Listening on Purpose
These ideas are so much better Shared!!
Take a moment to think about how you’ve engaged with others in the last week.
What did you learn about their lives? What questions did you ask? What responses were you given?
What information did you share about yourself this week? How was it received? Did you feel heard?
I run into this thing frequently, where someone asks me a question, then leaves the conversation in the middle of my response. We have busy hectic lives, and a 5-year-old, so I understand erratic conversation.
With so much stimuli constantly demanding our attention, it’s very difficult to avoid dividing our attention, or having our attention simply move on to the next thing.
Think back on your interactions again.
Did you hear others, and the messages they were giving you? Did they hear yours?
Were you listening for what they were saying (Listening to Receive), or were you listening for your opportunity to respond (Listening to Respond)?
These are not the same thing.
How does it feel when someone asks you a question, and your formulate your response to carry an essence of yourself to the other person, and they’ve already left the conversation, or are talking over you, not letting you answer?
How does it feel when you think back on conversations and realize you don’t really know the answers to the questions you posed? If you talked over someone’s answer, Listening to Respond, did you internalize your answer as theirs?
Attending is a struggle. It just is. We are all so overstimulated, and in need of validation and being heard, that our ability to hear others suffers.
Over time, this leads to the dissolution of autonomy and genuine interaction. Instead of sharing our selves with each other, conversations become something that have to be fielded, countered, prepared for.
Consider this…
Conversations in which we listen to receive the message of the other participant(s) can replenish our spirits, and give us back our spoons. Conversations in which we listen to respond, drain us, exhaust us, and steal our spoons.
Which interactions are you having? How are others experiencing you?
Audio version of this blog available on Spotify and Anchor
Survivor Literacy 
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