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Top 25 Douglas Stone Quotes (2025 Update)

Douglas Stone Quote: “Receiving feedback sits at the intersection of these two needs – our drive to learn and our longing for acceptance.”

1. “Receiving feedback sits at the intersection of these two needs – our drive to learn and our longing for acceptance.”

— Douglas Stone

Douglas Stone Quote: “Listening well is one of the most powerful skills you can bring to a difficult conversation.”

2. “Listening well is one of the most powerful skills you can bring to a difficult conversation.”

— Douglas Stone

Douglas Stone Quote: “The truth is, intentions are invisible. We assume them from other people’s behavior. In other words, we make them up, we invent them. But.”

3. “The truth is, intentions are invisible. We assume them from other people’s behavior. In other words, we make them up, we invent them. But.”

— Douglas Stone

Douglas Stone Quote: “People almost never change without first feeling understood.”

4. “People almost never change without first feeling understood.”

— Douglas Stone

Douglas Stone Quote: “Our Assumptions About Intentions Are Often Wrong.”

5. “Our Assumptions About Intentions Are Often Wrong.”

— Douglas Stone

Douglas Stone Quote: “Before you tell me how to do it better, before you lay out your big plans for changing, fixing, and improving me, before you teach me how to pick myself up and dust myself off so that I can be shiny and successful – know this: I’ve heard it before. I’ve been graded, rated, and ranked. Coached, screened, and scored. I’ve been picked first, picked last, and not picked at all. And that was just kindergarten.”

6. “Before you tell me how to do it better, before you lay out your big plans for changing, fixing, and improving me, before you teach me how to pick myself up and dust myself off so that I can be shiny and successful – know this: I’ve heard it before. I’ve been graded, rated, and ranked. Coached, screened, and scored. I’ve been picked first, picked last, and not picked at all. And that was just kindergarten.”

— Douglas Stone

Douglas Stone Quote: “Learning about ourselves can be painful – sometimes brutally so – and the feedback is often delivered with a forehead-slapping lack of awareness for what makes people tick. It can feel less like a “gift of learning” and more like a colonoscopy.”

7. “Learning about ourselves can be painful – sometimes brutally so – and the feedback is often delivered with a forehead-slapping lack of awareness for what makes people tick. It can feel less like a “gift of learning” and more like a colonoscopy.”

— Douglas Stone

Douglas Stone Quote: “Studies show that while few people are good at detecting factual lies, most of us can determine when someone is distorting, manufacturing, or withholding an emotion.”

8. “Studies show that while few people are good at detecting factual lies, most of us can determine when someone is distorting, manufacturing, or withholding an emotion.”

— Douglas Stone

Douglas Stone Quote: “Working to keep negative information out during a difficult conversation is like trying to swim without getting wet.”

9. “Working to keep negative information out during a difficult conversation is like trying to swim without getting wet.”

— Douglas Stone

Douglas Stone Quote: “When competent, sensible people do something stupid, the smartest move is to try to figure out, first, what kept them from seeing it coming and, second, how to prevent the problem from happening again. Talking.”

10. “When competent, sensible people do something stupid, the smartest move is to try to figure out, first, what kept them from seeing it coming and, second, how to prevent the problem from happening again. Talking.”

— Douglas Stone

Douglas Stone Quote: “Seeing my own contribution to my circumstances makes me stronger, not weaker. If I contribute to my own problems, there are things I have the power to change.”

11. “Seeing my own contribution to my circumstances makes me stronger, not weaker. If I contribute to my own problems, there are things I have the power to change.”

— Douglas Stone

Douglas Stone Quote: “I’ve been graded, rated, and ranked. Coached, screened, and scored. I’ve been picked first, picked last, and not picked at all. And that was just kindergarten.”

12. “I’ve been graded, rated, and ranked. Coached, screened, and scored. I’ve been picked first, picked last, and not picked at all. And that was just kindergarten.”

— Douglas Stone

Douglas Stone Quote: “Telling someone to change makes it less rather than more likely that they will.”

13. “Telling someone to change makes it less rather than more likely that they will.”

— Douglas Stone

Douglas Stone Quote: “Control is the unilateral ability to make something happen. Influence is the ability to affect someone else’s thinking.”

14. “Control is the unilateral ability to make something happen. Influence is the ability to affect someone else’s thinking.”

— Douglas Stone

Douglas Stone Quote: “Because good listening requires an open and honest curiosity about the other person, and a willingness and ability to keep the spotlight on them. Buried emotions draw the spotlight back to us. Instead of wondering, “How does what they are saying make sense?”

15. “Because good listening requires an open and honest curiosity about the other person, and a willingness and ability to keep the spotlight on them. Buried emotions draw the spotlight back to us. Instead of wondering, “How does what they are saying make sense?”

— Douglas Stone

Douglas Stone Quote: “Paradoxically, there is also considerable persuasion power in inquiry and listening.”

16. “Paradoxically, there is also considerable persuasion power in inquiry and listening.”

— Douglas Stone

Douglas Stone Quote: “Simply by changing your own behavior, you gain at least some influence over the problem.”

17. “Simply by changing your own behavior, you gain at least some influence over the problem.”

— Douglas Stone

Douglas Stone Quote: “Talking successfully about feelings requires you to be scrupulous about taking the judgments, attributions, and statements of blame out of what you are saying, and putting the statement of feeling in. It is crucial to look at the actual words you are using to see whether those words really convey what you want them to. For.”

18. “Talking successfully about feelings requires you to be scrupulous about taking the judgments, attributions, and statements of blame out of what you are saying, and putting the statement of feeling in. It is crucial to look at the actual words you are using to see whether those words really convey what you want them to. For.”

— Douglas Stone

Douglas Stone Quote: “Often we go through an entire conversation – or indeed an entire relationship – without ever realizing that each of us is paying attention to different things, that our views are based on different information.”

19. “Often we go through an entire conversation – or indeed an entire relationship – without ever realizing that each of us is paying attention to different things, that our views are based on different information.”

— Douglas Stone

Douglas Stone Quote: “Because when we set out to try to change someone, we are more likely to argue with and attack their story and less likely to listen. This approach increases the likelihood that they will feel defensive rather than open to learning something new. They are more likely to change if they think we understand them and if they feel heard and respected. They are more likely to change if they feel free not to.”

20. “Because when we set out to try to change someone, we are more likely to argue with and attack their story and less likely to listen. This approach increases the likelihood that they will feel defensive rather than open to learning something new. They are more likely to change if they think we understand them and if they feel heard and respected. They are more likely to change if they feel free not to.”

— Douglas Stone

Douglas Stone Quote: “We don’t care where the ball lands, as long as it doesn’t land on us.”

21. “We don’t care where the ball lands, as long as it doesn’t land on us.”

— Douglas Stone

Douglas Stone Quote: “We Ignore the Complexity of Human Motivations.”

22. “We Ignore the Complexity of Human Motivations.”

— Douglas Stone

Douglas Stone Quote: “Imagine that while scuba diving, you suddenly see a shark glide into view. Your heart starts to pound and your anxiety skyrockets. You’re terrified, which is a perfectly rational and understandable feeling. Now imagine that your marine biology training enables you to identify it as a Reef Shark, which you know doesn’t prey on anything as large as you. Your anxiety disappears. Instead you feel excited and curious to observe the shark’s behavior.”

23. “Imagine that while scuba diving, you suddenly see a shark glide into view. Your heart starts to pound and your anxiety skyrockets. You’re terrified, which is a perfectly rational and understandable feeling. Now imagine that your marine biology training enables you to identify it as a Reef Shark, which you know doesn’t prey on anything as large as you. Your anxiety disappears. Instead you feel excited and curious to observe the shark’s behavior.”

— Douglas Stone

Douglas Stone Quote: “Interpretations and judgments are important to explore. In contrast, the quest to determine who is right and who is wrong is a dead end. In.”

24. “Interpretations and judgments are important to explore. In contrast, the quest to determine who is right and who is wrong is a dead end. In.”

— Douglas Stone

Douglas Stone Quote: “In truth, we are all fast and slow, strong and weak, motivated and lazy in a thousand tiny ways throughout our days that the generalizations simply don’t capture.”

25. “In truth, we are all fast and slow, strong and weak, motivated and lazy in a thousand tiny ways throughout our days that the generalizations simply don’t capture.”

— Douglas Stone

Douglas Stone Quote: “Learning that you can’t control the other person’s reaction, and that it can be destructive to try, can be incredibly liberating. It not only gives the other person the space to react however they need to, but also takes a huge amount of pressure off you. You will learn things about yourself based on their reaction, but if you are prepared to learn, you’ll feel free from the desperate need for their reaction to go one certain way.”

26. “Learning that you can’t control the other person’s reaction, and that it can be destructive to try, can be incredibly liberating. It not only gives the other person the space to react however they need to, but also takes a huge amount of pressure off you. You will learn things about yourself based on their reaction, but if you are prepared to learn, you’ll feel free from the desperate need for their reaction to go one certain way.”

— Douglas Stone

Douglas Stone Quote: “But feedback is not simply a thing the giver hands you and you receive. The two of you are building a puzzle – together.”

27. “But feedback is not simply a thing the giver hands you and you receive. The two of you are building a puzzle – together.”

— Douglas Stone

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