When starting from scratch in a conversation, one option is to begin with simple questions. Who are you? Where are you from? Why are you here? There are countless similar, small questions. The challenge with small questions is that they are open to interpretation simply because they have too few words for much context to… More →

I used to have a noisy, inner voice which made pleasant conversation difficult. I didn’t realize it at the time, but that voice was reinforcing my belief that I needed to perform some specific role during a conversation. Back then, I was only having conversations that involved those directly present; the everyday sort of conversations… More →

Today I want to share my thoughts on how the participants’ relative levels of knowledge both affect a conversation and offer opportunities to make a conversation great. Imagine yourself in a conversation with one person. You’re not trying to record the conversation, nor create any specific experience for others. Let’s also imagine this conversation is… More →

Is it better to be the fly on the wall, or the hornet in the room? I variously categorize conversations on a spectrum from formal to casual. Today I want to talk about conversations that fall in the middle. At the formal end would be police interrogations and then—perhaps—live, antagonistic interviews of politicians. At the… More →

And I mean dialog which is set up with certain agreed-upon concepts and boundaries, not literally framed for hanging on a wall. A while back—January 4th, 2021 to be specific—I made some notes about an idea tickling my brain. I had had a conversation with two people. We had decided to get together to talk… More →

A speech is like a love affair. Any fool can start it, but to end it requires considerable skill. ~ Lord Mancroft Conversations are difficult to end well. I’ve spent considerable time thinking about how to end them, and talking to people about how to end them. (I am aware it’s awfully meta to have… More →

Communication between two people falls on a spectrum, and that spectrum has more than one dimension. What would happen if I continuously (as often as is possible in a conversation, but also by reflecting on each conversation and planning for the next), made conscious adjustments? Information could be flowing predominantly from person A to B, evenly, or… More →

I’ve long believed that two is the perfect number of people in a podcast. I’ve long believed that two is the perfect number of people in a podcast. Yes, there are exceptional instances of podcasts with the other numbers of people in them. But there’s magic in two. I often find things scattered about which make… More →