1. Thrive for personal connection: talk more, and text less.
2. Look the person in the eyes. It’s been proven to create more meaningful connections.
3. Allow for silence to be present. It’s not as scary when you let it happen.
4. Listen to what is being said, but also to the body language of your partner in conversation.
5. Listen with the intention of listening, not for saying the next clever thing.
6. Repeat what you’ve heard using your own words. This is called paraphrasing. There are many ways to paraphrase professionally but just try: “I hear that you’re saying…”, and that should do the trick.
7. Ask questions.
8. Be interested in the other person.
9. If they don’t ask you questions back, ask them to ask you something (always works. People realise they’ve focused on themselves too much).
10. Be genuine.
11. Be yourself.
12. Say what’s on your mind even at the risk of getting hurt. It’s worth it.
13. Invite the other side to share what’s on their mind too.
14. Stay with what you hear. It might not be easy to digest but at the end of the day, the truth is better than running thoughts in your head.
15. Be honest.
16. Expect the other person to be honest too. Such expectation can, but doesn’t need to be expressed in words. The inner feeling is sometimes enough.
17. Thank the other person for their thoughts, their words.
18. Read this list every day. In fact, print it and look at it as many times as you can.

Noa Brume