You get what you give. We can’t control how others treat us, but we can always choose how we treat them. Psychologist Carl Rogers identified three things that make therapists good at helping people heal and grow, and I believe they apply to all of us: mediators, doctors, lawyers, teachers, group facilitators, parents, plumbers, sales clerks: Everyone.
(1) Unconditional positive regard. Holding others with a deep conviction in the goodness at the heart of their being, even when their behavior is hard to accept.
(2) Genuineness. Showing up as our real selves, with no posturing and no mask, and giving our full, undivided attention to the cares, concerns and pains others are carrying.
(3) Empathy. Reflecting back what someone is telling us so they know we truly understand what they’re going through.You can practice these anywhere.
At a tense family meeting about a parent’s care. At the dinner table with a teenager who finally starts talking. With a stranger behind the counter who is clearly having a hard day. With a spouse whose hurt and frightened by what's been said in divorce mediation.
When we show up embodying these three qualities, we get our minds out of the way of our nature.
That helps others reconnect with their own nature, and then nature can do what it does: heal us and help us grow and flourish.
And here’s the part that makes “you get what you give” true: when we care for others this way, we open ourselves to healing and growth too.
Which of the three is hardest for you? Tell me in the comments on my instagram reel to the right.
🎯Save this this instragram reel for your next hard conversation. 🎯Share our reel with someone who shows up this way for you. 🎯And Follow @familytreemediation on instagram for more constructive communication and community-cultivating content. 🎯Last, contact me at 762-8733 to learn more how Family Tree Mediation helps families here on the Peninsula.
Attorney-Mediator Hank Edson is responsible for the information provided in this video and caption, which is for educational purposes only under California law and does not create an attorney-client relationship or mediator-client relationship and does not constitute legal advice.
FDR told us a long time ago, “The only thing we have to fear is fear itself.” Our fear and discomfort with uncertainty drive us to try to control things that can't really be controlled. This fruitless strategy doesn’t protect us, but it does put us in conflict with reality in a harmful way.
When we learn to apply ourselves to what we can control by investing in thoughtful preparation and then trust in the goodness of the nature of what cannot be controlled, we more fully open ourselves to receive that goodness than we do by fearfully slamming the door in its face.
And there is sound logic for trusting in the goodness of the nature we cannot control. After all, the nature we can control, our own, we know to embody a goodness it only makes sense to conclude is universal.
We also said a long time ago that it was a self-evident truth that all people are created equal. This means, among other things, that we recognize that within our hearts we all share an equally good essence that only tends to get distorted by the strategies aiming at an illegitimate control.
And we only pursue these distorting strategies out of a fear that leads us to act irrationally and in discord with our own nature. It’s not easy to learn to be comfortable with not being in charge, with uncertainty, with vulnerability, but the more we do, the more we learn that the ecological dynamics of life to which we all contribute equally enable us to embody goodness in a way that empowers us to live in happy and fulfilling relationship with each other and all life.
Cultivating clear eyes, and open mind, and a welcoming heart thus really does make a huge difference. One of the most effective ways to do this is by practicing constructive communication rooted in a confident appreciation of the goodness at the heart of every person we converse with no matter how many apparent conflicts we may share with them. In this way, mediation too can be transformative.
If a conflict is presently making you feel afraid, perhaps Family Tree Mediation can help you navigate it with the confidence and preparation capable of transforming a painful dynamic into a deeply meaningful one.
Attorney-Mediator Hank Edson is responsible for the information provided in this video and caption, which is for educational purposes only under California law and does not create an attorney-client relationship or mediator-client relationship and does not constitute legal advice.
Here's a cure for late-night doomscrolling that no app can offer: real conversation with real people.
You know the feeling. It's 11:30, the house is quiet, and we're still scrolling, waiting for something the feed never quite provides. Or we're at a party, deep in small talk, feeling lonelier than when we arrived.
We're not alone in feeling this way. In 2024, San Mateo County became the first county in the U.S. to declare loneliness a public health emergency. A year bofore, in 2023, the Surgeon General issued a report stating that loneliness was epidemic in America and as harmful to longevity as cigarette smoking. That same year, the Associated Press-National Opinion Research Center at the University of Chicago found that “Only 10% of all adults have a great deal of confidence in organized religion, a percentage that has been in steady decline in recent years, with confidence now at half of what it was in 2016.”
And here's the point: Everyone needs not just community and human connection; we need community and human connection that feeds our desire for purpose, meaning, beauty, and truth, celebration, awe, laughter, and sometimes, a shoulder to cry on. Not shall interraction. Deep community. Community that is alive with what matters, with all that is truly valuable to our happiness and wellbeing.
That's why Family Tree Meidation is offering Deep Community Groups.
Join a Deep Community Group in the New Year!
For our Group on Tuesdays from 4 to 6 pm, January 5 to June 15 2027:
For our Group on Wednesdays from 4:30 to 6 pm, January 6 to June 16 2027:
Each group meets once a week for two hours over 24 weeks. Together we explore the adventure of life: what matters most, what moves us, what we're struggling with and celebrating. The conversations are face-to-face, varied, often funny, sometimes profound, and structured to empower us to discover all the ways our connections are alive and nourishing to the heart, soul, and health of everyone of us.
No posturing, no networking. Just a place to belong.
I've come to believe the phone isn't really the problem. Our challenge is meeting our human need to live a meaning-rich life of connection with others in exploration of our full potential, in celebration of our adventures, and in solidarity through our trials. When we make space to enjoy deep community with each other, week after week, the pull of the screen gets weaker. Join us, and I bet you'll find yourself putting that cell phone to bed earlier and earlier.
You can register simply by clicking one of the registration buttons to the right! We look forward to having you join us.
Share this with others you know who are looking to cultivate a more vibrant ecology of deep community in their lives.
Attorney-Mediator Hank Edson is responsible for the information provided in this video and caption, which is for educational purposes only under California law and does not create an attorney-client relationship or mediator-client relationship and does not constitute legal advice.
Whether you're asking for a divorce, approaching your elderly parents about assisted living, dealing with adult siblings unhappy about the administration of your parents' estate, impatient to take your relationship with your sweetheart to the next level, or navigating any emotionally charged issue where there is a difference in perspective, the hardest thing about initiating a difficult conversation is that opening the issue makes you "the HOST." And being host comes with an etiquette. First, a host extends an invitation that not only includes the invited person in the anticipated conversation, but also includes the other person’s perspective. Second, a host makes the anticipated conversation a safe place. Finally, third, a host listens first and shares later. Of course, it’s good for guests to practice these good manners too, which is why it is important for the host to set a good example for the difficult conversation to be successful. What are ways you model good etiquette in difficult conversations? Please share in the comments below, and follow us for more reels about the etiquette of a good invitation, making your conversations feel safe, and the skills involved in listening and sharing.
Also, sometimes, families need the support of a neutral venue for difficult conversations, where no one has to play the host and a mediator is there to help everyone show up in the best possible way practicing their best etiquette. That’s what we’re here for. If you need help, give us a call.
Attorney-Mediator Hank Edson is responsible for the information provided in this video and caption, which is for educational purposes only under California law and does not create an attorney-client relationship or mediator-client relationship and does not constitute legal advice.
If you are experiencing conflict in your life you need help navigating, such as divorce or a dispute with your siblings about caring for your parents or handling their estate or differences with your young adult children, the thing that makes all the difference is shifting from a mindset in which each person reacts from a place of feeling vulnerable and alone to a mindset where each person has confidence that “we’re all in it together.”
When we're all in it together, we buy-in to the principle that everyone’s needs, experience, and contributions matter equally. We let go of the mindset that identifies with isolation and separateness, we let go of the compulsion to control. We recognize that there is an ecological genius at work in the whole of our family, community, society...whatever group we're a part of, that is greater than that of any one individual, that is greater than the sum of its parts. When we appreciate the greater genius of the whole to which we belong, each person's contributions, experience, and needs suddenly becomes vested with an irreplacable value to everyone else. We need each person's input and happiness to fulfill the formula that nature invests for the wellbeing of all us who are "in it together." This is the magic of collaboration.
When we need to control things out of a feeling that our isolated, separateness needs to be protected, we miss out on experiencing the profound ways in which our separate needs are better protected by the genius of the whole than by our efforts as people who feel ourselves to be separate and alone. Why is this so? It is so because a word of separate individuals who are not "all in it together" is a world in conflict and a world populated by people operating from fear and the limitations of their own experience, which is unavoidably distorted in all kinds of ways. In such a climate, our individual needs are far more vulnerable than when we give up control in favor of a "We're all in it together" mindset that is confident in our collective, collaborative ability to take care of everyone in fair and beautiful and profoundly satisfying ways.
Making this shift and keeping the right mindset takes practice, which is where mediation can be so helpful. Mediators are people who coach people trying to practice having difficult conversations with a “We’re all in it together” mindset. No matter what the context you find yourself in, if you are having a difficult convesation that is going from bad to worse, odds are that the reason is the participants need help practicing a "We're all in it together" mindset, which is exactly what Family Tree Mediation is here to offer: help. Give us a call. We can help.
These are feel good songs, songs with good advice, and motivational songs that focus and heighten my energy and passion for life. The message and the vibe. Both are key! When you're going through change and clarifying what you want most out of the next stage in life, a celebratory sound track is essential. Family Tree Mediation put this together just for that purpose.
A terrific book about mediation and negotiation that is aimed at the general public is Bargaining with the Devil: When to Negotiate, When to Fight, by Robert Mnooken, Chair of Harvard Law School’s Program on Negotiation. The book explores disputes in a variety of contexts where the relationship between the parties in conflict has grown so hostile that at least one side views the other as immoral, even evil. Thus, the title, Bargaining with the Devil. I will say a word about Mnooken's advice in such situations at the end of this post, but my real interest in mentioning Bargaining with the Devil is that, at the end of this book's last case study, Mnooken offers an important gem of advice relative to proactive, preventative communication in the estate planning context.
The case at hand involved three siblings’ inheritance of a large and valuable vacation property. The conflict had escalated to the point that two of the siblings were no longer talking to each other. If nothing was done to change the situation, the parents' gift to them threatened to permanently injure all the siblings’ relationships with each other, which certainly was not their parents' intention in making the gift.
Last time, I talked about all the ways sharing feelings feels unsafe and why it’s actually more risky to keep feelings out of a difficult conversation than it is to put them in it. I also explained that this “feelings layer” of the conversation was only part of the anatomy of any difficult conversation, there also being a “what happened layer” and an “identity layer.” Finally, I noted that the directors of the Harvard Negotiation Project whose book, Difficult Conversation, presents this anatomy, recommend a three-step process for including feelings in any difficult conversation in a manner that is both wise and self-possessed. These steps are:
1.) Sort out your feelings for yourself;
2.) Negotiate with your feelings; and
3.) Share your feelings without judgment or attribution.
Last time, I also offered my thoughts on how to sort out your feelings for yourself in a meaningful way. Today, I’d like to offer some insight into the process of negotiating with your feelings and also how to share your feelings without judgment or attribution.
Negotiating with Your Feelings
The idea that you can negotiate with your feelings at first seems a little ridiculous. It sounds a little bit like playing a game of chess by yourself – playing the black knight, pretending you don’t know the white queen’s countermove. The suggestion seems to be that you should be the instigator of your own psychological manipulation. But in fact, it’s not as bad or crazy as it seems.
When we experience difficult conflicts, part of the reason they are difficult is that we are not just confronting someone else; we are also confronting ourselves. One common form of conflict involves us receiving feedback that is painful to us. We find ourselves objecting to whatever it is, unwilling to accept delivery of the message being sent to us, in conflict with it.
What we are so often unable to understand is that there is a reason for our strong reaction to such feedback: the feedback challenges a story we tell ourselves about ourselves, about the way we show up as a human being in the world. We all need confirmation that we are competent, good and lovable people. This sense of ourselves is our identity. Over time, we develop identity stories that explain why and to what extent we are competent, good and loveable beings. But at times, we are confronted with feedback that is difficult to face because it suggests we are not who we thought we were, we are not who we have claimed to be to ourselves. Confronting ourselves in this way is no picnic.
Figuring out how to cope with such identity confrontations is one of the great offerings contained in one of my favorite books, Difficult Conversations.
They are all too common, those difficult conversations we would do almost anything to avoid. And though we do try our best to avoid them, that never seems to work. Sooner or later, we get cornered by a situation grown intolerable for at least one of the parties in the mix. If no one musters up the courage to dive into the situation, someone eventually “breaks” and the vectors of the conflict fly across the room from every angle. Chaos ensues. The perils of avoiding a difficult conversation are many and complex and they merit separate attention. Today, however, I want to think about why we are tempted to embrace avoidance in the first place.
I would like to venture the hypothesis that the temptation to embrace avoidance arises not just because conversations about painful conflicts are hard. Even if such conflicts are hard, if they were reliably successful in achieving a constructive outcome, no one would choose the inevitable failure of avoidance over the promise of eventually getting what we want in exchange for facing sooner rather than later the challenges ahead.
Instead, I think the reason we are tempted to embrace avoidance is that we have so much experience messing things up worse whenever we try to talk about triggering and difficult issues. Based on this experience, we cannot help but feel doomed either way, and therefore we are less inclined to speed our unhappy fate along by opening up the dangerous subject. You may end up catching me, we say to the situation, but I’m certainly not going to help you do it!
Well, let's see if we can find a more hopeful approach to our plight.
What happens in mediation can be hard to describe. A word of acknowledgment, an admission of pain, an uncovered fact can cause an internal shift within one or all of the participants that completely reorients the dynamics between individuals in a positive way. The internal aspects of our experience of dispute are indeed wondrous when an opening occurs that helps the parties to find agreement and even healing. But the opposite is also true: the internal aspects of our experience of dispute are also cause for frustration and dysfunction when we are unable to navigate our disputes effectively because we don’t have a good enough handle on what’s going on inside ourselves.
Yes, our conflicts are not just about the material goods, the outward aspects of the dispute at issue. Our conflicts inevitably are also very much about (1) the inward perceptions of the participants, (2) the way the inward emotional landscape of each participant effects his or her perceptions, and (3) the deeper inward needs that are emotionally linked to the outward material goods at issue.
A principal value of mediation is that the mediator offers the opportunity to isolate and focus upon different aspects of each party’s perceptions and experience so that it can be dealt with effectively on its own terms. Each mediation is different and the elements of the dispute that need to be isolated and dealt with separately are different in each case. However, Sharon Strand Ellison provides an illuminating insight into how useful this process of separating out different aspects of our inward perceptions and experience can be in her book, Taking the War Out of Words.
Hank Edson, J.D. 
