Research into everyday caring was conducted in a group discussion format, with persons invited to relate a story that illustrated how they lived their caring in everyday situations. The ease with which these research participants understood what was being asked of them, their willingness to respond and the clarity of the exemplars they shared have the potential to inform nursing practice. When nurse colleagues learned of this research effort, they often expressed doubt that people could and would describe their everyday caring ways. Based on the experience of the researchers and research participants in this series of studies, however, it became clear that persons do understand their unique ways of caring, and do recognize the importance of sharing that understanding. Nurses committed to practice guided by the tenets of Nursing as Caring can and should incorporate direct invitation as part of their coming to know other as caring person, A number of important benefits are possible with a direct approach to knowing the other as caring. One benefit is that as the nurse raises the issue of caring, patients are helped to understand that caring is of immediate importance to nurses, thus clarifying the service and value of nursing among the health disciplines. A second benefit is that as nurses address caring directly with their patients, nurses themselves gain affirmation of nursing as a caring service and of themselves as persons committed to caring. However, the most immediate benefit of a direct approach to caring is the opening of a line of communication that clearly establishes the "caring between," that space, that relationship within which and through which all that is important in nursing occurs. The patient is given the opportunity to recognize self as caring person and to join in mutual affirmation and celebration with the nurse. Nurses who are reluctant to engage patients in dialogues about caring ways may think the topic is "too intimate." It is true that caring is intimate and personal, but caring is also very visible, just as many of the topics introduced in the nursing situation are personal and intimate and have visible referents. As nurses have the courage to raise the topic of caring, the central importance of caring in human living can become not only recognized but openly and publicly valued. RESEARCH DEVELOPMENT OF NURSING OUTCOMES-VALUES EXPERIENCED IN THE NURSING SITUATION