Chris Duffy

Our guest was fantastic.

The negative reviews were basically because every single one of the questions that I asked was some version of, how do I convince conservatives to realize that they're wrong and I'm right?

And look, it's certainly not lost on me that there's a hilarious irony in me trying to host an episode about communicating across a political divide and then managing to alienate every single person who is on the other side of the political divide from me.

So much so that they felt compelled to give us zero stars and tell me that I am a condescending jerk.

And worse, they're not wrong.

I was being a condescending jerk.

So today, let's see if maybe I can do a little bit better this time.

Today's guest, Monica Guzman, is an expert in curiosity.

She's the author of the fantastic book, I Never Thought of It That Way, How to Have Fearlessly Curious Conversations in Dangerously Divided Times.

Here's a clip from her TEDx talk.

Obviously you want to know why.

We all want to know why.

But you're going to have to stick around until after the break to find out.

We've got more with Monica Guzman right after this.

We're talking about how to have better political conversations in divided times with journalist and author Monica Guzman.

Monica, thank you so much for being here.

And maybe let's get started by talking about how you got into this work.

Can you think of a particular conversation or people who you were trying to have conversations with who inspired you to start thinking about polarization and difficult conversations?

In your book, what comes across so clearly, and I think is relatable to so many people, certainly I relate to this, is this complex feeling of absolutely loving these people, caring about them so deeply, and being infuriated because it feels like you cannot understand where they're coming from.

It feels like a lot of us tend to just avoid these topics instead.