Don’t start a serious talk when someone’s hungry, tired or leaving. Timing isn’t manipulation. It’s kindness.

The same words land completely differently depending on what state somebody is in when they arrive. Hungry, exhausted or halfway out of the door, nobody has the capacity to hear something hard well, and choosing a better moment is not managing them. It is giving them a fair chance at the conversation.

If you have something difficult to raise this week, choose the slot deliberately. After food rather than before, sitting down rather than in a doorway. And ask first whether now is all right, which also gives them a way to say not yet.