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You are here: Home / Blog / Seneca Sunday: On quiet conversation – Letter 38

Seneca Sunday: On quiet conversation – Letter 38

Dan Cullum · Aug 22, 2021 ·

Note: This post is part of a weekly series called ‘Seneca Sundays’. Each week, I reflect on one of Seneca’s ‘Moral Letters to Lucilius’, and summarise the most practical and useful principles to share with you.

In this letter, Seneca gives us a framework for thinking about our words and conversation.

1. Seek out the low-toned conversation

Lecturers are fine. Speeches are good. Presentations can be helpful.

But if you “want to help someone learn, and not merely make them wish to learn” then the “low-toned words of conversation” is best.

Close, personal, and intimate conversations enter the mind with greater ease, and stick in the memory.

For example, I remember my teachers in school who would tell the class that we were “great kids; all smart and capable,” yet it is the one-on-one conversations with teachers who said they believed in me that have stuck with me for decades.

I’ve also recently been thinking about how purposeful one-on-one conversations in the workplace are more important for building team morale and culture than the presentations to large groups.

2. We don’t need many words, just a few effective ones

A good precept is like a seed.

“No matter how small the seed may be, if it finds favourable grounds it unfolds its strength. From an insignificant thing, it spreads to its greatest growth.”

If we have an open mind that is willing to listen, it only takes a few wise words to change our direction.

A slight change in direction now—a mere few degrees on the compass—can add up to a magnificent distance a few years down the road.

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