![\"\"](\"http:\/\/www.sxc.hu\/pic\/m\/c\/ce\/central\/720361_friendship.jpg\")
e where I\u2019ve felt that way too and my reply is a story about me. I bet that person didn\u2019t feel heard at all.<\/p>\nThe act of listening seems so simple to do. All it takes is being quiet while another person talks, right? As an intern therapist, it\u2019s what I signed up to do for a living, but I have quickly learned real listening is more than just being present and actually takes effort.<\/p>\n
When I think about certain times I\u2019ve \u201clistened,\u201d I guiltily remember how another person was talking, but the whole time I had been thinking of what to say back. Or I think of a time where I\u2019ve felt that way too and my reply is a story about me. I bet that person didn\u2019t feel heard at all.<\/p>\n
In a poem by Ralph Roughton, he states the following three things better than I can: \u201cWhen I ask you to listen to me and you start giving me advice, you have not done what I asked. When I ask you to listen to me and you begin to tell me why I shouldn\u2019t feel that way, you are trampling on my feelings. When I ask you to listen to me and you feel you have to do something to solve my problems, you have failed me.\u201d<\/p>\n
There\u2019s a subtle difference between listening and hearing. Listening is the act of appearing to absorb information, and hearing is when you are able to sort out what is being said and actually detect how a person is feeling. Better yet, it\u2019s being able to repeat that feeling back to that person and make them feel understood. (Trust me, they\u2019ll tell you if you got it wrong!)<\/p>\n
This takes trial and error, but it\u2019s always better to ask than to assume or read someone else\u2019s thoughts. At the least, telling someone \u201cI\u2019d feel the same way\u201d or \u201cI understand\u201d acknowledges that you\u2019re hearing them.<\/p>\n
I can think of several instances where I\u2019ve felt helpless if I didn\u2019t know how to \u201cfix\u201d a situation or help a friend by saying exactly the right thing. Then I realized it\u2019s not always about saying the perfect words, and more often than not, you don\u2019t have control over what happens. In fact (and in the wise words of my professor): Listening is fixing.<\/p>\n
If you\u2019re like me and it\u2019s difficult for you to sit back and not try to make a person instantly feel better, this is not an easy thing to believe. However, some of the most comforting times I\u2019ve had with friends and family are when they sat by me and were simply there without judgment. They allowed me to express whatever it was I needed to feel, even if it was hard for them to see me hurt, frustrated or angry.<\/p>\n
The bottom line is that no one wants to be told that his or her feelings are irrational. By not fully listening, that is the message that is being sent. I can\u2019t think of anything more invalidating than spilling your guts to someone and being told \u201cyou\u2019ll be fine\u201d in return.<\/p>\n
Next time you\u2019re in a conversation or argument, take the time to really listen and hear one another \u2014 before you jump to talking about you or defending yourself. You may be surprised how much this changes conversations, friendships and relationships for the better.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The act of listening seems so simple to do. All it takes is being quiet while another person talks, right? As an intern therapist, it\u2019s what I signed up to do for a living, but I have quickly learned real listening is more than just being present and actually takes effort. When I think about certain times I\u2019ve \u201clistened,\u201d I Read more…<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":12,"featured_media":1808,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[49],"tags":[154],"coauthors":[18],"class_list":["post-1807","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-relationships","tag-listening"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/collectiveinquiry.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/08\/listening.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/collectiveinquiry.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1807","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/collectiveinquiry.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/collectiveinquiry.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/collectiveinquiry.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/12"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/collectiveinquiry.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1807"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/collectiveinquiry.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1807\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1809,"href":"https:\/\/collectiveinquiry.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1807\/revisions\/1809"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/collectiveinquiry.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/1808"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/collectiveinquiry.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1807"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/collectiveinquiry.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1807"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/collectiveinquiry.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1807"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/collectiveinquiry.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcoauthors&post=1807"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}