Are you talking with your family as much as you think?
"We talk all the time." That's how 34-year-old Jenna describes her relationship with her mother, Audrey, who is 63.
"We talk about everything.
She's my best friend.
We are really open with each other." Audrey concurred.
"I'm really comfortable talking with Jenna about my life," says Audrey.
"There are life topics we talk about that I don't talk about with my husband or two sons." The sense of comfort Jenna and Audrey have about their conversations is consistent with research from The Generations Project.
We found that 98% of baby boomers and 94% of the next generation say they are comfortable talking about later-in-life topics.
Yet when we dug into the data, we discovered that they weren't talking as much as they thought.
Feeling comfortable or being willing to talk doesn't mean you are actively having the conversations.
After Audrey and Jenna reviewed 14 later-in-life topics that informed the Later-in-Life Conversations Study , Jenna said with surprise, "Wow, we don't talk about most of the things on this list.
I'm not sure what we talk about.
More the day-to-day stuff, I guess." Where is the disconnect between a willingness to talk about later-in-life topics and actually talking?
When we asked, respondents in the study described both barriers and resistors.
Assess the barriers and resistors that might be keeping your family from talking.
There is no judgment of Audrey and Jenna's relationship.
It's entirely normal to talk about day-to-day topics while avoiding others that feel hard or off-limits, even when we feel open to it.
But once aware we aren't having conversations about topics that are important to our future, we can explore new ways to expand what we can-and do-talk about.
Acknowledge each other's feelings around later-in-life topics as a way to give permission for stepping into the conversation.
Get started Start with a feeling word and then share a thought.
It sounds like, "I'm nervous about asking, but I think it's important to talk about future healthcare." Senior generation Share why later-in-life conversations might be hard and then give permission to ask about what's on their mind.
Next generation Recognize that talking about later-in-life topics may be hard for your parents and then let them know you don't want to be intrusive.