When Conversations Drain Us Dry

On Relational Energy, Naysayers, and Choosing Connection in a Time That Tests Us

There are many things about this moment in American life that feel… charged.

Not just politically, though certainly that. Not just socially, though we can all name the fractures, it’s something more ambient, like a low hum of tension running beneath everyday interactions. Conversations that might have once felt generative now feel brittle. Exchanges that could have held curiosity instead collapse into certainty. And increasingly, I find myself leaving conversations not just unconvinced, but depleted.

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Lately, I’ve been thinking about these interactions through the lens of Relational-Cultural Theory (RCT). This framework suggests that growth, healing, and resilience don’t happen in isolation, but through connection. At its core, RCT asks deceptively simple questions. What happens to us in a relationship? Do our interactions leave us with more energy or less?

One of the most grounding ideas from RCT is the concept of growth-fostering relationships, often described as the “Five Good Things.” When we are in relationships that are working, truly working, we experience:

• A sense of zest (energy, aliveness)

• Increased clarity (we understand ourselves and others better)

• A sense of worth (we feel valued and seen)

• Productivity (we are moved toward action)

• A desire for more connection

These are not abstract ideals. They are embodied experiences. You can feel them in your body after a conversation that lands well. You leave feeling more like yourself, not less. And here’s the thing: these qualities are not luxuries. In times like these, they are essential. Because when the world feels chaotic, the quality of our connections becomes a stabilizing force, or a destabilizing one.

Conversations steeped in doom, gloom, and hopelessness don’t just reflect the status quo; they help maintain it. Because hopelessness is not neutral. When we internalize the belief that nothing can change, we stop acting. We disengage. We conserve energy not for strategic use, but for self-protection. And while that may make sense at an individual level, especially when we are overwhelmed, it has collective consequences.

Inactivity, regardless of intention, stabilizes existing systems. So even when someone intends to be insightful or “realistic,” if the outcome of the conversation is paralysis, then the conversation is doing a different kind of work than it claims.

From an RCT perspective, we can ask a different set of questions about these interactions:

• Did this conversation increase my sense of clarity or muddy it?

• Did I feel more energized or more depleted?

• Did I feel more connected to possibility or more resigned?

When I’ve sat with these questions honestly, I’ve had to acknowledge something uncomfortable. Some conversations are not just unhelpful; they are relationally harmful. Not because people are bad. Not because they don’t care. But because the pattern of the interaction consistently produces disconnection. And disconnection, over time, has consequences.

In RCT terms, these are not growth-fostering relationships. They are energy-depleting exchanges. And when those exchanges become normalized, when they are framed as the “smart” or “informed” way to engage, they begin to crowd out other ways of being together, including camaraderie.

Comaraderie is often misunderstood as agreement. As sameness. As a kind of forced positivity that glosses over real differences. But that’s not the camaraderie I’m interested in. The camaraderie I’m talking about is relational. It’s rooted in a shared orientation toward possibility, even when the path forward is unclear.

It sounds like:

• “This is hard. Let’s think it through together.”

• “I don’t have the answer, but I’m not willing to give up.”

• “What can we do, from where we are?”

This kind of engagement does not deny reality. It expands it. Even in the midst of uncertainty, camaraderie leaves you with a sense of movement. A next step. A reason to stay engaged.

That is not small. That is everything. It is a commitment to staying awake to what is still available to us, individually and collectively.

RCT reminds us that we are shaped in relationships. Who we are becoming is influenced, moment by moment, by how we are with each other. Because in times like these, the stakes of our everyday interactions are higher than they might seem. We are not just exchanging ideas. We are shaping each other’s capacity to remain engaged. And that, especially now, is huge.