True inner freedom arises from self-connection. Without self-connection, we're mostly acting from habits, and those habits do not necessarily attend to our own needs. Here's a practice you can explore in your daily life to deepen your relationship with yourself, and experience true choice and inner freedom.

In the face of stress you can find ways to be present for what’s happening, rather than being pulled or pushed around by anxious thoughts or fearful feelings. Here are some strategies to return to and maintain expanded awareness.

Here are some guidelines and agreements for creating empathy buddy sessions. Includes a list of blocks to empathy.

To tell the difference between empathy and investigation, watch for distinctions along four different dimensions: energy, subject, intention and trust. These distinctions can help us engage awareness and skill to meet your needs and respond to others’ needs in more direct ways. The more you meet your needs in conscious and direct ways, the more present you can be for others. Read on for more about how to do this.

Shared vulnerability can build more intimacy, mutuality, being seen and heard, empathy, or community. Inviting shared vulnerability means earning another’s trust that you can consistently offer attentive, curious, and compassionate listening. Here are four strategies to invite shared vulnerability.

Misunderstandings can be painful. We can easily avoid this by checking what the other person understood from what we said, and ask the other person to do the same. Doing this is especially important when it comes to planning, shared decision-making, and when emotions are strong. Also, the more someone knows you, the more they think they already know what you mean -- which can get in the way of really hearing you. Here are a variety of ways to approach this simple strategy.

Effective and connected dialogue requires significant self-awareness, mindfulness, and skill. You can focus on any of these six areas that most often escape your awareness: anchoring and staying grounded; boundaries; thoughts and beliefs; stuckness or attachment; feelings and needs; and requests. Read on for a list of questions to help you focus on how to do that.

A big part of why receiving feedback is so challenging is because so few people around us know how to give feedback untainted with criticism, judgment, or our personal upset. But, if we wait for others to offer us usable, digestible, manageable feedback, we will not likely receive sufficient feedback for our growth and learning. Instead, we can grow in our capacity to fish the pearl that’s buried within. Here are three specific suggestions for how.

For each reactive pattern there is a perceived threat to a tender need. Knowing these tender needs helps us figure out how to interrupt these patterns and creating new ways of perceiving and relating to life. In addition to knowing the need, knowing the healing response and the primary reactive behavior helps with transformation.

In general, criticism is a reactive response discomfort. When someone criticizes, they are not yet able or willing take responsibility for their needs. All criticism is a tragic expression of feelings and unmet needs. When you meet that criticism skillfully you not only care for yourself, you can facilitate clarity, and constructive communication, about what the other person is truly asking for.