22/08/2023
Today, to the best of my ability, I want to give you the most valuable thing I have seen/learned on my journey in life: Openness to be impacted by others.
This is not to say that I take everything people say to heart, but it means I’ve learned how to listen.
It’s amazing how much I’ve learned!
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I thought I was a good listener. The reason why I thought this was because I allowed people to talk at me a lot.
Sometimes I would try to understand what they were saying. Mostly I would space out and instead got really good at giving neutral responses based on the last couple of words of their sentences.
Responses like, ‘uhum’, ‘oh really’, ‘and then what’...
I would utter these responses whilst being close to oblivious as to what they were actually saying, but it was enough to not get busted.
When I tried to understand what they said, I would try to be intellectual about it. In other words; try to think about and consider what they were saying as they were talking.
This usually lead me to only hear a portion of it, trying to construct responses based on the parts I picked up.
If I’m being completely honest, these things still happen, but considerably less. Old habits die hard.
It wasn’t until I learned to listen with nothing on my mind that I really started to HEAR. The reason is dual: I hear everything, and I feel where they’re coming from with what they’re saying.
It’s astonishing how much we tend to miss out on when we’re not being internally quiet whilst someone is talking.
We try to remember and intellectually understand what they said, hanging their words on mental pegs. Checking if we agree or not, trying to put their words into the framework of our own understanding, starting to construct responses, etc.
All this mental activity going on, blocking our ability to simply hear.
That one thing that doesn’t require an ounce of effort(our ears will pick up the sounds if we want them to or not).
It’s amazing how much I’ve grown as a result of JUST listening. And it’s amazing how comfortable it is when my internal chatter quiets down, allowing real connection to emerge.
So if it’s one thing I would love for you to get from this, it’s your ability to simply listen with no agenda. No trying to understand, trying to be empathetic, trying to make it seem like you’re listening, trying to let them know you’re interested as they’re talking(yeah, uhum, oh really, tell me more…).
Listening is a skill and it’s entirely based on removal of thinking, pleasing and effort.
