3 Tips For Having More Meaningful Conversations With Your Loved Ones

If you love the idea of getting to know some of your loved ones more, especially those who might be older and in senior living facilities, there are things that you can do when speaking with them to help make them more comfortable with you and more willing to engage in meaningful conversation.

To help you see how this can be done, here are three tips for having more meaningful conversations with your loved ones. 

Come With An Attitude Of Collaboration

No one wants to feel like they’re being talked at when they’re trying to have a conversation with someone. But on the other side of that same coin, no one wants to feel like they’re being interrogated when someone is attempting to speak with them. So to help people be more up for having an open conversation with you and sharing parts of their life with you, you need to come into the conversation with an attitude of collaboration. 

While this is natural for many people, if you have such a relationship with someone that there have been some hurt feelings or defensiveness in the past, you might need to address these issues first before you can move on to having an open and meaningful conversation. And although burying the hatchet and apologizing for things that you may have said or done that have put your relationship in jeopardy in the past can be challenging, it will be well worth it to be able to have these kinds of meaningful conversations in the future. 

Ask Better Questions

The questions that you ask someone when you’re trying to have a conversation with them can have a big impact on how deep the conversation is able to get. If you only ever ask surface level questions, you’re likely to only ever get surface level answers. But if you really want to know what’s on the heart and mind of someone, you have to know how to ask questions that will get them thinking and opening up to you. 

Be Willing To Share

To help conversations not to feel like interrogations when you’re trying to better get to know someone, you have to be willing to also share something of yourself.

The best conversations are one where there is some give and take with sharing your thoughts, feelings, and past experiences. So if you’re wanting someone to open up to you and share in a meaningful conversation with you, you have to be willing to do the same with them. Otherwise, you might find that you put them on the defensive and could cause the conversation to become uncomfortable. 

If you want to have more meaningful conversations with your loved ones so that you can learn more about them, consider using the tips mentioned above to help you achieve this.