ABSTRACT
So, we must talk so people can listen and understand, and we must listen so that what we say next makes sense and has a goodness of fit with the person with whom we are having a therapeutic conversation. Years ago, a Rabbi friend was speaking at a first-ever bioethics conference in our community. He enjoined the audience, “Physicians, guard thy words carefully,” a modernization of a quote from the Ethics of the Fathers (Pirkei Avot 1:11), which says, “Sages, be careful with your words.” He was implicitly sensitive to the reality that when doctors talk, patients listen carefully. And so it is that we must think before we speak, because people-and especially children who are in distress and come to us for help-are listening carefully. Indeed, they are in, if you will, a spontaneous hypnotic state, narrowly focused, listening carefully, and attending to precisely what we say and how we say it. Therefore, we must be thoughtful and cautious about what we say and how we say it.
