Relationships thrive on genuine connection—on feeling heard, understood, and supported at a deeper level. Yet all too often, we hold back, afraid of vulnerability, or simply unsure how to open up. This pattern of emotional distance is sometimes called “emotional unavailability.” While it can protect us from hurt, it also holds us back from the warmth and intimacy we crave.
Why do we intend to do things but often don’t follow through? Learn how the Theory of Reasoned Action explains this puzzle—and how attitudes, social norms, and perceived obstacles shape your intentions and actions.
When you have something difficult to say, something that might hurt or embarrass the person you're talking to, how should you say it?
Should you come right out and say it, bluntly and honestly?
Or should you be tactful and indirect?
What values should guide us in these situations?
Is honesty the highest value? Or is kindness?
I want to tell you a story.
In addition to being a college professor, I'm a consultant. The most common kind of training I do, as a consultant, is communication skills training.
I specialize in training health professionals how to talk to patients and families who have been harmed by healthcare.
These are very difficult conversations. We focus a lot on empathic communication skills, which is a topic I've taught a lot about.
I'm going to teach you the single most important step you can take to begin to improve your communication skill.
Our own behavior is killing us.
If you look at the top 10 causes of death, you'll see at the top diseases like heart disease, cancer, and stroke, but it's actually our own behavior, smoking, drinking, not exercising, having a poor diet, which lead to the problems.
If you want to change people's behavior, you have to stop giving them information.
Information alone simply isn't persuasive. Most of the time, people already have a lot of the basic information like smoking causes lung cancer, but it doesn't change their behavior.
If you want to actually change people's behavior, you have to put this information into a story.
Have you ever tried to be emotionally supportive to a friend and instead made things worse?
I know I have.
It's easy to say the wrong thing when we are trying to help people handle painful emotions.
Here I give you a guide to the potential landmines that you need to avoid.
I'm going to tell you what not to say when you're trying to comfort or provide emotional support to a friend or a loved one.
In high stakes situations, it's really hard to say the right thing.
Unfortunately, it's really easy to say the wrong thing.
Many of us avoid these high stakes, difficult conversations because we're so afraid we're going to say the wrong thing, or we're afraid we won't be able to find the words to say the right thing.
I'm going to describe a simple technique for how not to say the wrong thing in a high stakes situation.
As the sun sets on another week, I've just finished doing two days of in-person communication skills training.
We were working with 60 doctors, nurses, and other hospital staff to teach them how to talk with patients and families after the patient has been seriously harmed by medical care.
These are extraordinarily difficult conversations, about life or death topics, often with millions of dollars at stake.
