We too often see examples in movies, popular media, and especially in politics and in discussing charged issues, that shouting and waving our arms in the air and being ever-more demonstrative means that our stance must be right if we are so passionate about it.

Avoid using humor to belittle the defenseless, the taken advantage-of, the destitute, the downtrodden, and the marginalized.

When examined through the lens of building rapport, as well as Chris Hadnagy’s advice to leave people feeling better for having met you, how many of us can look at our lives and our interactions and say we lead with these intentions in mind?

When we merely seek to see the "other side" of complex issues, it oversimplifies and categorizes us into warring factions, and it prevents us from seeing the vast, gray middle where most of us actually reside.

I share these thoughts with you this week not to beat you up, but to help you get past any fear you might have of asking questions that have answers that might be uncomfortable for you.