How can we more effectively navigate conversations with people who have different values, and beliefs than we do?

Neighbors, community members, co-workers, and family members who care deeply about the same issues, but who have widely different views about them.

What are the conditions that would be needed in order to have productive conversations?

What are the intentions, skills and mindsets we need to cultivate?

In this new 3-episode mini series we will explore these complex yet practical questions with Courageous Life guests new and old.

You'll be exposed to leaders at the forefront of researching, facilitating, and sharing their hard earned wisdom, about how to have constructive dialogues, find win-win solutions to our hardest problems, and build bridges across difference.

As we move into election season here in the US, these conversations are particularly timely,

But the skills and insights contained within each conversation are also timeless.

Today we’ll continue this series with our second conversation - a past episode with Juliana Tafur who is the Program Director for the Greater Good Science Center's Bridging Differences Program.

Together we explored the art and science of listening in ways that lead to meaningful connection, deeper relationships, empathy, and can build bridges across difference.

Highlights include:

A framework for compassionate listening
The importance of giving ourselves and others grace while engaging in constructive dialogue
Why opening the heart across difference begins with tuning into self
Discerning when to engage in constructive dialogue and when it’s safer, and wiser, not to.
The power of asking questions from a place of genuine curiosity
Letting go of winning as a fundamental practice of effective listening
Why listening is an act of courage
The importance of appreciating complexity in other people’s stories, and lived experiences
Ways to quiet the ego in tough conversations

Interested in diving deeper into this topic? Check out the Bridging Differences Program for free resources including the Bridging Differences Playbook.

Did you find this episode inspiring? Here are other conversations we think you'll love:

More about Juliana:

Juliana Tafur is the Program Director for GGSC’s Bridging Differences Program, applying her experience as social entrepreneur and founder of Listen Courageously, and as Emmy-nominated senior television producer and award-winning documentary filmmaker. Juliana creates resources rooted in science to bridge political and cultural divides. She also forges strategic partnerships across sectors—government, education, philanthropy, and public service—and oversees communities of practice, to ensure bridge-building skills and resources reach people and strengthen social cohesion across the US. As a Colombian-American devoted to listening to bridge what divides us (as seen on her TEDx talk), fostering a broader culture of belonging—through dialogue, connections, and understanding—is her life’s mission.

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