A friend’s good news isn’t your cue to share yours. Stay in their moment a while.

There is a reflex that fires when someone tells you good news, and it sounds like a story of your own arriving right on cue. It is not usually selfishness. It is how people show they relate. But it moves the spotlight, and your friend goes from being celebrated to being an audience in about four seconds.

The fix is boring and it works: ask a second question. How did you find out, what did you say, who else have you told. Stay there long enough that the moment is clearly theirs, and your news will still exist in ten minutes.