In the initial talk for the second week of Wise Speech: An Introduction to Mindful Communication, Oren Jay Sofer encouraged us to come from curiosity and care when we are communicating. He also said, “We’re aiming for small changes that can be sustained.”

The topic of Wise Speech is immense and it’s easy for me to stumble or get lost in this enormity. For last year’s course I never took the time to choose one or two smaller pieces to focus on each week. But this year, particularly after hearing Oren speak of “small changes,” I decided that each week I would commit to at most two items from the smorgasbord of possible practices he packs into 1.25 hours.

Last week my choice was pausing when online. This week it’s “coming from curiosity and care.” In order to remind myself about this approach, I created a wallpaper for my mobile phone. Thus far it’s helped me at least three times. And I hope it might be helpful to others too.

 

Footnote

The wonderful photo of the cat is by Bing Han on Unsplash. I’ve darkened it so it uses less battery power.