It’s the simplest thing in the world. Someone steps on your toes ~ ouch! It hurts. But when it comes to feeling our toes stepped on by someone’s joke or email or thoughtless comment, we get all tongue-tied. What’s the right thing to say? Should I say anything? What will happen if I say the wrong thing? I don’t want to make someone feel bad…..

Well, from my experience, this is the beauty of saying ouch! It really communicates perfectly that I felt hurt. I’m not saying that person is wrong or bad, just owning my own feeling. Ouch actually opens the door to have a conversation about what just happens. It happened to me the other day. A friend started telling a joke about a minority group and I just said, ouch. He stopped and asked, “what?” I got to say how it sounded to me and why it hurt. He shrugged and said, okay, I can see that. Done. It didn’t ruin our friendship. In fact, we had a great talk about it. That’s just one experience. But it points to why the Ouch videos are so good – they give a few simple things people can say without blame.

And probably this is why I get so many enthusiastic emails from customers. I’ll start sharing them in my next post …. in 2010. Wishing you a happy new year 2010 filled with honest, real communication moments.