What interests you most? My Top 5 Blog Posts Tell the Story.

Barbara J. Mayfield, MS, RDN, LD, FAND
Jul 4
3 min read

In honor of our nation’s birthday, I decided to reshare my top blog post, published in 2020 and titled:

Communication Can Unite Us

Here is an excerpt:

Every 4th of July, Americans celebrate a birthday, the birthday of a nation. Over the course of nearly two and half centuries, the United States of America has experienced periods of great unity and also periods of profound division. It appears what currently unites us is agreement that we are presently undeniably divided.

What can help unite us?

One way we can become united again is for us to become better at communicating. In fact, communication is essential for unity. Communication is a relational activity that involves receiving and listening to the ideas of others as well as expressing our own. Without two-way communication, we cannot achieve unity.

The word communication is derived from the Latin word “communis” which means common. We can more effectively communicate when we learn what we share in common, which is a great starting point for creating connections, building rapport, and over time achieving unity.

Communication that builds unity begins with curiosity to truly learn about others, listening to one another, and hearing each other’s stories and dreams.

Listening with empathy leads to understanding and greater understanding builds trust and respect. Trust and respect are essential for creating unity. When we are united we can rely on one another to accomplish what we cannot do alone.

Check out the entire post: https://www.nutritioncommunicator.com/post/communication-can-unite-us

Searching through my posts, I was curious which of my other posts were most popular.

Here are four more that round out the top 5:

How Do You Describe Professionalism?

This post shares 5 principles of professionalism, which are:

1. Demonstrate respect

2. Show up and follow through

3. Demonstrate competence

4. Communicate with empathy and confidence

5. Hold to the highest standard

Check out the post here: https://www.nutritioncommunicator.com/post/2019/08/02/how-do-you-describe-professionalism

Will Artificial Intelligence Make Us Smarter or Dumber? It’s up to us.

I summarized my thoughts on using AI to write a blog post as follows:

ChatGPT produces content that is thorough and well-structured. It made writing this blog much more efficient than if I had written it on my own. However, I find the writing that is produced is not particularly creative and is quite wordy. It is not my voice.

In the future, I can see using AI language models as a starting point or as a tool for overcoming writing blocks.

Check out the entire post here: https://www.nutritioncommunicator.com/post/will-artificial-intelligence-make-us-smarter-or-dumber-it-s-up-to-us

How do Cultures Around the World Celebrate Food and Family at Meals?

I have published more than a dozen blog posts about family meals. This one is the most popular.

The post opens with these thoughts:

Meals eaten with family are valued around the world. They are valued for not only the nourishing food they provide but more so for the opportunity to connect with family.

Additionally, meals are an important means for passing down traditions and foodways from one generation to the next. Meals are an expression of our cultural heritage.

Check out the rest here: https://www.nutritioncommunicator.com/post/how-do-cultures-around-the-world-celebrate-food-and-family-at-meals

When is Silence Golden?

This post tackles the question when to speak and when to keep silent. Here is an excerpt:

When we think of communication, we are more likely to think of speaking than of silence. However, both speaking and silence communicate in powerful ways – both can be helpful or harmful. Knowing when each is appropriate is an essential communication skill.

The phrase “silence is golden” comes from an ancient proverb: “speech is silver, silence is golden.” In other words, both are precious, with silence considered the more valuable.

Silence can certainly be the harder of the two, but not always. And just because silence is “golden” doesn’t make it the right choice in every situation. Let’s answer the question…

Learn the answer here: https://www.nutritioncommunicator.com/post/when-is-silence-golden