Listening is so 2010...
I would be lying if I said I’m a great listener. In fact, I know I’m not. But, I am damn good at pretending.
You know what I mean; nodding the head in reassurance, looking at that person deep in the eyes, interjecting appropriate “I see” or blinking in a way that shows I understand whatever it is they are talking about, all while thinking about the twenty other things I have to do that day.
My skill is not one that I am particularly proud of. No, I have reprimanded myself, making it a resolution everyday that I will become a better listener and focus on the person in front of me.
At this particular moment, I am watching the The Daily Show, simultaneously writing an article, and checking my email. I’m splitting my attention in different directions, all the while thinking about how I need to pack for my trip on Sunday night.
And, in case some of you are wondering, yes, I have gotten tested for A.D.D.
Not listening to others is not because I find what that person has to say uninteresting. I can’t even give myself twenty minutes to sit down and write freely without checking my phone or checking for news alerts.
I don’t sit down and listen to the thoughts running through my own head. Instead, I find different means that inhibit me from paying attention to myself or anyone for that matter.
The art of listening is hard to master. I find it increasingly difficult to listen to others when I am unable to sit down and do the same for myself. So, I thought, if I was really going to get serious about my whole resolution thing, I would need to be able to sit down for just ten minutes and write in my journal.
I turned off my cell phone, went into the other room, sat down, pulled out my journal and pen and began writing. I don’t know exactly how much time had passed, but two sentences later I found myself wondering how I was going to meet up with my friend for lunch, go to the grocery store, finish this article, workout, pick up a shelf I bought on craigslist, and cook dinner with my boyfriend.
It was then, in that very moment, I discovered the core of my listening problems:
I overwhelm my day with tasks, and therefore, I overwhelm my mind.
I opened my planner for the week and saw it completely penciled in. I took it upon myself to start erasing plans. It was not humanly possible to try to fit in 18 holes of golf, a writing session with my editor, coffee with a friend, then coming home to my boyfriend to give him my full attention.
One day, as my boyfriend was getting to leave for work in the morning I asked him if he thought I could listen better.
He started laughing and without hesitation said, “Yes.”
When I implored further he responded, “I just think it’s funny when you say ‘I hate to have to repeat myself,’ and I often have to repeat myself to you.”
My boyfriend works in a field that requires him to listen well.
I then asked him, “Do you have any books on how to be a better listener?”
He laughed again, but quickly went to look for a book he read while in school. In chapter six they define ‘active listening’, basically stating that it’s not a passive process.
And, that’s what I had become: a passive listener.
Most of the time I hear what the person is saying, but my reaction is passive. I am not emotionally engaged in what’s told to me, whether it’s showing excitement for a friend getting a job promotion or one of my girlfriends telling me about a killer pair of shoes she got on sale.
If my boyfriend felt I lacked in the listening department, then surely my friends did, as well. I never ventured out to ask my friends out of fear of what the answer would be.
So, like any good friend would do, I assumed they believed I wasn’t a good listener.
I started thinking about how frustrated I would get with my parents whenever they asked me about something I told them several times, such as when I was leaving for a golf tournament.
While I tried to attribute their forgetfulness to age, there was a part of me that felt like they weren’t listening or didn’t care. If I felt this way, it was quite possible my friends had the same reaction.
Taking the time to sit down and be an active listener takes a lot of freaking effort.
So, my new resolution was to set aside any mumbo jumbo I had going on in my head, and to realize that the stuff I needed to do later was not as important as the person sitting in front of me.
As my boyfriend lovingly told me, “Sometimes you are a great listener, and other times I wonder what the heck is going on up there. It seems like your mind is constantly racing to the next thing.”
To listen better, I do need to simplify my life so I am not overwhelmed with a to-do-list when meeting up with a friend.
I don’t want to miss out on important details of my friends’ and families’ lives. I want to be engaged with what’s going on with them presently.
I read somewhere that was we have one mouth and two ears for a reason. I’m going to start giving my ears a better workout and actively use them.
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erikdolnack
This is a great little article; good advice for anyone in a relationship. It doesn’t have to be a romantic relationship.
People want to be heard when they talk. To not listen is rude. It kinda’ shows that they’re not all that important in your life. Or are they?
This article touches on something that I’m becoming increasingly a critic of, and that’s multitasking. The corporate world will hardly support (let alone publish) any research that shows the failure of human multitasking today, because they profit from abusing their workforce by making one person do three jobs at once (yet still only get paid for one).
However, in my experience, NO ONE can successfully multitask. The individuals that like to boast that they are excellent multitaskers often prove to be incapable of even doing one task properly. It’s like juggling: everyone can juggle one ball up and down in the air. Juggling two balls takes some skill. Three balls at once is even harder. And only expert jugglers that work in circuses and sideshows can juggle four or more balls in the air at once.
Everytime you take on a new task, you’re taking some focus off the one you were already working on. You only have “so much” focus. No one’s brain is so large, or their IQ so high, that they can maintain 100% focus on task A and then begin task B and still maintain task A at 100% focus. That’s impossible. What actually happens is that when the individual takes on a new task (task B), then their attention and focus get divided and they now consume 50% on task A and 50% on task B. Add a third task onto their plate, and they’re now only able to afford 30% on each of the three tasks at once.
Multitasking is highly inefficient, makes many mistakes, wastes time, money, energy, and effort. But management want to believe in multitasking because they can sell it to their superiors and shareholders as a way to “increase productivity” (which usually means lay a few people off and overwork the rest in the name of the ‘bottom-line’).
The other problem with multitasking (other than the fact that it’s completely inefficient) is that we tend to take these behavior patterns home with us and start multitasking at home, when we should be relaxing and just winding down. To some extent, as this timely article illustrates, we bring this one ourselves by over-complicating our lives with utter bullshit that when we think about it, really doesn’t matter. Ours is a culture that has lost its soul.