VIDEOS

Common ground, empathy, kindness, and listening are all ways to build bridges and encourage dialogue, especially dialogue with people who see the world differently than we do. But sometimes we simply need to stop conversations that are racist, sexist, and hateful. This takes courage. In this video I talk about an instructional coach who showed great courage to stop a racist conversation in her school, and I discuss a strategy you can use to find ways to have the courage to stop conversations that must be stopped.

Find several free forms for redirecting toxic conversations and toxic emotions, here:

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One of the great challenges we face as we speak with truth about what is good and true is that we need to move away from judging others. Judgment is a relationship killer, and if we are going to connect with others, it starts with relinquishing judgment.

The current political environment has made it very difficult for people to talk with others about things that matter. Friends have stopped talking to friends, family members have stopped talking to family members. Why are so many of us so divided? Why do so many discussions, especially political discussions, dissolve into anger? I think one main reason is fear. Our fear leads us to anger and our anger makes it impossible for us to hear people who see the world differently than we do. In this video I talk about how fear divides us, and I talk about what we can do to overcome our fears. We need to move forward together, not divided, and to do that we need to understand our fears.

How do we make sure other people hear what we have to say? Perhaps the best way is to make sure we understand them, which is to say we demonstrate empathy. In today’s video, I describe what empathy is, why it is important, and how to demonstrate it. In this time of polarization, trying to understand others may be one of the most important things we can do.

You can download free forms to help with demonstrating empathy here:
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Trust and love stand at the heart of effective communication. If we don’t trust someone, if we don’t think they have our best interests at heart, we will hesitate to have meaningful conversations with them, hesitate to learn from them. In today’s video, I talk about what trust is, how it is related to love, and what we can do to become the kind of person others trust.

You can download free forms to help get better at building trust here:
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Is listening the most important communication strategy for coaches? Maybe. Listening certainly is essential for effective coaching, but it is also essential for almost any meaningful communication. And, when we asked people from nine countries around the world to video record and watch their conversations, listening was the one strategy they identified that they most needed to improve. In today’s video, I talk about listening, why it is important, and I share one simple strategy that will help anyone become a better listener.

You can download free forms to help you improve as a listener (and improve at demonstrating empathy) here:
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Reflection is a big part of learning. When we reflection, we can look back at something, such as a behavior, assess how we did, and then think about how we can do better based on what we’ve learned through reflection. In today’s video, I talk about how we can use reflection to get better at the way we control emotions, build connections, and listen.

How did your weekend go? If you’re like me, the events we experienced this weekend may have prompted you to be in some tough conversations either face to face or online, and—again—if you are like me, you may not be happy with how you handled each interaction. What I urge you to do today, in this last video in this series, is to make sure you are not too hard on yourself. You can’t do better than your best, and none of us is perfect. Healthy relationships usually require forgiveness at times. To foster better conversations, we can start by forgiving ourselves.