TOKENS PODCAST: S6E4
Might good conversation be a pathway to human flourishing?
Loneliness has reached epidemic levels in our culture, with loads of research suggesting many of us lack intimate relationships. But we also know that having close relationships is a necessary ingredient to a good life.
The question, then, becomes this: how does one create “warm connections” in their own life?
According to Heather Holleman, it might be as simple as learning how to talk to each other.
“Good conversations create personal closeness,” she says. “When you have good conversations, it could intervene in the loneliness epidemic.” To her, conversation is an artform for which many of us simply lack the proper tools. And if we were to find these tools and practice learning them, our relationships – and our lives – would flourish.
In today’s episode of the Tokens podcast, she gives us those tools. And being an educator, she lays them out in an easily memorable way, in three helpful lists: The Four Mindsets, The Three Goals of Conversation, and The Six Paths to Conversation.
And I got geeky and made up some mnemonics for the four, three and six:
The Four Mindsets:
Be
-lieve
Invest
Divest
The Three Goals:
Encourage
Engender
En-awe
The Six Conversations:
S E P C V S
Social
Emotional
Physical
Cognitive
Volitional
Spiritual
I love good conversation. And I loved this good conversation about good conversations. Enjoy.
ABOUT THE GUEST
Hi there! I’m Heather.
I’m married to a hilarious and wise man named Ashley (a UNC grad who loves the Tar Heels), and I’m a mother to two vibrant girls. I graduated from the University of Virginia and then went on to finish my PhD in English Literature from the University of Michigan. I teach college writing—both Freshman Composition and Advanced Writing—at Penn State. I’m obsessed with vivid verbs like grapple, fritter, and effervesce. I also greatly admire the semicolon; it is the most beautiful and misunderstood punctuation mark. I love writing books, encouraging teachers, reflecting on spiritual principles in everyday life, petting my cats, walking with my neighbors, lighting candles, reading grammar books, watching movies and any television show with singing and dancing in it, entertaining, eating leftover Chinese food, and blogging. I also serve on the staff of Cru with Ashley (who serves as the Executive Director of Graduate Student Ministry). My favorite Psalm is Psalm 16, and my three favorite Bible verses are Galatians 2:20, Ephesians 2:6, and Deuteronomy 31:6. I’m slowly making my way through seminary classes in the summers. So far, I’ve finished Bible Study Methods, New Testament Survey, Doctrine Survey, Biblical Interpretation and Communication, God, Bible, Holy Spirit, and Old Testament.
ABOUT TOKENS SHOW & LEE C. CAMP
Tokens began in 2008. Our philosophical and theological variety shows and events hosted throughout the Nashville area imagine a world governed by hospitality, graciousness and joy; life marked by beauty, wonder and truthfulness; and social conditions ordered by justice, mercy and peace-making. We exhibit tokens of such a world in music-making, song-singing, and conversations about things that matter. We have fun, and we make fun: of religion, politics, and marketing. And ourselves. You might think of us as something like musicians without borders; or as poets, philosophers, theologians and humorists transgressing borders.
Lee is an Alabamian by birth, a Tennessean by choice, and has sojourned joyfully in Indiana, Texas, and Nairobi. He likes to think of himself as a radical conservative, or an orthodox liberal; loves teaching college and seminary students at Lipscomb University; delights in flying sailplanes; finds dark chocolate covered almonds with turbinado sea salt to be one of the finest confections of the human species; and gives great thanks for his lovely wife Laura, his three sons, and an abundance of family and friends, here in Music City and beyond. Besides teaching full-time, he hosts Nashville’s Tokens Show, and has authored three books. Lee has an Undergrad Degree in computer science (Lipscomb University, 1989); M.A. in theology and M.Div. (Abilene Christian University, 1993); M.A. and Ph.D. both in Christian Ethics (University of Notre Dame, 1999).
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