Your Old Texts Can Help You Talk, Listen Better

Some might argue that texting spells doom for the art of conversation, but at BuzzFeed, Nathan Pyle explains how his old texts are helping him improve on that front. He went back over some old text conversations with his girlfriend and noticed "great fluctuation." Some days, he had more to say, some days she did, and some days neither apparently felt much like talking. This "ebb and flow" was obvious to see in text format, "and I need to be as aware of it in real life as I am on the phone," writes Pyle.

In face-to-face talks, he's more conscious now about giving his partner the room to speak when she needs it, about not dominating the conversation himself, and about not forcing conversation if one or both of them is clearly not up for it. It's all about applying the lesson of the texts. "I've found that visualizing our conversations this way helps me to identify what mode we're in at any given moment, and what role I could play to best serve our communication needs—listener, talker, one-who-leaves-her-alone." Click for the full post. (More texting stories.)