Don't be a Conversation Thief

Here's your assignment for this week: observe conversations and identify how many conversation thieves you encounter. What's a conversation thief? It's someone who exhibits the following characteristics:

• They finish your sentences (which is perhaps the most annoying thing about a conversation thief).

• They interrupt you with a "Yes, but."

• You get the feeling they're having a conversation with themselves instead of listening to you, as you can see in their eyes and body language that they're formulating their response.

• They respond to your story by telling their own.

• You feel diminished in their presence.

• They look at some place over your right or left shoulder if you're in a crowded room.

• They respond with a rebuttal to feed their addiction to being right and, in the worst case, make you wrong.

• It feels more like a debate than a conversation.

If you've ever been around a really good conversationalist, you know they do the opposite of these things.

As Karl A. Menninger said, "Listening is a magnetic and strange thing, a creative force. The friends who listen to us are the ones we move toward. When we are listened to, it creates us, makes us unfold and expand."

Let’s help others unfold and expand. Let the other person finish their thought, and then ask a question that shows genuine curiosity and interest.