The Five Blind Spots Of A Bad Conversationalist

When every conversation feels like a car crash, sometimes the only way to move forward is to go back and learn your blind spots.

We have all been stuck with a conversation partner who is droning away, adrift in the memory images of their story, seemingly oblivious that your brain cells are committing suicide.

Either you don’t have any particular interest in what they are saying, you can’t identify with it, or the speaker forgot to give you context. You would like at they very least to ask a question, but they are just not stopping for breath.

I have just described my experiences of an older work colleague, the type of person who would frequently launch into rambling stories without first setting the scene. A bit like reading a book without the benefit of a synopsis.

This person was hitting number four on the following seven blind spots of what makes a bad conversationalist.

A real conversation takes place on a level playing field

Becoming aware of our faults will provide a small, but immediate improvement to our social skills, purely for having recognised them, and raised them into our conscious awareness. Going forward, we can then work to turn our blind spots into shining points of light in our personality.

Now we have set the scene i.e. that improving our conversational skills is not always about learning a new communication skill, but how to improve the existing ones. We will take a 360 degree look at a regular conversation, and highlight five typical blind spots, one or both parties are guilty of:

Five blind spots of a boring conversationalist

1. Guarded

During the introductions and initial exchange, a guarded person only gives the most basic personal information. There could be multiple reasons for this such as:

You may be in a negotiation type conversation
You may not trust people until you get to know them
You may be insecure about yourself and the type of work you do

What this first blind spot comes down to primarily, is a lack of trust in your conversational partners. This will almost definitely be due to bad previous experiences. But to turn them into life lessons, where the lesson is that all new people cannot be trusted!!! will limit all future interactions.

Like the Buddha may have once said:

Holding on to anger (or trust issues) is like holding a hot coal with the intention of throwing it at somebody - you are the only one that gets burned.

2. Superficial

This one is very pertinent for people with a lack of conversational experience and confidence. This may have arisen from a background of shyness and social anxiety. The biggest handicap of which, is a self-limiting, stunted social life.

Small talk, or introductory talk, starts with the superficial, i.e. the good old weather, or something in your environment. If you are one of the many people who hate small talk, it may be because your conversations never go any further.

When someone comments on a shared interest, or something trivial in the environment, the blind spot is not that you, or they, are asking boring questions - the blind spot is turning that ice breaker as the main subject.

For example:

At a dinner party, wedding reception, or seminar, someone asks how you know the host, speaker, bride etc. (a great question), but that leads to an exchange that gets stuck in a loop about that other person.

When somebody opens with a superficial comment, what they are really saying to you, is that they are open for a conversation. That’s their only purpose. Nothing more.

3. Quiet

When someone raises a new topic, you may feel like you need to make a critical or really interesting comment. This is why you sometimes see sparkling (or more likely), really vitriolic online debates and comment threads, sparked by a controversial article or comment.

The participants in such exchanges have time to think about their responses, maybe even research them first before firing their humdinger back out into the world.

This is one reason why texting became so popular (not so people could unleash their darker side), but because you can think about your replies in a way you can't in a real conversation.

So, when the motor skills of the brain don't work fast enough to come up with a great reply, the blind spot is to play it safe by staying silent. The irony of course, is that your silence is more boring than a boring reply.

4. Self-involved

The self involved person brings a very contrasting experience to the conversational table than the quiet person, but usually no less boring.

Most of us have that one trigger interest or soap box cause that can set us off. Others just seem to have a million stories or opinions just waiting to burst out of them.

And it’s a wonderful thing to have such a fertile mind with lots of material. Unfortunately, that material can be a bit like a theme park for the self involved person to get lost in.

And because their stories and opinions are so entertaining and important (at least to them), they think it must be to the listener also. And as a bonus, they think they are an excellent conversationalist because they can talk so much.

The blind spots here are:

Not being able to tell a story without excessive padding, repetition, or an initial hook of interest.
Not being socially intelligent enough to tell when you are losing attention.
Not waiting for permission to launch into the story in the first place.

This latter may be okay with a friend, but not with a new person. You can let it be known you have a story, or a strong opinion etc. then wait for the other person to provide the prompt i.e. 'Oh tell me more about that...'

5. Negative energy

This comes in three levels of N. That is Negative, Neutral, and Nothing. Negative energy can just be a one off moan when you just need to get something off your chest. Friends will accommodate these valve releases, but it's not for a new person.

Stepping it up, negative energy can also come in the form of gossip which is used for bonding. But gossip is often negative centric, and will ultimately leave a bad taste.

When negativity becomes a habitual way of thinking, your mind has now become conditioned to looking for the negative slant on any new situation or information. Somebody announces an achievement and you marginalise it. For example:

Big deal, anybody could have done that with a little practice.
They probably did something bad to achieve that status.
Why are they telling everybody? What makes them think we care?

Human beings are hopeful and aspirational by nature. When that turns negative, it's usually because of personal failure, or jealousy at the success of others. People want, and crave, to be inspired by, and to associate with positive, aspiring people, not to have their energy drained by the negative, who are craving a twisted kind of sympathy instead.

Neutral energy is shaped by insecurity and lack of worth, wrapped up in self-doubt. This makes a person bland with thoughts like:

'I haven’t had any interesting life experiences, formed any strong opinions, committed to any cause, developed any passions, or formed any strong beliefs…

The opinions I have, are borrowed from others. They sound good but they are not formed out of my own experiences or ideas. If I voice them and get challenged, I won’t be able to support my position.

I don't want to be made to feel small or exposed as stupid, so I will keep these opinions to myself and just be agreeable with those of others.'

The bland person just needs to move up one level on the assertiveness scale to bring that inner voice out. Learn more about the five levels of assertiveness here.

Nothing energy is the absence of passion. If you haven't found your niche in life, if you haven't found any hobbies, activities, or people to get passionate about, then no passion will shine through into your words.

A lack of passion or spark of interest, translates into:

A monotone speaking voice
Low speaking volume
Low eye contact
Disinterested body language

Conclusion

People are inspired by people who are passionate about what they are talking about. Just as they will feel good in the company of a positive person, they will feel bored in the company of a negative person, once their empathy has been drained.

It might be easy to get lost in the fine balancing act of what, and who you may need to become, in order not to be boring. So the reality check is that everybody is boring to somebody, some of the time...

It is a common theme that people in the public eye, who are charismatic and funny for a living, are bores in private. So, there is no specific benchmark we should all be striving for, merely more of a self-awareness and perhaps a healthy ten percent improvement to our social skills.

I'm Richard Gray, Founder of Lifeconfident.com where we focus on melting away shyness and social anxiety, building skyscraper confidence, and developing cloud-bursting social skills. Thank you for reading.