. I just signed up for a new gym and I got an email from them yesterday and it was this long, long, long email. It was welcoming me first. And then the next line was, so the first thing we're gonna do is we're gonna sit you down and I'm gonna get you to go through all of your previous fitness goals, your current fitness goals, your future, like fitness aspirations, what challenges you have, da da da da da. Then we're gonna get you on the floor. We're gonna get you sitting on the floor. We're going to see your flexibility and da da da. And they're just listing all these things and I'm like, I don't wanna do any of that. I wanna do none of those things is what I'm thinking. Cause I've worked out for over 10 years. I know what I'm doing. Yeah. I just, I got a tour of the gym. That's all I needed. But it just kind of turned me off cuz they assumed that I wanted all of these things and just the way that it was written, I was like, like not a, not a good taste in my mouth right off the bat cuz it was very presumptive.

Yeah.

And there was no curiosity. Like I don't wanna sit on the ground with you. Like, I want to be in and out in 30, 45 minutes. I don't have time for this.

Right, right. And then curiosity— no curiosity, right? And I think when you get to that corporate structure where it becomes like just run-of-the-mill, and it's— they may not care whether they lose you as a client. They're just happy that— right, meaning like they may not care whether you respond to the email and you just show up, but they're losing— like you said, I have a bad taste, and I'm more likely to not extend a contract or renew a contract if I find a better option that does fit that. Way in the future that will get you out, right, in 30 minutes. If you said I want 45 minutes, well, what happens if you find a place that gets you out in 30 minutes? And that's the whole thing.

100%. And it really could have been one line, just be like, hey, anything you'd like help with as you're starting out? It could have just been one sentence asking me a question, and I would have liked it more. I'm curious, Jason, do you ever get an email or something from a business or a service provider or something And then you want to respond with feedback on the email. You're like, here's how I would have written this better. You don't have to take the advice.

Yeah.

Like, here's how this email would have been so much better. Do you ever think that?

I got a fundraising call last week, and it's an organization that I willingly want to give money to, and these people are volunteers that are calling, and I felt so bad, and I had to say to the person, I'm really sorry. But I need you to let whoever wrote your script know that they turned me off. I'm willing to give you money and I will give you money, but you just told me how much I need to give based on what I gave last, that I should be giving it right now while I'm on the phone with you. And then when I said I'm happy to give, I'm already allotted for my month with other charities, I will rotate back around next month for yours. Your next response was, well, if you can't give me this amount now, can you, can you at least earmark a certain— tell us how much money you're going to give next month.

Yeah, it's got the presumption of what you would think or what you would want without actually considering or asking. Yeah, yeah.

And it's such an important charity, and I know friends have benefited specifically as a recipient of this charity. In a specific medical area. And I know they do good things. And this is trickle-down economics of this is a volunteer position. So, and that's why I said, I'm like, I know you're a volunteer, I'm not upset at you. I just want to let you know how this script comes across. And I don't know if you can relate that back up the flagpole or tell, you know, share this back up the flagpole. But this script doesn't work. And it turned me off.

You did give the feedback. I love it.

Yeah. And I said, you know, I know you probably don't have any control over this and you're doing your job and you're doing a volunteer bit. It's an important— I literally, like, I was as compassionate as possible. I will be giving money. I don't know what it will be. It may be the same. It may be more. It may not. I don't know what my allotment is next month because I have a few different charities I rotate around through. And I don't know what might come up that might take a higher precedent next month. But let me tell you how this might turn off a lot of people who aren't going to share this with you. And I don't know who you need to tell that to, if or if they even care.

But so they need to know.

Yeah, they need to know. But most companies, I think that's where, you know, having impact, right, getting into the nitty-gritty of where we can, you know, the listener who was like, well, how do I do this? But how do I have impact? And this applies not just in entrepreneurship, right? This implies in families and with friends and with even like a charity, right, or, or maybe they're on a nonprofit board, or they're— they want to volunteer somewhere— is how do you show up and feel like you can bring the full part of you to have impact if you can't express or share that completely without fear, without doubt, without like, I don't want to turn anybody off?

One of the things that a lot of people I speak with find relief in is that they don't have to do as much as they think. It's what you and I are talking about, right? At the foundation, it's a lot of listening, it's asking questions, and it's being curious. So if 80% of the time you're listening and asking questions, 20% of the time actually isn't that much. You don't have to talk nearly as much as you think. Right. And listening, I mean, you sit there silently, you can nod, right? You can give them some verbal cues, but you don't really have to do that much, right? You don't have to be super impressive or say anything cool. But when it gets to the part of your speaking, that's usually such a small piece. And if you've really listened and asked questions and been curious, that first 80%, then it's pretty easy, a lot easier anyways, because you kind of know who they are, what they might want to hear. The type of person. And so you can tailor your message and even tailor the way that you're speaking a little bit. So, you know, if they're very calm and they're peaceful and they speak like this, I wouldn't want to be coming at them like this, talking really fast, getting in their face, getting really loud, not pausing, right? They're going to be like, whoa, this is not a person that I align with. It's a great way to create a disconnection, right, when there's a big kind of vocal gap like that. So It's not that you need to speak the same way as them, but you can, you know, slow down a little bit to match them just so that they feel more of a connection. I remember actually one of my, one of my best clients that I ever had, I met her at a networking event and she talked to me about her aquarium for probably like half an hour. And for that half an hour, she had no idea what I did. She knew nothing about me. She's just talking to me about her aquarium, you know, all the different fish that she gets. And, you know, she gets a bigger one every couple of years and just keeps adding more fish. But you can't have these fish with those fish because this fish will eat that fish and just stuff like that. And I remember just asking questions about the fish and being like, you know, things like, oh, like, what are, what are some of the favorite ones that you've added recently? Or You know, where did your love for these aquariums start? Just basic stuff, right? Once somebody is talking about something that they like, then any question you ask about that, they're just gonna love to keep going, and they're gonna love you and love talking to you. So remember at the end she said, you know, that was one of the best conversations I've had in a while. You are such a good conversationalist. What do you do for a living? And so I told her, I'm a communication coach, help professionals speak with more confidence, charisma, and clarity so they can advance their careers, yada yada yada. Probably could have said any version at that point because she just liked me so much. She was like, okay, I'm gonna keep you in mind. And then a couple months later, she had to give a big presentation at work. She messaged me, started working together right away, and ended up being a client for like 6 months. Wow. After that, which is longer than I usually do. Usually people make all the progress in 3 to 4 months and they're good. But she just kind of wanted to keep working together because she enjoyed her time. So that was only because I listened and was so curious about her aquariums. Had I not done that, I would not have gotten her as a client and definitely would not have become friends.

Yeah, the two things I'm taking from that is this is a, this is a self-awareness play underneath everything, and I'm realizing more and more there's two factors for healthy success on all levels, is, is self-awareness and boundaries. And when those boundaries need to kick in, when they can be a little bit more open. But really what I'm, what I'm hearing underneath this is how does communication as an output of self-awareness. And when you're asking, when you're holding that space, because I'm sure there was a time frame in there if you weren't in a networking situation and this was just a random person in line next to you and they just started blurting out to you about their aquarium, it may have been a different scenario. But you were going in with the context of this is networking and this is business, and right, so you're already holding that space. Do you find that when people hold So I'll give you— maybe I'll just make it a personal example. There are times where I will go to social events that are purely social, but I'll have in mindset that it's— that I'm going to show up more of an energy without it being pushy and preachy, right, of being Jason the therapist versus being Jason the guy who's just going to the social event. And my energy and/or my esteem, self-esteem, might change, but also at the same time making sure that I'm even more so being more curious than I typically would be, even though I would naturally be curious, which probably led me to being a therapist. But do you find that when people can practice just that level? Well, I guess the answer would be yes. But like, how do you have— how do you— how do you find people? How do you navigate and guide people to be even more self-aware? In that experience, in that awareness of— because I think that's the crux of, of what helps people achieve what you are helping them with, is laying out a whole nother level of self-awareness.

I'm really happy you said this because it sounded like you went into that particular social situation with an intention to be a particular way, or maybe do something a little bit different. That alone is so powerful. Most people, they go into a situation and they think nothing. They're just going through the motions. They're just on autopilot. They don't think about how they wanna show up before a particular event. I cannot over— I cannot overstress actually how much this works personally. When I was first learning about communication, I read about the power of intention, and there was an example that I was given about money. And they said, if I told you that I was going to give you a million dollars to listen to me speak for the next 5 minutes, then I was going to quiz you, and I would give you the million dollars if you could answer the questions correctly based on what I said. How well would you listen? I use that example now with people, but I say it's 10 million cuz a million doesn't actually get you that far anymore. So I say it's 10 million. And so the only difference is intention. So I remember I was going to, I think it was just like a party, like a social event, casual friend thing. It was still pretty, would've been early 20s still at this time. I remember showing up and before I went in I thought, okay, I'm gonna do my best to connect with people there. Be a good listener. I want to make them feel good about our conversation. And I swear it was a completely different experience just because I thought about it versus my autopilot, which was just at that time, just kind of be awkward, kind of be shy and not really talk to anyone, you know, talk a little bit, but kind of be weird about it. And for some reason, because I had set that intention, the whole night, I was just like, wow, I'm having a good conversation. Oh, you know, that's kind of nice. Oh, people are responding well. People seem to like me. I'm thinking, what's going on here? Am I likable now? So just setting the intention and the awareness of saying, okay, in this situation, I'm about to go, and maybe it's the work meeting, it's a presentation, maybe you're talking to a prospect, maybe you're going to, you know, an event, a gathering, whatever it might be. Pick the type of person that you want to be and say, I'm going to listen very well, I'm going to ask a lot of questions, I'm going to speak very clearly, or I'm going to tell short, interesting stories. Whatever it might be, just doing that, I promise, will change how you show up.

Yeah, you reminded me of a story that I loved so much. It was from one of my graduate school professors, and it was actually published, I believe, in Psychotherapy Networker many, many years ago. And this is He was a founder of a family therapy program. He is an expert Ericksonian hypnosis teacher, author of multiple books. And we would joke in graduate school, like, he had this like, wonderfully friendly and wonderfully warm, but there was just like this intimidation factor, right, of this professor. Like, it was just like, you know, he was never a self-proclaimed guru. We just like, we put him on that pedestal. So I remember him telling the story and I remember reading it, but I remember him telling the story of like one of his first big speaking engagements. And he went in and he thought he killed it, like just amazing. I was so proud of myself. And I was— and I shared everything so succinctly. And then I opened the floor for questions. And one of the people there just tore me apart. You said this, I don't believe this. You said this, I think this is— the research shows this. You said this, right? And he was devastated. And he's like, I'm never going to present again. Done. Done speaking, whatever. And he went to his mentor. And his mentor said, I want you to, to try this. You're going to speak again. Right? I'm gonna take control of that situation for you. You're going to speak again. But here's what you're going to do. You're going to get up at the beginning and you're going to say, at the end, you know, I'm looking forward to sharing this information with you. And my guess is that there are probably at least one of you in the audience that's absolutely going to disagree with everything I say. And I might piss some of you off. And I look forward to hearing your feedback at the end in a playful and loving way to help me become a better Speaker.

I love the, the pre-frame where he's almost setting up the behavior that he wants. That's so powerful. That's a perfect example. I thought you were going to say, okay, some of you will probably disagree with me, which is why there will be no Q&A at the end, right? There's going to be no questions. No.

Or am I even going to— right, am I even going to open— am I even going to tell anybody? Am I even going to open up for questions. Or you could say, like, just send me an email, right? This is just the data, didactic information, right? You take it with what you want and shut that off. It was actually welcoming that, right? It's— and I call it like, it's that, you know, we, we, we all at some point have that image of like the Magician, uh, or the cartoon, right? Yanking the tablecloth off, you know, under the— off all the dishes and like everything falling. But right, it's that, it's that, you know, It's that, right? We're yanking the tablecloth out from under the cutlery before it falls, before we set, right? And I think that sets the table in a really wonderful way for the mindset of if you are concerned, I would challenge someone to say, like, if you're concerned that you're more awkward than you want to be, you can leverage that as part of your commitment. Hey, like, I may like— I'm not sure what question I might you know, say it, own it, right? Hey, but like, I want to get into this conversation with you. It sounds really interesting. I don't even know what question I should ask you. I'm just really interested about the topic you guys are talking about over there. What should I know?

And a lot of people would take that feedback and either, like you said, not speak again, or just do nothing with it and hope it doesn't happen. Remember there was a time, it was one of my first jobs, my boss, we were going around the room, everyone was giving their weekly update.

Yep.

Weekly update team meeting, classic, right? And so I gave my update and he said, okay, like, what do you think about this? I don't remember what the exact question was, but he asked for my opinion. And then I remember giving an answer. I think I spoke for 2 or 3 minutes straight. And he said, Yes, Ty, but what do you think?

Mm-hmm.

Because apparently I was just throwing spaghetti at the wall and not being very clear. If anyone's ever seen The Office, there's a Michael Scott scene that I really like, and he's just, he starts a sentence and he's just rambling and rambling, and there's a cutscene of him where he's speaking to the camera and he says, sometimes I start a con— or sometimes I start a sentence and I don't really know where I'm going with it, but I just kind of hope I find it along the way. Yeah, so that's apparently what I was doing, but I just never found it along the way. And I just remember his tone of voice was so— I mean, at the time it was seemingly harsh. It could have been normal, but it seemed very harsh at the time. And so what I— yeah, what I learned from that was I need to be now more concise. I need to say my main point first. And so really practical framework that I teach and that people seem to like is just you start with your main point, then you give your reason— why do you believe your point— and then you can restate your point at the end for ultimate clarity. So just your point, reason, point. So if I said, this is what I think, these are the reasons why I think it, that's what I think. Yeah, then I could have saved that embarrassing experience where I still can hear his voice in my head to this day. But I, I mentioned that because sometimes other people can show us those gaps for us, and it might be painful at the time, but they can be great indicators of where you need to improve. And if you're not getting that feedback, I highly recommend recording yourself in some of these situations. And watching it back, because a lot of people that I work with don't even know that they're making some of these mistakes until they watch and listen to themselves.

Yeah, yeah. I'm reminded I went to my mentor where I was struggling. It was the first weekend I met him, and, and business entrepreneur coach, his name's Rick, and I've been hearing about this program for a while. Took me 2 to 3 years to decide to go. And I was working with a coach. And I'm like, well, this guy, this coach has come, done stuff in his program. I'm not sure if I'm getting the value out of it that I need. And I went up to him and I asked him the question like, hey, and it was a whole narrative. And he basically said, hold on, stop one second. And he whittled it down to 3 questions. Do you want to continue working with person A, at this amount of time, right? At this amount of money per that time? Yes or no? Well, but maybe there's more to come, and maybe I'm not doing all the work. No, no, no. Do you want to continue working with this person at this amount of money for this amount of time? I don't know. Hold on. Do you want to work with anybody at that amount of time for this amount of money? Yes or no? I'm like, oh no. Oh, okay.

Right.

So it was like that, that step-by-step filtration that just— I felt my brain unlocking in helping solve a problem, which is why he's a capital venture billionaire and owns Xan and 100-something companies, right? It's— that's, that's the decisiveness. That's the clarity. And I knew my pattern at that time was telling that story because I wouldn't even want to hurt the person that I'm firing to my own detriment. That was more of a concern. But I like the guy. I care for him. Maybe there's— maybe it's something I'm not doing. And really, it just was, I don't want to spend that amount of money with anybody, even if I was getting that value.

Yeah, sometimes there's all those thoughts swirling about, right? You had mentioned, well, maybe I'm not doing enough, or well, maybe, you know, if this was a little bit different. And so the framework of even the point, reason, point, right? If you were forced to think of your main point first and say that, you probably would have thought, well, no, actually No, no is your main point. No, I don't want to. Not, well, and this and a bunch of other variables. No, what's your main point? Main point is no.

Yeah, but most people, that is such a powerful frame. Yeah. Oh, remember at that time, I'm 46 now, so this was late 30s, early 40s, so I had that many years of momentum of a narrative And I'm thinking about all the people out there that are listening, all the people you're working with, and I'm working with, of like, how many years of a momentum of a narrative, compounded, unhelpful interest that's etched into their neurology, all of us, that the beauty of what you're doing is helping them reprogram.

Yeah, I use the computer analogy all the time. Just programs in a computer, right? We can uninstall some of the old ones, install some new ones. Sometimes it takes a little bit longer to install the programs just depending on what it is, but it's just a computer that we can install new programs on, and it's pretty cool actually. That our brains are just so wired to change, right? Anyone that is into personal growth has maybe heard a little bit about the brain here and there, maybe a little neuroplasticity, which is— and just the brain is designed to change. And so whenever we talk about the brain from that angle too, people are usually like, yeah, okay, okay, yeah, you know, if I can build this skill Oh, this is actually just like any other skill I can build. Like, I learned how to ride a bike when I was younger. I learned how to like ski a couple years ago. And so this is just like that.

Yeah, it's muscle memory. Emotion— sometimes it's emotional muscle memory. Yes, right, which is what I use a lot with the— and I just want to go back to one more thing because we were talking about neurology and we're talking about self-awareness. You, you mentioned earlier about, you know, these patterns sometimes come up in relationship to specific types of personalities. And I like working with common denominators. So instead of situations, I like asking, what's the LCD? What do all of these things have in common if you take away the names and the faces and the places? And what's the LCD? What's the common denominator of that? And a lot of times I find that's the place to work on. Well, I'm this issue with my family member and I have this issue at work and I'm not sure what I want. Okay, great. Well, what do they all have in common? What's that running theme that ties the thread through all those? And let's do the 180 from that. And I, and for me, I find that that helps them express really what's going on for them. But again, right, because we're so stuck in the immediacy of things. And I'm wondering, you know, if they— we talk about the idea of taking ourselves seriously, and how do we do that, right? If we want a different role, we want to raise, we want a different position, we want different relationship How important, how important do you feel that is to taking yourself seriously, to chunk it down to that level?

Well, it's incredibly important, and I'd say the lowest common denominator— so the thing that a lot of these people have in common is that it's not this particular person that they feel nervous speaking around, it's usually people that they deem as higher ranking or more important than them. In some way. So I'd say that's power difference. Almost everyone, yeah, that I work with, they're like, well, I can talk to my friends just fine, I can talk to my team members that are on the same level as me or beneath me just fine, but I'm talking to like my boss or I'm talking to the CEO or even like a CFO will say, when I'm talking to the CEO, right, right, I just, I'm feeling a little bit, you know, like things just aren't coming across as clear. I feel like sometimes it's like, he or she doesn't take me as seriously. I hear that all the time. So they might take themselves seriously in all these other situations, but then when there's those people that they deem as higher ranking or more important in some type of way, then that's usually the times that they find the most challenging.

Yeah.

Now we can teach them the skills, like for example, speaking more clearly, doing everything right with your voice, delivering points very concisely, having your right body language and everything. And then usually once that happens and they're actually building the skills or they're addressing the gaps with their communication skills, then those quote important people start responding, responding differently to them. And then they get these little pieces of evidence of, oh, okay, so if I improve this, they have less pushback, they're agreeing with me more, or they seem to be like valuing my opinion more because I'm communicating it differently.

Yeah.

And then they start to kind of open up and see, oh, it was actually just some of these other things that I was doing. Like maybe my voice got a little bit quieter when I said certain things, or maybe my body language was closed off when I was uncomfortable. Some of these environments, maybe I was using too many filler words. Could be simple stuff like that. Maybe I wasn't very concise in my points. Weren't very easy to understand. So it actually— they— it's not that they didn't take me seriously, it's actually just that I wasn't presenting myself and my ideas in a way for them to take me seriously. So that's, that's usually a big, big, big difference maker.

I'm reminded of, of one of my favorite comedy movie movies, PCU, with David Spade and Jeremy Piven. So it came out in the '90s if you haven't seen it, um, and it makes fun of like the political correct groups on campuses and their agendas. And, and there's one group, the womenists. And the whole time, and throughout the movie, they're just like ripping into these guys, right? And in one of the scenes, big party scene, and one of the frat guys comes over to, to one of the women, and he's like, would you like a drink? And she's like, what did you say? How dare you talk to me? And he's like, do you want a drink? And she's like, I think, I think he, I think he wants to get us a drink. And the guy comes back. She's like, yeah, I'll take a beer. And he comes back all excited that she said yes to the drink. And she's like, wait a second, if we're nice to them, they'll want to do good, like kind things for us. And it was like this, like, big explosion of this, like, massive shift of like, of an identity that someone was so committed to, right? And we talked a little bit about like, I'm an introvert, or I'm, or I'm very shy, or I'm socially awkward. And it's just that one little aha moment that can transform someone entire's life. So as we, as we wrap up, I'd love to have people know where to connect with you. I know you have a few different programs, and I know you have your book, and you have a lot of cool stuff going on. So let's just take a few moments and just share those places.

Yeah, I appreciate it, Jason. This has been a fantastic conversation. This time has flew by. Yeah, really enjoyed this. And yeah, I've been following your podcast here for a while. You're almost at 200 episodes now. You've done a lot of episodes. You're really the type of guy that's, you know, you're always overdelivering for your audience. So you've actually inspired me to do the same for anyone that's listening. So actually I put together kind of a special gift for anyone that's listening. So I call this the CEO Communication Kit. There's two parts to this kit. So the first part, it's a course, it's called Speak Like a Confident Leader in 7 Days. So if you want to dive deeper into a lot of the things that we talked about today, learning how to speak more confidence, more charisma, more clarity like the world's top leaders, that's exactly what that course is going to teach you.

Nice.

And the second part of the kit, this is what I call the Secrets to CEO Level Presence. Okay, so this is something I only teach to my VIP clients. And so this is really diving really deep into all the body language, all the nonverbal things you can do so that you're really commanding the room with that executive presence. And I'm actually going to teach that to you live on a one-on-one coaching call. This is only for anyone who's listening to the show. So if you want to not only work on your CEO-level speaking, but also your CEO-level presence, both verbal and nonverbal. All you have to do is message me the word CEO24 on Instagram or LinkedIn, and my handle for that is @tyhosesgen. Last name's a little bit funky, I know, so I'll say it again. T-Y-H-O-E-S-G-E-N, and just message me CEO24. That way I'll know that you came from Jason Wasser and from the podcast here. That's Instagram or LinkedIn. Send me a DM, CEO24. We'll set up the call. I'll send you the kit and all the resources. And just my way of saying thank you for listening. I love it.

I just wanted everybody to be clear that as I'm getting in, you know, for what Ty was just saying, I'm almost up to episode 200, and I'm at the point in this podcast where I'm getting dozens of emails a week of people wanting to be on the podcast, which I never thought was like a thing, right? It was like me at the beginning having to reach out to people and, you know, and part of the journey was being able to make the ask. And part of the journey is being able to also say no to someone. So when people— when you're listening to this episode today, I want everybody to know that I'm being incredibly discerning with who I allow to share on this platform. And so if— Ty, right, I want to thank you for, for creating this little package for everybody— that it's something that I want, you know, to see people achieve and accomplish. And I want people to know that it's— that I am being discriminate, right, with, with the guests, and, and that it's not just a fly-by-night thing and it's someone that's going to take advantage of the situation. That someone who comes with their own expertise and their own experience and is going to add a tremendous amount of value for them. There's no bait and switches, and there's no— right, all the other— because we know what's out there. We know what's out there. So I just want everybody to know that, right, that's an important stance for, for, for the You Winning Life podcast. I mean, as a therapist, is to make sure that, that these type of things that are being offered are impactful. And I really want to thank you because I really, you know, walking away from our conversation knowing and having spent my time you know, looking, you know, making sure that this is gonna be a good fit for us, is knowing, like I said to you, how drastically life-changing that this can be for the sake of just from a mental health perspective, how this can be a lifesaver for people. So I wanna thank you for committing your time, effort, energy, and your life and your passions to this work. And, and I'm very much looking forward to seeing you succeed and thrive upon your, your journey and spending time with us. Cause I know you've been doing a bunch of these podcasts recently and you know, we, we were lucky enough to, to have you in our inbox, and I'm glad that we were able to do so. So thank you.

I appreciate you, Jason Wasser. Those kind words, they really mean a lot. They really do. So thank you again for having me on. This was a fantastic conversation. I can tell you've done almost 200 of these because you asked amazing questions. You added great input yourself too. So absolutely fantastic. This was a lot of fun.

Thank you. So for everybody out there, please go follow Ty on his Instagram, check out his links that he told you. And if they're— and send him a message if you have a question that may not be there, may not be on the website. You know, what's a great book to read? What's— where should I start? I'm not ready maybe yet to commit to all this, right? This is the wonderful thing about— it's not an all-or-nothing package, right? Personal growth is, you know, sometimes 30 seconds at a time. So want to just remind everybody out there. And again, thank you so much. And everybody, we'll see you on the next episode. And as always, really thank you for sharing your time with us wherever it is, whenever it is. And I'm glad to be part of your life. And just let us know where you're— where you are in the world and what's going on in your life. And just send me a message if there's anything from any of my previous guests that we can get you in touch with. If there's something that I can help you get in touch with, doesn't mean you have to work with me. But I'm happy to be just a resource to point you in the right direction to help you get there. So see you all next episode.