“ARE YOU LISTENING OR WAITING TO SPEAK?”
On a subway trip the other early AM, my eyes settled on the back cover of a magazine being read by a woman in front of whom I was standing. The capitalized, bold-faced, four line message printed there blared me out of my reverie over the previous day’s eye surgery and that morning’s poking and prodding and examining that brought me back into pain. Such a simple, direct, logical question implied such a profound intention and truth.
At first, my mind raced to friends who always seem to be just waiting for me to take a breath so they could jump in with their words and befuddle mine. One in particular seems completely incapable of not performing those “active listening” intrusions. That person’s constant need to let me know that “they’re” paying attention drives “them” to forcing me to actually stop and let them let me know that they are paying attention. I often question to what that person is paying attention besides “their” own mind, “their” own need to be “with it,” “their” own need to garner attention, just “their” own need.
Then, my mind went to where it should have been, on my own need to be waiting just to speak my own “truths…insights…wisdoms…platitudes…inanities… intrusions.” After all, what I have to say is so wonderful and important that I just need to express them immediately. So, there I stood before the message, bleary eyes transfixed as best as they could focus on those seven words arranged in such profundity. My mind bounced between other conversation intruders and myself and all of us who have decided that we are so worth hearing before, over and instead of those to whom we are supposedly listening. We have taken “active listening” techniques to heights that the originators of the theory and the practice might be turning over in their graves over.
So, where does all of this leave and lead us. Well, perhaps we should begin to practice “real listening.” If the speaker isn’t sure that we are paying attention because we are not “hmmming” or “yessing” or interjecting or ejaculating our own seminal importances, affirmations, ideas, contradictions and everything else that really is so disruptive to good listening, they can always ask if they are expressing themselves clearly. Then the listener can feel free to use a really effective “active listening” technique and rephrase what the speaker has said.
Controlling our need to “jump in” seems particularly difficult when we are using the phone. We don’t have any of those other signs that the listener hasn’t fallen asleep out of boredom or just left us. We can’t see the listener’s facial or other physical expressions to let us know if they agree or disagree, understand or not, or are even really interested. That’s a definite problem worth working on.
What another friend of mine and I have inadvertently come up with, completely unrelated to the incentive that motivated me to prepare this blog entry, is a very simple solution. If the other person hasn’t said anything for awhile, the speaker asks, “Are you still there?” Then, the other responds, “Yes. I’m just listening.” How comforting that is. How appropriate and un-offensive it is when you take into account how often we are using cell phones and how often even the one with the “most bars” kills our conversations by dropping the call.
Since that eventful ride, I have tried to become more aware of keeping my mouth shut while someone at the other end of the conversation is explaining themselves. I don’t always succeed, so, if I can, I often just stuff my mouth with something yummie. That seems to take my focus off the need to be an active listener and put it on listening so I can enjoy my nosh. If I choose the right tidbit, my friends will have my undivided attention, will be able to say what they have to say sans my “wisdom…display of knowledge…with its…etc,” and I probably won’t put on an ounce. If I can’t “tidbit it,” I try just to keep my mouth shut. I don’t always succeed, but it is worth the effort.
ARE YOU LISTENING OR WAITING TO SPEAK?
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