The Call I Didn’t Want

A better way we can all help those around when they are going through a bad experience.

I instantly knew it was going to be either brilliant news or bad news when I heard the voice message.

“Do you have a minute later for a quick chat?”. It was from Adam, the owner of the CrossFit gym, where I rent a treatment room. I first started to rent out the room a year ago and we would only occasionally text or email each other. 

We have never talked over the phone so when he said he needed to talk, I knew it was urgent.

Adam told me another company wanted to rent out the treatment room full-time (I was only renting out the room one day a week but wanted to have it for two days a week). So he would be ending my contract. I fully understood his decision - it was just business – I would have done the same if I was in his position. 

As I hung up the call, my mind raced. 

I had just started to get real traction in my business. Starting at a new location would delete a lot of the hard work I had put in. But worse, finding a good treatment room that wasn’t stupidly overpriced in London is difficult. All the best places go quickly.

A few seconds after hanging up the call, I turned to Chris, another therapist, who was standing behind me when I took the call. 

Chris has an unassuming appearance that matches his soft voice. He’s easy to miss in a crowd. But whenever I speak to him, he always leaves me with something to think about. He is a typical “wise old man”. But he’s not very old.

Most people would say try to comfort the other person in this situation but Chris did something different. 

He instinctively asked, “What was bad about that treatment room?”. My mind drew a blank. I couldn’t think of anything. It was in a good location, the room was a reasonable size and the rent was relatively very cheap. 

But the question forced me to look at the situation differently. 

It took me a few minutes to come up with an answer but only when I stopped trying to think of answers: the room was windowless so it felt like a cave, the room would get very hot quickly until I switched on the cooling system which was so loud I could then barely hear my clients talk and only a few of my clients were from the gym so being in that exact gym wasn’t that important). 

If I was in Chris’ situation, I probably would have said “You’ll find something else soon” or “Maybe it’s for the best”. Both are reasonable and logical statements. Both would be intended to make the other person feel better. But I don’t think either would work. Telling someone it might be good immediately after something bad happens doesn’t usually change how they feel about the situation. 

But a question, like the one asked by Chris, can.

Had Chris said “It could be a good thing.”, it would have gone over my head even if he had given me logical reasons to support his argument. I was too busy thinking about what I was losing and feeling sorry for myself. But his question forced me to think about how it could be a good thing for me. It forced me to do the thinking, I wasn't told what to think. 

Working things out on my own is so much better than being told something even if I come to the same logical conclusion. 

It was only after writing this essay that I realised everything I would have said to the other person were statements, not questions. But questions, asked at the right time, are often more powerful in changing how people think.

Hopefully, the next time someone comes to me with bad news, I can help them reframe it with a question.

Rather than saying something like “It might be a good thing for you”.