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Welcome to Before Breakfast, a production of IHeart Radio.

Good morning.

This is Laura.

Welcome to the Before Breakfast podcast.

Today's tip is to try a collaborative riff.

Rather than getting stuck with small talk about the weather,

try creating something with your conversation partner instead.

Today's tip comes from behavioral scientist Maya Rosignat Milan and Erica Boothby.

In a New York Times article, they proposed what they call collaborative riffing as an alternative

to small talk. They write, our aim and conversation shouldn't be to mind for surface-level commonalities or go on a charm offensive.

Instead, we should ask ourselves, what could we create together in this moment?

I definitely appreciated their portrayal of small talk as usual.

You're having a root canal next week?

I had a root canal last week.

You're from a small town in Iowa?

I'm from a small town in Massachusetts.

Sometimes these superficial similarities do pave the way for real connection.

But more often they remain an uninteresting game of ping-pong,

with the ball going back and forth and getting nowhere in particular. That is where collaborative

riffs come in. The authors explain, when riffing, speakers resist the urge to counter every observation with their

...