“Like a woman who cannot be a little pregnant, an argument cannot be partly valid or invalid but must be completely one or the other” (Louis P. Pojman, Philosophy, 15).

“Our research has shown that strong relationships, careers, organizations, and communities all draw from the same source of power–the ability to talk openly about high-stakes, emotional, controversial topics” (Patterson, Grenny, McMillan & Switlzer, Crucial Conversations, 9).

“Literature takes reality and human experience as its starting point, transforms it by means of the imagination, and sends readers back to life with renewed understanding of it and zest for it because of their excursions into a purely imaginary realm” (Leland Ryken, Thinking Christianly About Literature from The Christian Imagination, 24).

“When conversations turn from routine to crucial, we’re often in trouble. . . . Two tiny organs seated neatly atop your kidneys pump adrenaline into your bloodstream. You don’t choose to do this. Your adrenal glands do it, and then you have to live with it. . . . The issue at hand, the other person, and a brain that’s drunk on adrenaline and almost incapable of rational thought. It’s little wonder that we often say and do things that make perfect sense in the moment, but later on seem, well, stupid” (Patterson, Grenny, McMillan & Switlzer, Crucial Conversations, 5).

“Literature consists of words, first of all. Yet when Christians talk about literature, it would be easy to get the impression that literature consists of ideas. It does not. . . . A proper respect for language is a prerequisite to producing and understanding literature” (Leland Ryken, Thinking Christianly About Literature from The Christian Imagination, 24).

“Despite the importance of crucial conversations, we often back away from them because we fear we’ll make matters worse. We’ve become masters at avoiding tough conversations” (Patterson, Grenny, McMillan & Switlzer, Crucial Conversations, 3).

“Literature enlarges our world of experience to include both more of the physical world and things not yet imagined, giving the “actual world” a “new dimension of depth” (C.S. Lewis, Of Other Worlds, 29)” (Donald T. Williams, Christian Poetics, Past and Present from The Christian Imagination, 17).

“The crucial conversations we’re referring to are interactions that happen to everyone. They’re the day-to-day conversations that affect your life” (Patterson, Grenny, McMillan & Switlzer, Crucial Conversations, 1.

“In the real world after the fall, as in the literary worlds which represent it, good and evil are so intertwined that the responsibility of discernment cannot be realistically avoided” (Donald T. Williams, Christian Poetics, Past and Present from The Christian Imagination, 13).

“The root cause of many–if not most–human problems lies in how people behave when others disagree with them about high-stakes, emotional issues” (Patterson, Grenny, McMillan & Switlzer, Crucial Conversations, xiii).