Start Where It’s Safe; Make It Safe For Each Other

Posted on September 16, 2025 by Catherine Cheng, MD

When and where is it safe for you to disagree strongly and still maintain healthy relationship?

My friend and I had a brief text exchange recently.
Me: “…I wonder when they will start profiling East Asians on the street. My kids and I all live in target cities. It’s less and less safe to be non-white.”
Friend: “You’re citizens; no need to worry.”
Me: “Citizens have been picked up and detained already. Lots to worry about on many fronts. Please do not dismiss people’s concerns, even if you don’t share them. They are not all unfounded.”

Our friendship has developed over a couple of years, accelerating and deepening this year around and through mutually respectful and unreserved political discourse. This thread occurred spontaneously last week. I felt safe to express my fears as well as my reaction to his response. I know he did not mean to dismiss my feelings; he knew that my response was meant to uphold mutual accountability rather than incite shame. Our relationship is now strong and trusting enough for us to be bluntly, caringly honest. We caught up on the phone today and reaffirmed that respect and trust, that bond of platonic love that transends difference even as we embrace and grapple with it. I cannot wait to sit down over lunch and explore each other’s perspectives again soon.

This summer I gave a series of wellness presentations to a global professional firm. Over five Zoom sessions we explored self-awareness and -regulation, open and honest communication, generational differences, variables of diversity, psychological safety, authenticity, leadership, and culture. I did my best to leave an impression and aspiration of empathy, compassion, and accountability in action and relationship, to be cultivated intentionally, both individually and collectively, in the year to come. In all of my conversations with the series organizers before and since, we continue to seek the attitudes, postures, resources, and practices that help a workforce engage and contribute, dissent and challenge, all in the name of elevated collaboration and excellence.

This weekend I traveled to New York City (hence this delayed post) to meet Andy “AJ” Wilson-Taylor and my fellow fans. I only knew two other attendees walking in, and was welcomed and folded into a truly unique throng of uplift and bonding. This community, led by a loving, humble, curious, generous, and kind soul, reflects and amplifies those qualities and values in spades. The brightest love and joy radiated from every person gathered; oxytocin flowed and saturated my whole being. I wondered aloud to more than a few people about the possibilities of capturing the energy of that assembly–the joy, love, shared humanity and connection–concentrating and focusing it, then aiming it to heal the wounds of the world. Members of this group, led by AJ in his unassuming and self-effacing way, have already healed themselves and one another in presence, encouragement, and steadfast mutual support through darkness and disconnection back to light and flourishing kinship.

I pondered this weekend what political discourse would look and feel like in these groups–collegial coworkers practicing interpersonal effectiveness to leverage diversity and elevate creativity and innovation, and a gathering of women brought together by shared love and admiration of a man whose purpose in their space is to ally with and elevate their personal, sexual, and social well-being.

Then yesterday Braver Angels hosted an extemporaneous gathering of leaders from bridging organizations across the country: “Dignity Over Violence: A Unified Civic Response”. I hope to have a link to the recording to share here soon. Claim hope, my friends. This movement of intentional, resilient, and empowering connection across political polarization grows stronger and tighter every year. Love can still win. Over the two hour program, at least twelve leaders both acknowledged what is and pointed to what could be. They cited words and acts of people across the political spectrum, from every demographic, that defy the loudly skewed rhetoric of extremes. In this, yet another mission-driven gathering, I felt an unwavering commitment to mutual understanding and connection, to humility, curiosity, empathy, generosity, and accountability.

“When you hear something triggering, take a deep breath and ask a [good, open and honest] question. Try to understand why that person believes what they believe.” This is the first step to any exchange of true connection.

All systems of human relationship require us all to practice these skills. We cannot just rely on designated leaders to lead by example (especially since so few today do so). Each of us must take up the cause of connection and get to work; more urgently now than ever in my lifetime. But how daunting, to consider reaching across a great political chasm to connect with an adversary, real or perceived?

So after this weekend immersed in gatherings of hope and possibility, I remember that any skill must be developed and cultivated deliberately, consistently, and iteratively. As I prepared to leave the office at 8pm today, I debated briefly about doing my five minutes on the slackboard. Consistency. Commitment. Every session on the slackline, no matter how brief, is another chance to train my nervous system in sensory awareness, feedback integration, and dynamic balance. Over the course of 2.5 songs on my Spotify liked list, I had the best session to date. So too, political discource can be trained in the workplace, in a social gathering, in a family–anywhere and with anybody–by practicing humility, curiosity, empathy, generosity, kindness, and accountability in any relationship system around any topic. We all do it, but I bet we don’t think of it in these terms.

The slackboard, a Braver Angels Zoom call, an AJ’s Angels meet up, my wellness talks, and my conversations with Friend–these are all spaces where I feel safe to express my authentic self. I can challenge staid and conventional social norms, explore the possible. I practice and develop the skills that make me confident to engage in political discourse calmly and with equanimity. Come to think of it, patient encounters train me for this every day, too.

So I ask again: When and where is it safe for you to disagree strongly and still maintain healthy relationship?

Where do you already do this well? When you disagree without getting triggered, how do you show up and conduct yourself? How can you translate this mindset and behavior pattern to the more fraught and emotionally higher risk scenarios? What do you need to feel safe to try/train? Can you identify the ladder of escalating potential triggers to tackle, the way a skier progresses from green to blue to black diamond trails? Can you schedule practice sessions the way an athlete trains for a race, so you can hone the skills, see and feel yourself improving with each encounter?

How can we all make it safe for one another to practice? Like accountability partners at the gym, how can we hold each other up in this effort to save our democracy, to reconnect across polarization and mutual dehumanization, one conversation at a time?

Humility. Curiosity. Empathy. Generosity. Kindness. Accountability. Start where it’s safe and easy. Then look for the next challenge. We grow and strengthen through struggle. Environments and circumstances that feel threatening are not conducive to learning or progress. We can create and cultivate safety for effective disagreement for ourselves and one another. Take a deep breath and ask one good, open, honest question. Start there.

Healing Through Connection

Posted on July 13, 2025 by Catherine Cheng, MD

“How did you get to be so kind, generous, compassionate, empathetic, self-aware, thoughtful, and creative?”

I asked this of someone I admire recently, and then considered all the other people I know and admire to whom I’d ask the same thing. Knowing what I know about their lives, here is my story.

We emit and express these qualities from at least two origins:

First, we have felt them from other people. We were open to and received kindness, compassion, empathy, thoughtfulness–love, basically–from fellow humans. It was role modeled to us. Second, we experienced challenges, struggles, and pain that taught us the value and importance of having this love in our lives. As I think more, these experiences–feeling loved and supported in times of crisis and pain–integrate to make us stronger and more resilient, more grounded in ourselves and open to relationship with others. This is the essence of Healing Through Connection.

Consider the folks you know who exude these qualities. I bet you could easily describe them as Strong and Soft, vulnerable and courageous, with a depth, mass, and volume that can hold space and tolerance for a wide and divergent field of ideas and experiences, even and especially conflicting and paradoxical ones. They are the ones we seek when we long to feel this wideness, this grace.

Then I think about how the opposite happens: When in times of existential crisis and pain we feel isolated, unperceiving of love and support. Just thinking about it evokes a deep sadness, an instant recognition of profound loneliness that seeks immediate relief. What is this dynamic? How does it happen that someone faces pain and struggle truly alone and devoid of kindness, empathy, compassion, and grace–of any connection–shown to them? I know it happens, and I am likely guilty of ignoring or simply being oblivious to other’s struggles as I go about my own busy life.

So when I come across someone who exudes the opposite of kindness, empathy, compassion, generosity, openness, and grace, what story do I tell about that? How does my story, told subconsciously and automatically, then affect and even dictate how I show up to that person? How might I modify and optimize my default story to then raise the likelihood that I will interact with this person in a way that connects and heals?

We’re living in tumultuous and fraught times, friends. The stories we tell about one another, the presence or absence of love in our daily encounters, matter more now than ever. Look around you for the role models. See how they move through life with ease and joy, resilience and hope, optimism despite everything. Observe them, query them, emulate them. Feel the rewards of connection with them, and amplify that.

It’s never too late, and no action is ever too little, to Heal Through Connection.

This Moment

Posted on June 15, 2025 by Catherine Cheng, MD

5 talks to prepare in the next eight weeks.
Blog post to write.
Dinner to cook.

But all I wanted to do is write to my friend. Not just jar smiles, but a letter. Connect in long form, right now. Because this was a big week and weekend and I wanted to share it.

Daughter graduated high school and turned 18 on the same day. Family came and went from my house for six days in a row; I woke up each morning having to run the list to keep track of everybody. Our family has been through things over the years; getting to this point of pending empty nest was, at times, not guaranteed. We got through it all together, one breath at at time. This moment is a big deal in our family. This moment is a big deal for our country. All of this on my heart, I wanted to do nothing but write to my friend, before any of my other tasks and obligations. I’m getting better and braver at letting my intuition guide me, and I have yet to regret it.

Turns out I want to share what I wrote with all of you, too:

“…I write to you today because this moment in life feels important. The No Kings protests marched all across the country yesterday as most of my family were basically offline and absorbed in ourselves. We read about the two political shootings in Minnesota and I felt a little guilty not participating in any larger demonstrations of my values. And I reconciled it by attending to the connections in my own tight circle. We have disagreements and friction within my own family and I see my navigating and mediating these peacefully and mindfully as an important contribution to society–small and mighty. 🙂

“There are so many calls to ‘fight,’ so many adversarial, us vs. them, good vs. evil narratives surrounding us right now. And while I abhor so many actions taken by ‘leaders,’ I still resist to call them evil and dehumanize them… That feels antithetical to the ethos of love and connection that I wish/strive to live by… But OMG it is challenging to resist that ad hominem train! *sigh*

“…This weekend I begin creating five new talks for this summer, to be delivered to [XXX corporation]… As I consider how to address their wellness challenges, many of which are relational, I come back, as I so often do, to core principles of humility, curiosity, empathy, and connection. My intent is to light the spark of togetherness, mutual caring and uplift, and collaboration, starting with the premise that we all matter, and that no matter what chair we occupy in the orchestra, we can and do lead from exactly where we sit. Each and every one of us matters to the whole–WE ARE THE SYSTEM–and embracing that fundamental first principle changes everything–don’t you think? If we all matter, then I need to know how I affect you, and vice versa. We need better self-awareness, self-regulation, and effective communication skills to get the work done and not burn out doing it! And having talked to people and learned how we operate individually and in groups my whole career, I feel qualified to help here! And who knows–this could be the start of something that grows; I could possibly help more people than just my one patient at a time! SO many possibilities!”

This moment, my friends.

We get to decide how we show up, and for what, over and again, in resilient, optimistic learning and persistence, in love and connection, in faith and confidence that we can do what is needed to heal the ragged tears in our social fabric, one encounter, one conversation, one relationship at a time.