Acive Listening
Once again, I am teaching Employment Dispute Mediation online to students in various professions, including Human Resources, union representatives, teachers, law enforcement, paralegals, etc. As in...
View ArticleReactance aka Self-determination
I just finished reading a book for our book club- The Catalyst: How to Change Anyone’s Mind by Jonah Berger (Simon & Shuster Paperbacks, New York (2020)) (“Catalyst”) As one might glean from the...
View ArticleAn Unfinished Difficult Conversation
Last year, I attended a memorial service online. The service meant a lot to me. The telephone rang, and rather than letting it ring and go to voicemail, I picked up and very quickly said I was...
View ArticleListening To Understand
This past week, I taught my last class for the semester at the University of Southern California’s Gould School of Law. The online course entitled Employment Dispute Mediation teaches the students how...
View ArticleMediation Skills in Everyday Life!
My husband decided to purchase windshield wiper blades at Costco for our Audi. A few days later, when we took the Audi in for repair, we asked the repair person to put on the new blades. He advised...
View ArticleMediation is Not Always about Settling!
A colleague of mine- Jan Frankl Shau, Esq.-recently published an article in the Los Angeles Daily Journal entitled “ A New paradigm for mediation: the role of “bearing witness” (July 28, 2023). In it,...
View ArticleBut…It is The Principle of the Thing!
The Harvard PONS blog posted an interesting tale about a billionaire who bought a 53-acre parcel for $37.5 million encompassing Martin’s Beach in 2008. In “When our “Principles “Crash up Against our...
View ArticleMany Different Ways to Say the Same Thing!
As I have previously mentioned, I am in a book club which reads and discusses books about conflict resolution. The latest is Holding the Calm: The Secret to Resolving Conflict and Defusing Tension by...
View ArticleThe Sound of Silence!
The Sound of Silence is a song written by Disturbed and released in 2015 but made famous by Simon and Garfunkel in the movie, The Graduate. Its lyrics include the phrases: “People talking without...
View ArticleA Hypothetical Conversation
A few weeks ago, my husband and I attended a family social gathering seeing extended family we had not seen in quite a long time. As one typically does, I went around to say “hello” to everyone,...
View ArticleHow Do You Define “Ethics?”
In a recent post, I discussed a book I just finished reading, The Power of Ethics by Susan Liautaud (Simon and Schuster, New York, NY 2021). While Professor Liautaud made many interesting points, her...
View ArticleInterpersonal Skills
The end of the semester is drawing near in my online employment mediation dispute class. The theme of the last discussion board is reflective: what three things has each student learned from or skills...
View ArticleSilence is a Great Tool!
No doubt, you have encountered the situation where you are addressing a group of people and ask a question and are met with silence… absolute quiet! It feels awkward… no one is answering your...
View ArticleDifficult Conversations
Recently, a friend of mine challenged me to write a blog about how to survive Thanksgiving dinner considering our recent election. Some will be happy while others will be distraught at the results; yet...
View ArticleActive Listening: Start with “Third Things”!
Several weeks ago, The New York Times published an article about one of my favorite topics: Active Listening. Entitled “Practice Better Listening” by Kate Murphy,(Sunday, May 17, 2020, At Home...
View ArticleThe Consequences of Not Listening!
Last week, I posted a blog about an article in the New York Times discussing the lost art of active listening. (“Are You Listening?”). It seems that my blog post was very timely because NPR just...
View ArticleAre You Listening?
One of the first things a mediator in training is taught is to listen, really listen what the parties are saying. Aka “Active Listening”! Well, it seems that the need and ability to listen is a trait...
View ArticleHow we “Become” a Settling Society.
I just finished reading Becoming by Michelle Obama (Crown Publishing 2018). While the book is an autobiography of the former First Lady, its theme is more than just a story about how some African...
View ArticleWhen Interrupting is NOT interrupting!
The other weekend, my husband and I were visiting some friends (husband and wife) whom we had not seen in a while. As we were leaving, the wife and I were avidly talking with each other, seemingly...
View ArticleListening Leads to Empathy
Have you ever sat back with your eyes closed and listened to music or someone speaking? Why did you do it? Probably, to appreciate more fully and deeply what you were hearing. By shutting down one of...
View Article![Ruthie Foster – Just Say Yes (2026) [24-bit FLAC]](http://imageurl.xyz/images/2026/08/27/Ruthie_Foster-Just_Say_Yes-24BIT-WEB-FLAC-2026-ENRiCH.jpg)
