Dr. Alison Wood Brooks

If they really take what we talk about to heart, I think everything about their life could get better.

Your love life, your relationship with your children, your relationship with your parents, your work, your relationships with your colleagues, what you're able to get done together, everything, every person you know, every relationship in your life is a repeated sequence of conversations over time.

So even if each of those conversations gets a little bit better,

this short time that we have on the earth, everything about it is going to get better.

Wow.

Why does communication matter so much?

Communication is everything, everything.

So really, you can think of every relationship in your life as this repeated sequence of conversations.

And if you zero in on each one of those conversations, it's a series of tiny choices that you're making at

Every moment of every conversation, and we're about to do it right now, Mel.

Every moment you're making these choices, what should we be talking about?

What should I be asking the other person about?

When should we be laughing?

When should we be crying?

When should I ask a question?

When should I share something of myself?

We're making these tiny micro decisions all the way along.

And it's going to determine what we're able to do together, what we're able to accomplish together, what we're able to learn about each other.

How we talk is who we are and what we're able to do in the world.

I have to tell you, getting that course title approved by the powers that be at Harvard is one of the greatest accomplishments of my professional life.