Listen!!!!

One of my challenges this past year was learning how to listen. On second thought, ignore the “learning how to” part; I should just say “listening.” I’ve always tried to be a good listener but now I’m not so sure I am. My need to be heard sometimes overrides the politesse of listening to others. Funny how I see one thing as a need, the other as a duty.

In typical conversation, one person talks, the other listens. Then in due course, the listener may comment or add or query or encourage but to do so, the listener momentarily becomes the speaker while the former talker becomes the listener. And so it goes, typically like a game of tennis, serve, bounce, return, bounce, return. It is an enjoyable thing, this exchange.

In my experience, many people no longer know how or want to play this conversational “tennis”. They simply want to be heard: “Listen to ME!!!” Sometimes, it’s recounting an experience, sometimes it’s a long-winded complaint, sometimes it’s a rant against some perceived injustice or fault or event from the past which must be rehashed, and sometimes it’s just verbal diarrhea along the lines of my life is more interesting than yours or allow smart ME to inform ignorant YOU! As Milton Wright wrote: “A monologue is not a conversation.”

But as a listener, do I share the blame of a monologuist conversation? Am I too busy trying to put forth a solution to the problem? Have I been there, done that? Have I not given the speaker enough time? Have I read the body language? Perhaps the speaker simply needs a listener, needs to “vent” as we like to call it today. Or maybe I, as listener, am bored and can no longer track the so-called conversation. Am I patient enough? Am I reading a pause as a finish and thus jumping in before the other's done? I’ve been guilty of the all the above.

What to do? I’ll discuss this in upcoming blogs.