Count to five before you hit send. Those five seconds have saved more friendships than any apology.

The gap between feeling something and transmitting it is where nearly all the damage gets prevented. Messages are permanent in a way speech is not, and a sentence written hot keeps its exact wording forever. A few seconds is usually all it takes for the strongest version to lose its appeal.

Build a small delay into sending anything with heat in it. Type it, put the phone down, come back before you press the button. Most of the time you will cut one line, and that line is the one you would have had to apologize for.