What happens when nobody says anything? We’re remarkably good at filling the silence with stories of our own. A missed email, a changed tone or a colleague walking past can become a whole narrative before we’ve stopped to ask what else might be true.

Most conflict doesn’t look like conflict. It can look like keeping your head down, getting stuck in the middle, avoiding a difficult conversation or telling yourself it’s all over while still carrying the mental load.

We all make assumptions about what other people should know. But if the expectations are unwritten, how can we be surprised when someone doesn't follow them?

We tend to think people resist change because they don't like change. But what if they're actually responding to what they feel they're going to lose?

We tend to notice the obvious energy in a room. But what about the quieter energy that pushes back, digs in and quietly resists? Sometimes the person you think you're wearing out is wearing you out too.

When someone raises their voice, our instinct can be to focus on the shouting. But what if the more useful question is why they feel the need to shout in the first place?

Helping people is part of being a good leader. But there’s a point where helping becomes doing, and doing becomes getting in the way of someone else’s ability to learn, think and take responsibility.

People are full of contradictions. We want people to listen, but we also want them to speak up. We want to persevere, but sometimes we need to let go. Perhaps the trick isn't choosing between the two.

We all want to make a good impression. But perhaps the best way to do that isn't to work out what other people want to see. It's to understand yourself well enough to be comfortable being you.

We talk a lot about connection. But healthy relationships aren't about being open to everyone, all the time. Sometimes knowing when to close the gate matters just as much.

Some people are ‘pull your hair out’ annoying. But what if the person frustrating you isn't wrong? What if they're just standing on a different part of the elephant?

Trust doesn't appear overnight. It grows through the little things we do consistently, and it can be damaged just as quietly. But what builds trust for one person might not be what builds it for another.

Feedback is loaded with emotion on both sides. So how do you give feedback in a way that people can actually hear, understand and do something with?

Goals in business are supposed to create shared direction. But shared means relationship. So what happens when the way we set goals takes the people involved out of the equation?

What makes people tick? And what does play have to do with it? We can spend so much time trying to understand how people behave that we forget one of the things that makes us human in the first place.

We like to think we're pretty good at judging people. But our brains are constantly taking shortcuts, filling in gaps and looking for evidence that we're right. So how much of what we see is actually there?

What happens between someone saying something and us responding? SAFER was my attempt to make sense of that space — the attention, meaning and emotion that shape how we respond to each other.

Remember when calling a friend meant ringing their landline and asking their parents if they were there? Social interaction used to require us to take little risks all the time. What happens when we stop exercising that muscle?

We make hundreds of tiny decisions in our relationships every day. But there is one decision that matters more than most: are you actually going to be present?

Good relationships don't happen by accident. They need attention, time and a sense of safety. So what are the people who build genuinely positive relationships doing differently?