Assume Everyone Has a Story
The quiet coworker, the cab driver, your aunt who never says much — every one of them is carrying something worth hearing. Your job is to act like you know it.
It's easy to sort people fast. Nice enough. A little boring. Nothing much there. You decide it in the first minute, and then you stop looking.
But you're almost always wrong. The person who seems flat is usually just waiting for someone to assume otherwise — to ask like they expect a good answer.
People become who you treat them as
When you go in believing someone has a story worth hearing, it shows in how you ask. You lean in. You wait. And people can feel the difference between polite curiosity and the real thing. Given the real thing, most of them open up.
Nobody is boring. They're just waiting for someone to ask the question they've been dying to answer.
How to assume the story
The one you'd normally skip. Decide, before you talk, that they know something you don't.
"How did you end up doing that?" works on almost anyone. Then actually listen for the turn in the road.
When something unexpected lands, say so. Surprise is the sincerest form of attention.
- Ask one more question about the first answer — the real story is underneath.
- Echo a word they used and hand it back as a question.
- Swap "How are you?" for something smaller and more specific.
- Ask about the feeling, not just the facts.
- Pick the person you'd normally skip and ask them one real question today.
- Swap 'How was it?' for 'What's one moment that stuck with you?'
- When their voice speeds up, drop your next question and chase that.
- Studs Terkel. Working — Pantheon Books (1974; a life's work built on the belief that ordinary people hold extraordinary stories)