“Shall I show you what I mean? A moment ago you said X. What kind of X is that X?”
For two decades, I've been dropping this little nugget into all kinds of conversations and winning Clean Language converts. And yesterday, I taught it to other people for the first time.
Here's what I know now. Even for seasoned Clean practitioners, flicking the switch from general chat into a conversational Clean demo is not as simple as it looks!
The Two-Minute Demo
Turns out, there are at least five steps:
Get set to demo, knowing that "show, don't tell" is what works
Choose a word to ask about
'Stop the bus' of conversation and offer: "Shall I show you what I mean? A moment ago you said X. What kind of X is that X?"
Ask a couple more Clean Language questions, max
Ask the person about their experience of being asked the questions
And people can be tripped up at every stage, I discover.
Let me walk you through the steps:
Get set. As a Clean practitioner you’re probably skilled at keeping one foot in, one foot out, when it comes to someone’s content. Now, you’re applying those skills in an everyday conversation. Part of you is staying with the conversational flow, but another part is musing, “I’ll be doing a demo. What needs to happen for me to start it?”
Choose a word. Random works scarily well! And, it’s worth bearing a few things in mind. You want a word which sounds interesting, that could have multiple meanings. It shouldn’t be pure jargon, or your question might be interpreted as a request for a definition. Ideally, it should be emotionally neutral or positive in tone. And - the icing on the cake - it should have been uttered by the most senior person in the meeting.
‘Stop the bus’ and make your offer. We talked about interrupting the other week, but you probably won’t need to actually interrupt. What you will be doing is disrupting people’s expectations of the flow of conversations. That can feel transgressive and a bit scary - but if you always do what you’ve always done, you’ll always get what you’ve always got.
Ask a couple more Clean Language questions. Don’t get lost in the content, and turn it into an epic coaching session full of flowery metaphors. Keep the tone conversational. Don’t get fancy with your questions, or your syntax. Stay with, or close to, the original word you chose. And - critically - stop after no more than three questions!
Ask the person about their experience. One of my realisations in yesterday’s class is that I do this so automatically, I hadn’t included it in the model. I usually say something like, “Let’s pause there. I’m curious - what was your experience of being asked those few questions?” And then… I wait.
Your Two-Minute Demos
I want us, as a community of Clean enthusiasts, to get really good at this, so that we win Clean converts all over the place.
I want you, as a Clean enthusiast, to get really good at this, so that you win more opportunities to use the skills you have. That might mean doing demos like this in ‘sales’ meetings, with your boss, or with people who hold the keys to other opportunities you’d value.
And to get really good at this takes practice-plus-feedback. Can we start right away?
Try your own two-minute demo, ideally today, in a low-stress conversation, and then comment on this post with a quick report. Just three things: What word you chose, how they reacted, what you learned.
Let’s spread #CleanInTheWild together.
I was getting my regular massage and I was chatting with my therapist about how I'm updating my EFT practice to utilize Clean Language in session, as well as share it with colleagues.
She knew about the Tapping already but never heard of Clean. I started to tell her how I do it in sessions, but then I immediately jumped to showing her how it would work even in a massage.
I said when she's asking a client what they need that day, I used myself as an example with "this knot here", suggested she could simply say, "... And what kind of knot is that knot?". I said that could happen while on the table as well. I said, "whoa I can really feel that one," I suggested she could actually say, "and what kind of really feel that one is it?"
I didn't dive much deeper, but I mentioned how it can be used in any relationship, helping each other feel truly heard. She did seem to be impressed! She asked for my card!
I love this clear, actionable invitation to actually do it rather than just admire the elegance of Clean Language from a safe distance.
As a visual practitioner I find that the moment of “what to draw” is often a silent fork in the road: do I impose my own assumptions, or do I pause and get curious? The pragmatics of drawing the first thing that comes to mind often win out.
That simple question, “What kind of X is that X?”, becomes a game-changer. It gives permission to hold back on interpreting and instead listen for resonance before making meaning visual.
Thanks for the reminder and for breaking it down with such clarity and heart.
#CleanLanguage #VisualThinking #ListeningDifferently #Sketchnoting #FacilitationTools #CuriosityFirst