I failed a coworker. Badly. No, not just badly … very badly. It took me a while to face it. When I finally realized what I’d done, embarrassment kept me from going to talk with him right away. So now I was doubly wrong. Failed to support him, and failed to admit it...
A week ago today, I had the privilege of teaching relational wisdom to our Montana State Legislators and their staffs. I was warmly welcomed by every person I met as I walked into the House Chamber. More importantly, many people came up afterwards to express their...
I recently received a complaint from a woman who I will call Ruth (not her real name) regarding a video clip I used in one of my blog posts. The video is called "It’s Not about the Nail." It features a graphic metaphor built around a woman with a nail in her forehead...
During a recent seminar in California, I was approached by a man named Ross who told me he is “successfully failing” in his business. Ross employs over a hundred people. His company is thriving, which enables him to provide his employees with excellent wages, benefits...
My mother-in-law lived with our family for twenty years. For six of those years, my mother also lived with us. Corlette and I called them “the Two Treasures.” In all the years they lived in our home, I never heard one word of criticism, grumbling, or complaining from...
To find your greatest weakness, first identify your greatest strength and then look right behind it. That’s one of the tragic results of sin: it twists our strengths into weaknesses, just as (-1) x 100 becomes -100. Are you highly intelligent and well-studied in the...
When Corlette and I were raising and educating our children, we struggled far more with relational challenges than we did with academic content. Put four sinful people together in the same home and the relational tensions will easily eclipse educational issues. Our...
Adversity tends to pull us down. It hurts when others sin against us, take us for granted, fail to stand up for us, or break their commitments to us. Such treatment can easily cause us to feel discouraged, bitter or depressed. But there is a way to convert these kinds...
Would you like to have hundreds of articles, videos and downloadable ebooklets on relational wisdom, biblical peacemaking and Christian conciliation available on your smartphone? To review just before a difficult conversation or meeting ... To remind you how to show...
Jeff’s reputation was being trashed by people in his own church. He was respected throughout the city for his outstanding Sunday school classes, which had drawn hundreds of people to his church. But then he got caught in the middle of a congregational battle over the...
In today’s movie clip, Will Smith demonstrates the enormous benefit relational wisdom (RW) can have in the workplace. The clip comes from the movie Pursuit of Happiness. It is based on the true story of Chris Gardner. In the weeks leading up to this scene, he ran out...
After weeks of nonstop travel, I was running out of energy. As a result I was unusually apathetic as I walked into the conference center for one of my recent presentations. Not a good attitude for teaching relational wisdom. So I began to pray. “Lord, I feel lousy...
Includes 90 "Getting-to-Know-Others" Questions! Many of us waste golden opportunities to deepen relationships during family, church and business conversations. How? We ask generic questions of one another that produce superficial information: “Where are you from?”...
Do you want to learn how to connect with people? Really connect? To touch others heart-to-heart, life-to-life? To convince them you understand and care about them? To move them toward actions that are right and good and pleasing to God? Then learn how to connect with...
Cindy and Alicia, both seventeen, walked out of the mall after a fun afternoon of shopping. Just as they reached Cindy’s car in the parking lot, two young men drove by on motorcycles. One of them knew Cindy from school, so they stopped to talk. After a few minutes of...