Andresa: Today we are talking about conflict. We live in a world where teams are spread across cities and countries. What seems to be a misalignment might actually be a difference in communication style, expectation, or cultural norm. The real question is: how do we know the difference? And how can we handle it in a way that creates connection? In today’s episode, I have Anna Lecat. She has built multiple businesses across different countries, and today she works with leaders on conflict and communication. Let’s get started.
Andresa: Many real estate investors avoid conflict for different reasons, but during a webinar, the number one reason they told me they avoid having a difficult conversation is because they don’t want to make things worse. So let’s talk about it. What is the next step, Anna, when you are looking at a situation and you know you need to have that conversation, but you actually don’t want to because you don’t feel comfortable doing it? What would you say to that person listening to us?
Anna Lecat: Thank you. Thank you for asking. And let’s remember: we all hate conflict. We grew up in a culture that teaches us to avoid conflict, that loving someone means keeping the peace, making things smooth, avoiding it. Most of us were told, “Okay, you have a hard conversation, just absorb it all and keep the peace.” I was like that also, as probably you and many listeners were. I would rehearse 40 times how I was going to start it, and then when the person was in front of me, I would say, “Everything is fine.” So the first thing is remembering that we are all like that. Very few people love and adore hard conversations or just can’t wait to have one. So it starts with self-knowledge, right? And then also knowing how you specifically react when you are trying to avoid a hard conversation. Do you freeze? Do you run away? Do you get defensive? Do you attack? All of these are not useful. And then what is important to remember is that in front of you is another human being with the same or similar fears, the same or similar values, because those are all intrinsic to us as human beings. They also care about being seen, being witnessed, being loved. They also want to have a feeling of belonging. They want to have a connection with you, and they want to be acknowledged and validated. So just remembering that, getting the focus from you onto them, and remembering that they are a human being. Whatever it is that you need to do to remember that. My hack, for example, if I really am feeling resistant to connection, is that I will look at the person and imagine them as a five-year-old. You know, in our body, I am all about somatic processing and feeling our body. So for me, if I look at you and I think about you as a five-year-old, in my body there is this “aw,” like this person is afraid of something or really wants to be seen. Immediately, I’m softer, I’m kinder, I can be more deliberate. So first is remembering: human being. Another one is: how do you listen? Is the person experiencing being completely heard? That is an art, and I teach that in my workshops. The quality of listening should be: am I really ready to change my mind? I am not preparing my answer while you are talking. I am listening to you fully. Another hack there is letting people finish their sentences until the last word. We tend to help people speak. If the person pauses and they are looking for that last word, we tend to stop them, interject something, and help them out. I practiced for a year. I gave myself a regular practice of not finishing people’s sentences. And you know what I found out? What I was about to say was often in a completely different direction from where people were going. Because we have confirmation bias, because we want to be agreeable, because we always prioritize connection, people just nod. They also feel bad that they are pausing because in our culture, especially in the West, we are not supposed to stay quiet or silent with each other.
Andresa: There is a lot to unpack there, Anna. I want to start with feeling heard. Sometimes we paraphrase what the person is saying so we can get to, “Is this what you said?” And they still feel, “No, that’s not what I said.” Then you repeat it again and use different types of strategies. I’m sure when people are in conversations, they want to feel that they are being heard and they want to hear others. How do we make that happen? I think many times I say, “I hear you. I understand you,” but the other person does not feel heard. Where is the root cause of that disconnection?
Anna Lecat: Thank you for asking that. I don’t think it is about a technique. It is not a communication technique. And I think that is how conflict is often taught right now: “Just say that,” or “Just repeat back what they said.” I don’t think we can trick people into having the experience of being fully heard. I think the only way to do it is to truly be ready to change your mind. It is not faking it until you make it. It is not, “Okay, if I repeat back,” or “What I hear you say is…” There are all these tricks, but no. Because if, in your mind, you already know they are wrong, if there is nothing they can say that will change your mind, and you are just trying to manipulate them into getting them to the right place, then it is not going to work. Even the best people who teach this, they don’t achieve it. People feel it. I think we underestimate how much people feel. All my work comes from tango dancing. I am a tango dancer, and I teach conflict through dancing, through somatic movement. In tango, we don’t speak. We are very close to each other. We really feel each other’s bodies because it is a fully improvised dance, and the only way to follow and lead is to fully listen with our whole body to the experience of the person who is in our arms. We can feel and hear the breathing, the nerves, the shaking. We can feel it all. But then there is also the intuitive part: how are they feeling? Are they nervous right now? Are they confident? Are they open to me? Do they want to go slow? Do they want to go fast? And I dance both roles, so I also feel: do they want to initiate, or do they want to surrender? Do they want to lead or follow? I switch between leading and following. Going back to conflict, if you are faking it and trying to lead them to your conclusion, it is not a conversation, and you don’t have permission for that conversation.
Andresa: I love this so much.
Anna Lecat: I have a very high bar for conversations. If I am not ready to change my mind, and I speak a lot with people who have different political views, who are very anti whatever I represent. I’m Jewish, I speak with anti-Semites, open racists, men who think a woman has to stay in the kitchen and never do anything on her own. I’m also Ukrainian, and Ukraine is at war, and I will speak to Russian people even if they are pro-war. So this is practice every day for me. And if I’m not ready to change my mind about something that is so unacceptable to me, I will say it. I will put that card on the table.
Andresa: Can we go there in terms of changing our mind? By the way, I love this. I never thought about the concept of tango as the same thing as having a conflict. And I think really starting by sharing, “Hey, this is uncomfortable to me. I don’t like to do this, but bear with me as I process with you.” Just putting the cards right there. Same as a person dancing: “Hey, this is my first time doing tango. I actually don’t know how to navigate this. Bear with me. Let’s create something.” But you are talking about being ready to change our minds. How do we evaluate that? Let’s start with ourselves. How do I know if I am ready to change my mind? How would somebody listening now know for sure she is ready to change her mind?
Anna Lecat: Thank you for bringing it to very practical steps. I love that. I think that is how the conversation should be. Practically, it is about intellectual humility. It is about accepting that it is okay to be wrong. This is very hard for us because we like to be right. For that, I personally keep the goal in mind. My ultimate goal is connection with another human being, not winning the argument. If I am going in and trying to manipulate them into voting for my party, it is not a conversation. I need to go in saying, and I have talked to many people who campaign, and I know that the most successful people who campaign are the ones who knock on somebody’s door because they want to make a friend, not because they want that person to vote for them or their party. So what is your intention here? Do you want to maintain this friendship? Do you want to keep speaking to your mother? Do you want the love to continue and grow, or do you want to be right? Check your intention. Another part is constantly knowing where you are and doing a lot of work on self-knowledge and knowing where your body is, so you can notice early if you are getting flooded, if something triggers you. I know my triggers really well. I watch myself carefully, and I know there are aspects of life and values that, if touched or threatened, cause me to become so flooded that I cannot be deliberate anymore. I know them, and I disclose them upfront to people who don’t know me. For example, somehow, for whatever reason, I cannot stand being told what to do. The way I grew up, and I worked with my therapist on it for a long time, I know I get flooded more easily than most people. I’m like, “Don’t tell me what to do.” I cannot be deliberate. So if I’m driving a car and somebody is in the passenger seat next to me and they do not know me, I tell them before we start the drive: “Look, I want us to be friends at the end of this drive. I love you. I respect you, and I have this thing. So please do not tell me to turn right unless there is danger.”
Andresa: Unless there is danger, then just say, “Slow down. Stop. Pause.” Be very concrete with what I need to do. And very clean. No passive-aggressive, no sarcastic. Do not joke about my driving.
Anna Lecat: Exactly. I’m very upfront, and then I enjoy the drive, and we have a great conversation. So I open my cards. Again, I like this idea that I have a blueprint. There is a blueprint of me.
Andresa: Yes.
Anna Lecat: I give it to people. If it is a new friendship, I will say, “I don’t like to be ignored. I am quite a queen.” I will say it, and it is honest.
Andresa: I like that. I feel that then I get to know you, and you get to know me. I am more interested in that type of relationship versus people wearing masks and keeping their cards to themselves. That is not fun.
Anna Lecat: It is not fun. It also takes a long time to become attached, to fall in love with each other, to have fun together, or to have collaboration, because you have to learn about me for years and years. Then I change, because we change every day, and then you have to keep learning. I am upfront. Even when something changes, I update the software. I say, “Oh, you know, this new thing showed up.” If you want to be my friend, do not assume I am okay with being ignored. I easily think you are ignoring me if you don’t reply to me within a few days.
Andresa: Of course. Let me say that. Of course.
Anna Lecat: I’m glad.
Andresa: I’m glad to know, but it is not “of course” for many people.
Anna Lecat: Absolutely. Or, for example, I have a thing about alcohol. The way I grew up in the Soviet Union, alcohol meant danger. So I don’t drink, and if we are going out, I will tell people with me that I cannot be around people who start to slur. If they have reached an alcohol level where slurring occurs, I will leave a minute before. And if you want, let’s talk about it now because it is not about you.
Andresa: I curse without drinking. I also don’t drink, but I curse. What do you mean?
Anna Lecat: No, I mean slur, not curse.
Andresa: Okay. Okay.
Anna Lecat: Cursing is all good.
Andresa: Okay.
Anna Lecat: Slurring, for me, signals that the person is not clear anymore in their mind and that they might not remember this conversation tomorrow. They cannot be deliberate anymore. It signals danger to my system. It is not judgmental about them. I am not criticizing their lifestyle. I am just saying I need to get out. It is my boundary, and I will tell them upfront. So it is like that in conflict too. Cards on the table. This is who I am.
Andresa: I love that. I will share one of my cards. I wanted to ask you, and all the women listening. One of my cards is when I am speaking with somebody about, let’s say we are going into a meeting to talk about a very specific subject, and then the other person starts talking as if they did not think about it before, did not process it, and they have what I call an open brain. They are talking as they are processing, and it feels like they are literally vomiting all their thoughts together to me. It takes a long time for them to get to the point they want to make. That does not work for me. What I have as a rule with people is: see where you are at. What are your non-negotiables? Check with yourself. Do you have an opinion about something? Is it a 10 out of 10? What are the most important things you want to accomplish? What are the details you want to leave out of this conversation? What are you trying to get out of it? When we have half an hour to have this conversation and the person goes into a rampage and jumps from one subject to another, I get lost. I don’t know why they are making that comment or whatever. That really does not work for me. It has nothing to do with the person. It has to do with me, how I value time and how I respect people’s time. I come from Brazil. I am an immigrant. Many times, I did not get a second chance to make a point, get a job, sell myself, or try again for a scholarship. I had one chance, and I had to come really prepared for that interview, for that opportunity. I could not waste my time. So I had to do this work to go back and recognize it is not about the other person. They can express how they feel, but for me, I think it is my connection with time, because I don’t have time to waste and I don’t think other people have it. I look at time as single opportunities. So let’s make the best out of it and come prepared. People not coming with their thoughts straight feels to me like they did not put the same effort into it as I did. Does that make sense?
Anna Lecat: Totally. Can I offer something more to that?
Andresa: Yes.
Anna Lecat: In tango, you know how they say it takes two to tango? Usually people think it means it takes two people. My tango teacher, Veronica Toumanova, said it differently. She said it takes two to tango means two connections: one with myself and another with the other person. For that, I need to be fully present with myself. Where is my axis? Where are my feet? How am I feeling? Where am I centered? Am I planted on the floor? Am I hungry, lonely, angry, tired? How do I feel about the music, the floor, the other person? And then there is the connection with the other person. I am guessing that what you are experiencing in those moments when people are not fully clear is not necessarily about their logical preparation. I bet you would enjoy talking to someone on the fly, without preparation, as long as they are fully there. It is really a limbic system experience. We know when the other person is not present. We know deeply, and it is very loud. I would say it is even louder in women because we have had to pay more attention to it. As we were socialized, the world is dangerous, so we had to really pay attention to the state of the person in front of us. You probably feel unsafe, and it is really irritating to you when somebody is not fully present. It shows up in how they communicate. But I bet even if they were able to stay logical and prepared, but their thoughts were somewhere else, or they were experiencing something different and they were not fully focused on you, you would still be highly irritated.
Andresa: Totally. My business partner Liz and I have been business partners for 10 years, and we really invested in ourselves and in getting to know ourselves. We know each other’s triggers. An agreement we made is that when I can tell she is triggered, or she can tell I am triggered, we take a step outside to regulate versus continuing something. As you mentioned, I am out of my game. So for the women listening, when they are in a heated argument, recurring argument, or recurring conflict, how do we get out of the cycle of saying, “Oh, I already talked to him about it,” or with contractors, for example, the repetitive conflicts. How do we get to the real root cause of it? And what is it teaching us if it is repeating over and over again?
Anna Lecat: I want to first address what you said before about your business partner. First of all, it is beautiful. I love it when people work together for a long time and know each other so well. And the fact that if one of you gets triggered, you step out, I want to address that point first, if you don’t mind.
Andresa: Yes, absolutely.
Anna Lecat: I have heard this taught by conflict people: “Can I take a pause?” I have been teaching it also, but in the last couple of years, I have been trying not to do that. I stay in because I am really practicing staying. All my work is about staying in the tension. Usually when we are in tension, it is because something big got triggered in us: fear, value, something that is non-negotiable. To find that non-negotiable and talk about it with the person in front of you is gold. When the other person sees us disclosing our fear or our value or our love to them, they will trust us because they will recognize us as another human being. They will stand up for us and help us out because they now love us, see us, and trust us. In our culture, people say, “Step away, calm down by yourself, and then come back in peace.” I say no.
Andresa: I agree with that, and let me clarify because I probably didn’t. We take a pause on the subject itself, and we address the trigger. We process it together. Before, it would take a long time for us to process, but right now we literally have a one-page process for how we get to the root cause. We put the subject we were discussing aside, and then we address what we are seeing. “Hey, it seems that you are triggered. Let’s go there. Let’s see what’s coming up for you.” We usually say that: “What’s coming up for you?” So we put the subject aside, but we don’t go away. We stick with it.
Anna Lecat: Okay. Good. Because I have heard it taught in seminars: step away, take a pause, come back, take care of yourself.
Andresa: I don’t think that is it.
Anna Lecat: Okay, good.
Andresa: I don’t think we should abandon the boat. I would not leave you. Let’s process it and get to it.
Anna Lecat: Exactly. It is important to stay together in connection and say, “Hold my hand through this.” Another thing that is very important, I think, with people who have been together for a long time, is not to become a friend-therapist to the other person.
Andresa: Oh, yeah.
Anna Lecat: Because you just said, “It seems that you are triggered.” I am sorry, I am not criticizing you. I love you. I am sure you are amazing. You have done great things with your partner.
Andresa: I am a work in progress.
Anna Lecat: It is just that I do not think it is about, “Oh, you seem to be triggered.” It is always, “I think I am flooding here. I think what you just said…” Especially nowadays, with so much content about psychology and therapy, people love being therapists to each other. They say, “I watched this short, and I think you are doing this.” They talk about each other’s attachment styles, love languages, and traumas. I am always like, “Ah, okay. Not a therapist friend.” Friends are there for processing, as long as we are not playing the role of therapist. It should be, “This is what is happening to me.” And then your other question was about recurring conflict, like with a contractor, for example.
Andresa: Yeah.
Anna Lecat: A long time ago, I learned that if I have a recurring conflict with someone, there is something for me to learn there. Something is up. It is a lesson that the universe, or whatever you believe in, is bringing to me because this conflict keeps happening in my life while all the other issues are resolved. So it is even more reason to invite that person for lunch. Not when they are in front of their people. It needs to be calm: tea, coffee, beer, whatever your cup of tea is. And I would say, “Hey, I’ve noticed something. It’s so strange. I love everything that’s going on between us. However, there is one thing where I keep getting triggered. There is something about me. Would you be willing to sit with me and look into me?” It is not looking into you. Another trick or hack: if I have a conversation with my husband, with whom I have the most difficult conversations, the highest-stakes conversations, I do this. If we are in a restaurant, he is French, so he really loves nice restaurants, wine, and all of that. I don’t drink, so water for me and wine for him. In France, people are very serious about the ritual of how they eat. When I have a hard conversation with my husband, I will put a chair next to him. And I will say, “You and me have this problem.” So we are together here, as a team, and for us there is this problem. It is never “you and me have a problem.” It is very difficult for bodies to understand “we are a team” if I am looking at you, pointing at you, and imagining a third problem. But if we are together next to each other, then we can look at the problem together. So if it is a contractor, can you bring lunch and sit on a curb next to each other? Then you show even with your hands: “This is the problem. Can we discuss it together? Because you and me, we are a team. We can only succeed if we continue being a team.”
Andresa: Oh my gosh, I love this so much because it is us against the problem. Whatever that problem is. But I like that you are materializing it. Is it a chair? Is it a house? Whatever that is. Then every time I look at that chair, we are talking about the problem versus being against each other. We did not get a chance to go deeper, but I did not want to miss the opportunity to talk about culture. Many times we work with people from different countries, even within the U.S., right? Diverse people, immigrants. I am an immigrant, and I work with so many different people. Many times, and I am using “I” now every time, I think culture is not taken into consideration as one of the issues or root causes of conflicts. Many times there is alignment, but there is a difference in culture itself. People say, “Oh, I forgot you are Brazilian, and that is why you do this, and that is why you talk with your hands,” etc. Many times you have a cultural difference and not necessarily a misalignment issue. So how does it play out? How have you seen culture playing into conflict?
Anna Lecat: Thank you so much for asking. I love this conversation, and it is so rare that people want to talk about it. I am a triple immigrant. I immigrated from Soviet Ukraine to China. I speak Mandarin fluently, and I lived in Shanghai. Then I moved to the United States, so I am an American, and now to France. Three different countries, completely different planets. I needed to adapt, learn, and build businesses. I built several businesses across these countries. There are two things. First, yes, remembering that this is a person from a different culture, and mostly remembering that you are from a different culture. Put your card on the table upfront. I will say, “I am Ukrainian,” or “I lived so many years in China, and this affected me. This is how it affected me. You might notice that I behave this way because of my background, and I would like to keep it in our relationship. Is that okay for you? How do you feel about that?” Then translate that when we communicate. I will use my hands, for example. For many Asian people, many Chinese people who work in the States, they do not explain that eye contact is not obvious for them. It does not mean they don’t trust you. It is just that they were taught that it is not polite to look people in the eyes. While somebody from Latin America, if you don’t look them in the eye for a long time, they may think, “Are you hiding something?”
Andresa: Exactly. How do we know, right? You don’t know how to connect with another person if you don’t see their eyes.
Anna Lecat: So remembering that, learning about different cultures and respecting them, and yet at the same time not stereotyping. I see the other side of the pendulum a lot in the business world, where people say, “Oh, you are French, so that means…” For example, I get a lot of, “Oh, I have an Eastern European girlfriend. I know how you all are.” What does that even mean? First of all, congratulations. Eastern European girlfriend, awesome, I am sure. But maybe I am a human being who has been affected by my whole life, not just by the place where I was born. And to your point, in the United States, we have different cultures on the same street. People move so much from the South to the North, from the coast to the middle of the country, and you already have those differences. So do not say, “Oh, you are from South Carolina. I had a neighbor from South Carolina. That means you are like that.” Be sensitive not to over-stereotype and over-bias people because they have an accent, because they look similar to your girlfriend, or because you assume that means they will also want flowers. Which is possible, but check. Again, put the card on the table. I like it when people tell me they had an Eastern European girlfriend. It means I know they are stereotyping me, and then I know what to tell them. For example, I will say, “Well, I have been independent. I left when I was 17 years old, and I am actually overcorrecting on independence.” So they know: don’t tell me what to do. What are the stereotypes about your culture and your accent? Disclose them and open those cards in the conversation so that you don’t step into overcorrecting on the other side.
Andresa: I love this. I think we can continue talking about it so much, especially amongst everything that is going on in the world right now. I think we are more alike than we are different. And I think what you are saying is: keep the connection as the goal of a conversation. Am I connecting with you? Are we both present? I am going to double-check every single connection that I have now. People are screwed. I am going to double-check: Are we here? Mind and soul, are we here? Are you here? Am I here? Are we all here? Because I think that is a fair request to make. I want to connect with people, and I think they want to connect with me. They also don’t want to see my walls go up and everybody’s walls go up. I want to connect with real people. I usually say that I don’t like a lot of people, and that is the truth. I think the main disclaimer is that I don’t like when there is a mask, when people are not comfortable being themselves unapologetically, because then I cannot know them. And I think it is a missed opportunity. I might like your real version versus the version you are putting up. With social media, people put a lot of versions out there, and then they create an image where we might not know who the real person actually is. Anna, you shared that you have a new book launching very soon. Tell me more about it.
Anna Lecat: Yes, it has actually just arrived. Thank you for giving me the opportunity. I just unboxed it before this. The book is called Loving Conflict. It is going to be available on March 31. It is only softcover because I wanted to write a book that people carry with them and open on the plane, on the train, very easily. It is half memoir, half my framework of how to love conflict and fight kinder. My goal is that if you are conflict avoidant, if you hate it, if you stopped loving someone or stopped communicating with somebody you love because you have a difference of opinion, political beliefs, or lifestyle, I hope you read this and then you know what to do, how to call them, and how to invite them for that curbside lunch. I tell stories about my travels and how I adapted in China, in San Francisco, and now in Paris. It is hard to have those conversations. I know this is not a very happy subject, so I try to make it as fun and engaging as possible so that people relax and dance with me.
Andresa: Awesome. Now I have a different perspective about “it takes two to tango.” I do, and I won’t change based on what you said. Anna, thank you so much for spending the time and having these conversations. I think the women in our community appreciate going there and talking about it because that is what they feel on a daily basis. Thank you so much for your time and for sharing your story with us.
Anna Lecat: Thank you so much for inviting me.
You can find out more on Anna’s website at annalecat.com.