517 | How To Stop Gossip

Chris LoCurto 0:00
Negativity can easily spiral out of control. It's contagious and difficult to contain. Once it's gone viral, how do you stop it? That is coming up next!

Welcome to the Chris LoCurto show where we discuss leadership and life and discover that business is what you do, not who you are. Welcome to the show, folks. I hope you're having a fabulous day, wherever you are, we are back at it again answering the questions that you have about the life and business that you want. Now this time around, we've got another how-to episode for you. Today we're talking about gossip, idle talk, rumours, negativity, backbiting and strife. And we've all seen it. And we all know it's like a virus that infects people's minds and hearts. And most of us have been on both sides of this equation, either spreading it or receiving it or both. We do have to take responsibility for what we've done. It's easy for us to point out the gossip that we see in people and not recognise the gossip that's in us, right? So in a general sense, gossip is just idle talk and speculation. But it quickly spirals out of control. Now here's a dictionary definition of it. Casual or unconstrained conversation and reports about other people, typically involving details that are not confirmed as being true. So if you look at it from a dictionary definition, we understand the concept of people talking. But how many times is that gossip not even confirmed as something true? So you can see the intent come to light in that last phrase, typically unconfirmed and not true.

Now, the Bible has a lot to say about gossip. And the bottom line is this. The Bible outright prohibits gossip. The Hebrew word translated gossip in the Old Testament is defined as one who reveals secrets, one who goes about as a tail bear, or a scandal monger. Again, notice the intention here. Someone has privileged information about someone else or a situation. They reveal that information to people who have no business knowing it. So they tell secrets in hopes of creating scandals. Why would somebody do that? While there's a tonne of reasons why and, and there are all kinds of root system issues going on here out of spite to hurt someone or defame someone else to paint themselves in a better light or position or, you know, to feel better about their own lives or circumstances. But at the end of the day, it's always always always selfish. It's always self-centred. It's always about you. Believe it or not. Gossip is never about somebody else. It's about hurting somebody else, for your reasons, right? It's always focused on you. And notice what the Bible says about the consequence of gossip. A perverse man stirs up dissension and gossip separates close friends. That's Proverbs 1628. So two things we see there are dissension and separation. None of that's good. None of that's a blessing. None of that is worth messing up lives for and yet it happens all the time. Proverbs 1112 13 says, A man who lacks judgement derives his neighbour, but a man of understanding holds his tongue. A gossip betrays confidence, but a trustworthy man keeps a secret. So for more on the trust issues or aspects, go to Episode 516. For more than, Proverbs 2123. Watch your tongue and keep your mouth shut, and you will stay out of trouble. So what do we see? Gossip creates trouble and holding your tongue prevents it. So that's a great admonition for us. But what do we do when we find that in our businesses or in our homes? Right? To help us wrestle with this problem today? I've asked our man in Sicily, Brian to jump back in the virtual studio with me so Bon giorno, Brian, I forget

Brian A 4:31
what to say. It's a little late.

Chris LoCurto 4:35
Much later where you are. I don't

Brian A 4:37
know how I'm gonna help wrestle with this. I've got just as many questions this time around. But I'll start off with this quote, because I love quotes. It's not technically gossip. If you start your sentence with a quote, I'm concerned about so and so and name the person you're gossiping about that. skirt the issue right there. Right off

Chris LoCurto 5:00
It's a call that Christian gossip. Yeah, y'all pray for Frank. You know, he started doing cocaine again. So you know, y'all pray for him? Oh my gosh.

Brian A 5:11
But yeah, I mean, just just like you had mentioned that the trust episode, the How to episode. There are so many core perspectives. There are so many core issues going on here worth are just start the culture in our business, the culture in our home, root system issues surfaced, on and on and on, man, and it can spiral out of control quickly.

Chris LoCurto 5:35
Wow. Yeah, absolutely. I love you know, we both love quotes. I love this old story, a guy went and gossiped and then came to his rabbi. And he says to his rabbi, hey, I gossiped I know, it was bad. I know that was terrible. What do I do about it? And the rabbi says, no problem. Did you get a feather pillow at home? Yeah. Bring that on over. He's like, That's it. He's like, Yep, no problem. Great. Okay. So he goes home grabs, his pillow comes on back to the rabbi goes, here you go. And the rabbi takes the pillow and rips it open and happens to be a windy day and feathers go everywhere. And he goes, Okay, now go get all those feathers, and put them back in this pillow. And the guy says, that's impossible. There's no possible way I could do that. And he goes, That's right. He goes, it's the same with gossip. What you've unleashed cannot be put back. Understand what you've done. And I think that's so profound to recognise. You know, we think we're just saying something. And we don't recognise just how painful and how far-reaching it is.

Brian A 6:48
Yeah, yeah. And again, just like the trust episode, this is both in the home. And this kind of negativity, the backbiting, the strife, the contention, all of that, just like in the, in the office, and so we're gonna do our best after the break to look at both sides of this and try to be helpful if we can. Such a huge issue.

Chris LoCurto 7:15
All right. All of this all these questions on what do we do about Casa for coming up right after this? Folks, if you've been listening to me for any length of time, then you know, the number one issue when it comes to business when it comes to the family when it comes to friendships, is having a lack of high-quality communication, to make sure that you are winning in every aspect of your life. It all starts with having great communication, the best way to get that communication is to understand your personality style and to understand the personality style of the folks that you're spending the most time with, whether it be at work, whether it be at home, the best way to do that is to go to Chris LoCurtol.com/store. And get your personality profile and personality profiles for your team today. Get it for your family members. Today. As you go through that profile, you will begin to see the greatest ways to communicate, go to Chris LoCurto.com/store today. All right, we are back. And Brian, if I understand you have another little test for us.

Brian A 8:30
It's a litmus test.

Chris LoCurto 8:33
Litmus little litmus test.

Brian A 8:37
Oh, gosh, okay, so let's see if we can find ourselves somewhere on this spectrum. The idea here is to see where we're popping positive on the gossip spectrum. And these are, these are a couple of things as we go through them. Try not to think about just just about somebody else, think about yourself, because that's where our minds typically go. Oh, yeah, that's so and so I

Chris LoCurto 9:06
know. I know exactly who that is.

Brian A 9:09
All right. So here's the first one does embarrassing someone else help to numb a wound in your own heart? Yes. Okay. Let that. Just let that sink in a little bit. Do you? Do you feel a rush? Do you get a buzz from sharing something secretive? about someone else? Do you feel the need to get even? Or you mentioned a second ago one-up the person you're talking about? Does it make you feel better or superior to the person that you are spreading these things about? And the last one does it make you feel closer to or more intimate with the person that you're talking to? Wow, there are a lot of motives right there.

Chris LoCurto 9:59
You are The whole show right there. That is literally. Thanks, guys. We appreciate you joining us today. That's the show. That's a great litmus test. And let me throw with that last one, you know, do you feel more intimate or close to the person you're gossiping to the old saying, if a person who's willing to gossip to your face is willing to gossip about you, behind you, right? So that is super important to understand. Yeah, yeah. It's gonna happen if somebody's willing to gossip to you. And if you're the person gossiping, understand you're not only are you willing to do this to the person that you think you're getting closer to, but you are going to probably gossip about that person that sometimes Yeah, so yeah.

Brian A 10:44
Well, and I'll give a quote as well, because I, you know, if Joel is listening, and he shouldn't know, he is he, you know, I just have to mention that I was in the military. I don't think he was and so I just wanted to put that out there. But there's an old saying in the military,, that loose lips sink ships Say that five times fast? Well, the idea is,

Chris LoCurto 11:11
you're saying there's been a battle forever between you. In our, for years, there's got this battle between you were in the Navy, and he was civilian air force. So it was hilarious.

Brian A 11:25
Well, it happens to be on the gossip episode. I'm gonna make sure that everything I say it's true on this one, okay, but

Chris LoCurto 11:32
no positive the next time Joel is on the show, there's going to be a dig somehow, someway.

Brian A 11:37
We gotta have another three-rules episode, just so we can see that. All right. There you go. Yeah, you've all heard that expression, loose lips, sink ships. And you know, if you're busy spreading negativity, you're creating a subversive subculture that is going to cloud the truth. I mean, as you were walking through some of those scriptures, that is the purpose. You are spreading misinformation to divide. And yeah, at the end, you can't distinguish fact from fiction, you feel like you can't trust others, you lose sight of reality, you get distracted from your work, and you begin to make mistakes. Well, if you lose integrity, then the ship loses integrity. That is not a great plan when you're out at sea. So there you go.

Chris LoCurto 12:27
Yeah. Yeah, you know, it's so funny. I love that you use that example, I was working on the ridge with so here in Tennessee, it's so funny, this would never have happened. In California, at least I would not have been able to do this fire is such a big concern out there. But here in Tennessee, we can light stuff up on fire like crazy. You know, we've got acres and acres of all these trees, and we've had to clear some, and we just torch them. And I mean, it just goes up. It's great. It's fantastic. I don't, you know, don't have to worry about lighting the forest on fire because everything's too wet. We were working it and we're using our excavator and a pin fell out the pinhole in the bucket. So the pin that held the pin must have come undone. And then the pin that held the bucket fell out in the bucket just hit the ground. And it was so funny. I was talking to Brian, Brian Dudley who works up here. And I said, well, hopefully that thing didn't go into the fire. I don't think it did. I said, Well, if it does, I'm going to just pure steal it. I said, so it'll still be usable. He goes yeah, but I'm gonna weaken it. And it was just a, it was just a great comment. In that moment of you know, that metal will now be weak, or, you know, had that pin holding the bucket onto the excavator. If it did fall into this pretty raging fire, then there is the tendency that that metal could become weak. And I really think that is a great analogy for us. That as we take on Gossip as we gossip about people, you know, as you talked about the integrity, our integrity weakens, you know, we aren't as strong. And if I'm willing to gossip about somebody right now, which by the way, I need to tell you some things about Joel we'll do it after the show anyways. Man Look at that. I could make a joke every now and then. But if I am willing to take part in gossip, then you know, what does that mean about my integrity? It's gonna weaken so alright.

Brian A 14:37
Yeah, I got some man.

Chris LoCurto 14:38
I haven't looked at these questions. So I don't know. I don't know what you're gonna hit me. Let's see.

Brian A 14:42
They're easy. No, but we'll get into On the work side of this first but you know, I'm thinking about the leaders that are listening to parents that are listening because we'll touch some on the home side. But yeah, I mean gosh, when you're just talking about Fire I was thinking about the verse in the book of James, where he talks about the tongue, lights things on fire. And just think about how we're allowing that if we allow gossip in our home or the workplace, we're weakening the fortification, the integrity of that environment, that structure, man, this is weighty. The responsibility here is super, super weighty. So here we go into the first work culture question. I'm imagining this as I'm reading it coming maybe from a leader who says, I've got a sneaking suspicion that people are whispering behind my back, what do I do? We'll just start cosy. Yeah.

Chris LoCurto 15:47
Okay. And these are from followers, right? I believe these questions are coming in from people. So it is we do have to assume some things in that question. Right? If it is a leader? Well, I guess if it's anybody, the question is, do I do something about people whispering about me behind my back? Well, what missing? My first question would be, do they have a reason to write? Should they be doing it? No. But what could they possibly be whispering about? Right? A healthy person isn't going to whisper behind you, about you behind your back, a healthy person, if there's something that they're struggling with is going to come to you and confront you with it. If it's something that needs to be dealt with, or if they're healthy, and it doesn't need to be dealt with, they're gonna get over. Right. So we're not talking about Healthy People, healthy situations, I can tell you what, I don't tend to care. or worry about somebody whispering behind my back. Maybe that's because I don't feel like I've got anything that they have any, you know, reason whispering about now

Brian A 16:55
is kind of like you, you you want to say Hey, welcome to leadership, you feel like the circle is whispering behind. Yeah, welcome.

Chris LoCurto 17:05
The funny that Yeah, I mean, that's one of the things we talk about when we're talking about leaders with their worth, and you know, trying to hide, you know, when you're early on your leadership, you feel like you're hiding your mistakes from your team. And I always say, your team knows your mistakes, man, they've been aware of that for a long time. Or you do before you even worry about that. They already know it. But what if they are whispering? What do you do about it? I'm, I have the mindset, that if you have to go and approach gossip, and you don't know if it exists, where is your worth? Right? If you do not know that gossip exists, I assume people are whispering. What does that speak to? It's speaking to a worthwhile issue that I'm having. I'm struggling personally. And I think that maybe the so here's the deal, if you've not done anything wrong, if there's nothing to whisper about, then why are you having that concern? Right? You don't know that they are because otherwise it wouldn't be. I'm assuming it would be people are doing this, right? So if you're doing something wrong, that may cause some whispering then I would start with me. How do I fix the thing that I'm doing? How do I change the thing that I'm doing that's causing people to in it's not causing people are choosing to whisper if they are? So for my health? How do I fix myself? Right? Focus on that start there. But what do I do if people are gossiping? Well, you can try and go out there and ask, Are people gossiping? What is that gonna look like? You know, where's your worth? Then? What does that, you know, speak to your people?

So if I'm looking at this from a leadership role, the first thing I'm going to do is look at me, if I'm assuming people are whispering behind my back, I'm having worth issues. I need to focus on the worth issue. If I am doing something that would be worthy, worthy is not the right word that people would gossip about. I need to focus on that. What am I doing that? If I continue to be concerned with it, then man I'm, I'm struggling. I gotta go even further. All of those aspects for me from the question, the weather, the question is posed, you're going to say, man, you know, if people are whispering about you behind your back, going after that is just going to create more problems focus on you take care of you. If the thing was, if somebody was saying people are gossiping, that's a completely different answer. And we need to address gossip itself. Right? But just know that the person who wrote this, the assumption part is screaming, what they're experiencing. And that is, you know, the concern that something is happening and they don't know it. Right, which speaks to two things worth issues much worse than in people. And second, that they're possibly doing something that they believe people would be whispering about.

Brian A 20:26
Yeah. And we're back to that integrity issue that we started with. Yep. The second one is a little bit more nuanced. I've caught someone spreading lies, maybe that's part A, part B, but they won't tell me why or what's going on. And we're talking about these are untruths, these are lies, what do we do with that?

Chris LoCurto 20:50
So if we assume the leadership aspect, then I am going to handle lies as a cultural issue. We do not lie around here. You know, that is going to be something that I, I don't, there's a couple I can deal with all kinds of stuff, I can deal with all kinds of failures. i There's so many things I can handle. Don't lie to me, and don't steal from me. Those are two things that man, I gotta get you fired fast. Right? And that probably tells you a lot about what I've experienced in my life. Right, that, that that is that speaks a lot to my root system. Those are things that I hate. And I think it's so destructive. So for me, I'm always going to handle the lying, if I find that you've been lying, I'm going to address it in, you know, I'm going to try and find out why. Why are you telling this? Why are you saying this? If I can't get away from you? If I can't get an answer from you. The My response is still the same. This is unacceptable. We do not allow this. Yeah, this is destructive. You need to now go take responsibility for this, you know, so on and so forth. Years ago, I had a sales guy that just was so so focused on himself, so narcissistic and, and, you know, willing to do whatever.

He came to me to go, oh, man, I just got the sale. And you know, is this really big ticket item big sale? And he told me everything he said, and he was super excited and said, Whoa, that piece right there is not true. And he goes, Oh, but yeah, he doesn't. It doesn't matter. I mean, we got the sale. I'm like, no, no, that's not true. Because it doesn't matter. And I want Nope. Go back. Call that person. Tell them that you misspoke if they want their money back, give them their money back. But we're not taking this money with that. untruth having misspoke is You're kidding. I mean, he was pissed. He's like, You're kidding me? I'm like, No, I'm not kidding you and never lie again. And see a he had to go back and call that client up and go, Hey, I misspoke on this. And he was right. The client was like, no big deal. And so for him, it was like, see, and I'm like, I don't care if it wasn't again, though. That's right, exactly. Like I don't care if it wasn't a big deal. It's still a lie. And one of the things that I've said forever is I don't want any illegitimate dollars. have said daughter once on accident, dollars coming into this business. And I don't want it speak the truth. Speak the truth.

Brian A 23:35
Yeah, not so good. And it goes right into the third question that we have here is and again, from a leaders standpoint, but you know, all of these we could have transposed to the home, the culture in the home, and we'll get to that in a second. But the last one here, how can I cultivate a culture of honesty, transparency and truth? But without being oppressive? How do we where's the tension there? Because I know we talk about culture, we talk about teaching it, forcing it repeating it. We're always you know, that's why we have leadership teams, we just finished that, that cultivate series talking about leadership teams are your you know, allies in in creating that culture in your business or in your home? You've got your spouse as an ally, but how do you do that without it becoming a regime of oppression?

Chris LoCurto 24:33
So the cognitive dissonance I'm having is creating trust, creating oppression. Okay, it's not, it's not, you know, it doesn't make any sense in my head. So I'm trying to run through what is this person's meaning. How would creating a culture of trust create a culture of oppression? I don't. I'm gonna have to ruminate on that.

Brian A 24:57
where my mind goes as I read that is Maybe they've been involved in some groups or environments where everything is so pressed towards telling the truth, honesty, transparency, all of that, that it can become like to the nth degree to an extreme in the sense of somebody, you know, maybe the leader is paranoid, maybe the leader is wrestling, like you mentioned, from the first question dealing with some of those worth issues going on. And they're always looking over their shoulder, they're always, you know, Hey, are you guys talking about me? You know, that kind of thing, where it's kind of that extension of their worth issues and insecurities?

Chris LoCurto 25:42
Yeah, that's a tough one, because I don't think you are creating a culture. Either way, it's a conflict, right? I don't think you're creating if it's oppressive, you're not creating a culture of trust. It's just not happening. So I think what we have to focus on there is the culture is the oppression, if I have to be so over the top, attentive to whether or not somebody is Miss speaking, I don't even want that business. I don't want to show up to that place every day. I don't want to experience that I forget that noise, right? So the key is, that's also going to come back to the worth issue of you're trying to create a culture of trust, and yet you don't, what do you have to do to create a culture of anything? model it, you have to model it if I can't be trusted in, which means that I'm also able to be vulnerable, what's the biggest part of the trust? vulnerability, right? And if I can't trust you with my vulnerability, I can't trust you period. That is one of the things we talked about and, and strap on, I use an old saying, and it's a silly saying, but it drives the point home, when we're talking about these leadership teams, in the Strat Plan, because many leadership teams like each other, know each other, enjoy talking with each other, but deep down, they don't trust each other. And they don't even many times I don't even know it until they get inside and we pull things apart. And it's like, oh, my gosh, I didn't realise that I didn't trust the very, I love these people. But I didn't realise I don't trust them. There's an old military saying, now don't know which branch it came from, you know, I can trust you with my life. Let

Brian A 27:28
me ask Joel

Chris LoCurto 27:29
yella, Festo, he'll have that answer. That the saying is, is you know, I can trust you with my life. But can I trust you with my money in my wife? Now, it seems like a silly saying it is a silly saying, but really, what is that saying? Say? I trust you with my life. But my life is less important to me than my money and my wife. Those are, those are the areas that I'm most vulnerable with. And I can't I can put my life on the line with you and trust that you've got my back. I can be vulnerable there. But I don't want you around my wife. And I sure don't want you around my money. Which I don't know why I guess money comes first because it Ryan,

Brian A 28:08
you would think my wife priority issues there that we could take into the rhyming

Chris LoCurto 28:12
throws that off a little bit. But it it drives the point home, right? If I can't be if I can't trust you with the things that I'm most vulnerable with. I can't trust you. There will never be complete trust, right? So if I'm going to have a culture of trust, I can't be oppressive. I can't be constantly looking over my shoulder. I can't constantly be checking trust. Yeah, because I'm not trusting. Which means I'm not being vulnerable myself. You know, we hit heavy-duty stuff inside of our staff meetings instead of our devotionals. I feel like I'm pretty darn vulnerable. You know, I put myself out there in ways that you know, I do not doubt that people on our team go. Well, he's a little crazy from time to time, but oh, well, you know, I mean, it's like, because I don't, I'm not worried about it. I'm not worried about man's opinion. I'm not struggling on Oh, gosh, what do all my team members do Please, every team member today is not worried about it. Right? This is the stuff we're doing. Here's the stuff that we believe in this business, you know, all that kind of stuff. I put that out there and have a problem with it. I model that vulnerability. And I ask that my team does it too. And it's great to see when that happens. Like, I'll give an example. We had a great devotional, as we're going through some deep material. And I'm like asking people to ask any questions, push back, whatever you got. And I loved that one of our team members spoke up and you could tell when the team member spoke up. There's still this deep inside concern, am I being judged? And the first thing I tackled when that person stopped speaking was, hey, there's no judgement to this here. Right? The fear that we have to speak up as our people judging me, as Chris judged me as anybody, if anybody's judging you, it's coming from an unhealthy side. So let's first just tackle that there is no judgement, it doesn't matter. Be focused on what God judges you on, not what man judges you on, right? And just allowing the people to know, it's okay to speak up and push back. Right? My team pushes back on me, you've pushed back on me many times, in our years of working, they're not yours. Respectfully, with, as you say, with minimal judgement,

Brian A 30:33
there's a judgement, all right, it's gonna be their minimum.

Chris LoCurto 30:38
You know, you've always felt okay to push back, or you would have never pushed back. Right? These are things that we have that type of relationship and I want, and I want people to understand that if you're going to expect that culture, you got to model it, you got to allow it, right? I tell our team, to feel free to push back. Don't be disrespectful. You know, don't be a jerk about it. But feel free. And if somebody can't handle that, then we need to handle that aspect of it. Right? If you are genuinely pushing back on something, because you don't understand it, and somebody can't take that, then we need to handle the person who can't take it. So if I'm going to create a culture of trust, I better treat people who said this is leading to a different aspect of this question. I better treat people well when they're vulnerable. So with that being said, the way that I handled that situation, you know, I hate that word. Say I look at me, I'm so amazing. The way that I expect everybody on my team to handle the situation where that team member spoke up is the same. Yeah, treat them with respect and dignity. There's no judgement here. Thank you for being vulnerable. Thank you for throwing that out there. Let's tackle that. Right. So that that person can feel like it's okay to speak up. Because when I do not trust you, and I do not believe that you have my best interest at heart, and I do believe you're judging the crap out of me. Forget it. You're never getting the trust out of me. You'll never get invulnerability out of me. I'm not going to take the risks that you pay me to take. I'm going to do things to preserve myself and go home at the end of the day and get a paycheck.

Brian A 32:15
Yeah, no, I love the contrast that you teased out there just in the in the question itself to say, hey, look, these two things don't go together. If we have a toxic culture. Yeah, you're gonna be experiencing some of these issues. But if it is a culture, that healthy culture where truth is, honesty is prized, it's a value, you're not going to have a sense of, of this oppressiveness our, you know, the toxic totalitarian, you know, approach those things are not going to be found hand in hand. And so yeah, beautiful, beautiful concept. There. Thanks for the clarity there. And then in the home, you know, we need to start wrapping up here, keep I keep thinking these are going to be really, so it's we're just going to sail right through them. Yet another nautical, Joel, another analogy for you anyway. But coming back into the to the home, because a lot of the same issues, I mean, crop up in the home as well, whether it's the backbiting, the negativity, all that, you know, that just set strife and division that comes in, but I love what you were talking about just that, at the very beginning with a team member. We could say that also as parents, hey, we don't do this. Yeah, this isn't what we do. We don't lie. We don't cheat. We don't steal. We don't, you know, paint the truth in different colours and shades to put us in a better light. You know, that we show that honesty and transparency and truth are prized. It is a value in the home. What else? Could we encourage parents here that are struggling with some of this negativity in their homes? Well,

Chris LoCurto 34:15
why do we lie? Right? We're lying because we're trying to protect ourselves. We're lying because we're trying to get away with something or we're lying because we're trying to gain worth. We lie for attention. You know, there's all these different aspects and what So, for those of us that are believers, we believe that you know, most lies are a sin, right? Interestingly, we will find certain things in Scripture that was a benefit but all in all, we believe that lying is not a good thing. And because it's not a good thing, we have to look at how it's destructive. How it's, you know, how is this hurting somebody else or relationship or, and so for me, you know, again, lying and stealing, those are two things I'm going to, I'm going to hit them pretty hard. But I'm always going to go into teaching mode, you know, help somebody to understand how destructive and why it's destructive, and how painful and how, at the moment, it seems like this is the right thing to do. But what does this create on the other side? You know, and how does this affect somebody on the other side? And how does this affect relationships and you think that you got away with this, but here's what this is doing here, and so on. So for me, I'm going to try and go into not lecture mode. But just let me try and help you to understand, the evil inclination here, you know, what is this doing? And how is this affecting things? And if you can see that, then hopefully, you can choose a better response, right? So if I choose to lie, you know, we're huge on choices and consequences. If I choose good choices, I choose good consequences. If I choose bad choices, I choose bad consequences. Either way, the consequence is because of my choice, no ifs and no victim mentality is allowed. It's my choice, right?

So if I can recognise the consequence of my lying if I'm a, you know, a parent, or if I'm a leader if I can recognise that by lying, I've pushed somebody away. I don't get their trust anymore. I don't get their vulnerability, I don't get their risk-taking. That's all on me. Was it worth it? For that one timeline, or multiple lines? Whatever the situation is? Same thing as a parent, what should I teach my kids? Do you understand that? I'm now struggling to believe what you say. Do you understand that it's now created a situation in our relationship, where I'm going to hold back this part? Until I can trust you again? Do you understand that I'm not going to allow you to do X, Y, and Z because of this line? Do you know and walk through those, here are the ultimate consequences. Being able to teach not from anger, not from being upset, but help them your job is to parent is to educate them, right? Help them with their decision-making process choices have consequences that lead to them, right? You help them to make good decisions, if I can help that child understand because you lied, this is how I am now if it's a one-time deal, may not need to go into this. But if I see that this is a pattern, pattern, here's where I am with you, I am now not trusting you in this area. I'm now holding back on what I'm going to allow you to do in this area not holding back love holding back activities, or, you know, some consequences are coming from that if I can help that child to see, hey, this is bad. And ultimately, more importantly, if I can help them to see how God sees it, then, gosh, I don't know any better ways to hopefully stop that. That child or even adult from lying. Yeah,

Brian A 38:07
yeah. And that's, that kind of brings us to just this wrapping up this conclusion, because we, we were talking at the very beginning about how it can so quickly spiral out of control, it goes viral. So quick, like the feathers from the pillow, you know, in the wind, we are dust in the wind, which raised us to this little filter test that this philosopher would have with his students is kind of adapted. But let me know what you think of it. This form is if you're from Southern California, and your names are Bill and Ted, his name, the philosopher is so Kraits. So came up with this. But he would ask his students before he would allow them to tell him something they had heard, whether it was about him or somebody else, he would ask them, Is that true? Is that you 100%? Sure, it's true? Is it? Is it good? Is it healthy? Is it positive? He would ask. And the third thing, will it help? Is it helpful? 90% of the time, their heads would hang down low, they'd walk away, and he'd be better for it. So would they? What could we adapt here? What else would we add to or take away from this little gossip filter test?

Chris LoCurto 39:30
What I love about good also crates, or Socrates is those who are wondering what they're talking about. What I love about that is how much he protected himself as well. Right? We read that and we go, oh, gosh, he's doing such a good job teaching people not to gossip not to lie not to, you know, even to the last piece. Will it help? Are you telling me this thing? Right there That's huge. Does it matter? If you didn't tell me? Does it hurt anything? If you do tell me, does it help anything? Well, no. Well, then what do you want me to know? Because then intent is behind it again, everything that he asked is all about your intent was telling me something it's not about it's good is the thing? Is the information important? It's really about what's your intention behind it. Right. So if it doesn't help anything for you to tell me, then what are you going to tell me in the first place? Right. Now, keep in mind, everything in that aspect is about somebody else. You know, if I wanted to say, I don't know, Brian had the best tennis match he's ever had the other day. And I wanted to share that with somebody. Will it help?

Brian A 40:50
Was that true? True? No, Brian does not play tennis. He would like to, but he cannot.

Chris LoCurto 40:59
So let's just stop. Right. Don't tell me anything about

Brian A 41:03
but nip it in the bud.

Chris LoCurto 41:06
But, you know, if, let's say it did happen, even to that third point, will it help? Well, it may help you to know and be proud of Brian's forgiveness, but out there and doing something good. Well, okay, well, then that's a different thing. You know, it's Socrates isn't saying let's not have any conversations whatsoever about other people. You know, it's really what's the intent behind all of this? If the intent is positive? If it's pure, Krait? Fabulous. That's awesome. Right. So I think that's, I think that's great. I think it's great for the person who's approaching with the thing that wants to talk about it. But it's also incredibly powerful. How it keeps negativity and gossip. You know, backbiting backstabbing out of my life, if, and here's the funny thing, 90% of people drop their head and turn away. How many people don't come back with a second thing?

Brian A 41:57
Right? You know, I mean, how well, the answer that again, right?

Chris LoCurto 42:01
Yeah, how much does it filters out? This? I'm not even gonna approach him until I answer these three questions. This means I'm chances are, he's not hearing a whole bunch of crap about a bunch of people. Yeah. So I think it's powerful. It's kind of

Brian A 42:14
thing that's good in the home, too, for parents. And that's probably just good advice for all of us to think about before we open our mouths. Is it true? Is it positively good? And will it help someone or not? Wow,

Chris LoCurto 42:30
you know, the thing that comes to mind right then and some parents are a little bit more submissive? How does not have those types of standards, allow a child and enable a child to play one parent against the other? What should the standard be when my child comes to me and says, you know, Mommy won't let me do this? My standard better be, why are you why are you coming to me? Why are you telling me if Mommy told you? No, the answer is no, don't come to me again, you know, that understand mommy and daddy are on the same page. We are unified. You know, we're gonna back each other. It's so as you say that, that's the thing that comes to mind. Because we have a lot of folks that do a lot of folks that deal with and don't know how to parent that. And if we have these standards in our household, you know like you just said, then it changes the way a child looks at how they're going to, you know, approach their parents. Right, right. Good stuff. Well, brother, thank you again for joining me. Late in Sicily. I know it's considerably later over there. But thank you for this. This was great. Great episode.

Brian A 43:44
My pleasure.

Chris LoCurto 43:46
Well, folks, that's all the time we have for today. Truth is, we probably could talk on this for another hour, but we're not gonna we're gonna save you time. So that's all we've got. We hope this was helpful to you. We'd love your questions, please continue to ask them. Send them on to us podcast at Chris LoCurto.com. And as always, we hope that you take this information, change your leadership, change your business, change your life, and join us on the next episode.