Kyle MacDonald

But like you say, I mean, again, that's one of the sort of the big ways when I was thinking about this topic today.

One of the big difficult bits is actually the more we can increase our own self-awareness, the more we can be honest with ourselves about where our own weak spots are.

You know, do we have a tendency to fly off the handle or whatever?

you know, to get frustrated when we're tired or do we have a tendency to get hangry or we're not very patient sometimes at the end of the day with our kids, then actually that opens up the possibility of taking responsibility.

I mean, I always like the way that AA or Alcoholics Anonymous put it, which is that actually we have to take care of our own side of the street.

So it's a challenging idea, but I think a lot of times, particularly with people we like or respect, if they're saying something to us, the question we should be asking is, are they right?

What do I need to hear in this?

What message can I take from what they're saying?

Absolutely.

And I think the professional environment is kind of a whole other category in and of itself, really.

But I think that it's also OK with feedback to be able to say, particularly probably with family members more than a workplace, actually now is not the time.

I'm happy to talk about this, but actually I'm finding myself getting quite upset right now about this.

Maybe we can come back to this.

And so it's often useful when we think about giving feedback to strike when the iron's cold, as we say.

that the worst time to give someone feedback is when you're in the midst of the argument.

No one takes feedback at that moment.

But actually being able to then sit down calmly later, which is often the temptation then, of course, to avoid the topic, and then actually take some time to talk it through then.

I think so.

And I think another great strategy is always sleep on it because that slows us down immediately, right?

Hopefully, most of the time, we wake up more regulated the next day than we were the night before.