The Importance of Listening

I read a book a few years ago that changed my perspective on every relationship and friendship I’ve ever had and will ever have. The book is called The Lost Art of Listening. It’s a deadly accurate and well-written instruction on how to listen. I never thought listening was important enough to write a book about. I was wrong, dead wrong. I’ll summarize what I can:

In common practice, listening is usually the time spent during a conversation when we either reflect on our own part of a story, start constructing a reply, or prepare some insight for advice. We listen so that we can respond, because we believe we are expected to. If someone calls us for help, we listen so that we might figure out how to can help. If someone speaks in anger or frustration, we listen defensively or we withdraw. In other words, we react when we listen. We do not know how to listen objectively. We listen with reactionary and lazy minds. We do not empathize. In short, we do not realize the importance of simply and actively listening to each other.

Ironically, I wasn’t inspired to read this book until I realized I get really annoyed when people are not listening to me. I thought, “Hey, maybe this will teach me how to get people to understand me.” People can always tell when you’re not listening: shifty eyes, easily distracted, interruptions, spacing out, call waiting, etc. I know you can relate to this. Ever talk to a loved one about some difficulty you were having? Have they ever responded with, “I don’t know what to tell you,” “Try harder,” or “I can’t really relate?” I don’t know of anyone who talks about their difficulties solely so they can get advice, be told to work harder, or wanted someone to tell their own story. In fact, this response only leads the speaker to feel isolated, neglected, or even abandoned at times. Is it any wonder why one of the leading complaints in relationships is that one partner feels the other is not listening to them or their needs?

What do you need to start listening effectively? There are really only two goals: the first is to attain knowledge from the speaker, and the second is to be completely available to the speaker. When attaining knowledge, it is important to understand the difference between what is being said and what is meant.

For example, if someone is speaking in frustration or anger, does that mean they are angry with you? A good question to ask yourself in this situation is this: do they want to vent or do they want advice? Listen to their intent so that you’ll know how to listen to what is being said. “Dang, I was driving to work, I was in a hurry, and THREE DIFFERENT CARS cut me off!” Put yourself in their shoes. Do they want advice? Probably not, the situation is over. Do they want to vent? Yeah, probably. So now, you can begin to empathize by exploring their perspective.

Observe their body language when speaking, tone, emphasis on emotions or events, repetition. Then, keep the conversation going by encouraging them to talk about those things. “You sound understandably upset, did you get to work late?” “How did you react to them?” “Was everything going okay before they cut you off?” “How did the rest of the day go for you?” Put yourself in their situation. Find out how deep their thoughts/feelings go. Don’t be surprised if they move to a different topic or event. Be available enough for them to fill your head with their perspective. Follow them in their feelings/thoughts/stories, let them guide you into each one. Emotional topics are hard to effectively listen to, because you need to transcend into their world and the suspension of your needs is complete. But, in order to listen effectively, you must be completely available to the speaker. You are theirs. Once they stop or pause in conversation, simply encourage them to give you more knowledge about their feelings/thoughts by asking insightful knowledge-seeking questions or simply saying, “Tell me more.” Do not turn the conversation to yourself. Good listening really does take more effort than it does to speak.

In contrast, how does it feel when you are truly listened to? Important. Cared about. Understood. How would you feel if someone effectively listened to you talk about whatever you wanted? What if, after you went off for a while, they said, “I enjoyed listening to you, but keep going! I want to hear more!” Loved. “What is your opinion about…?” “I’d like to hear your thoughts on….” Respected. When you truly listen to people, you treat them like a blessing, not a burden. It is clear when someone is and is not listening to you. It is unbelievably important.

Christianese

I’ve been having a problem talking with some of my Christian friends lately. For the first time in my life, I’ve been away from the Christian community for quite a few months and I’ve had a problem returning to it. Part of the problem is that I no longer completely understand Christianese. I don’t quite understand how Christianese ever started, but I regret that it did, and that’s not really the point anyway. I think very few Christians understand how difficult it is to bond with someone spiritually who uses this language. I want to explain what I mean by that.

Try to have a conversation with someone who speaks Christianese and you’ll usually hear the following phrases: “I have a passion for…” “I am blessed because…” “I have a heart for…” “I feel led to…” “I feel like God desires…” “My vision for…” “As Christians, I think we should…” “I have a lot of compassion for…” “What would Jesus do?” “I’ve prayed about it and…” “We should really seek God’s passion/vision for…”

In the examples above, the most common words used are passion, vision, desire, seek, feel, led, blessed, and heart. Rarely do those words occur in the English language in normal, every day life. In normal conversation, people who hear these words are not only forced to pause so that they can remember their meaning, but they also must understand the symbolism in context. For example, if I said “I have a heart for the poor,” native Christianese speakers would understand that I want to help the homeless. But our culture does not commonly use “have a heart” as a substitute for “want.” I understand that there is a deeper meaning in the term “have a heart,” but our common language is not without its deep meanings either. What if I said, “I have a heart for paying taxes,” “I have a heart to eat healthy,” or “I have a heart for not cussing?” Are these not still duties we can do as Christians? It would not only sound strange to say these things, but it would also put us at an unnecessary distance from our listeners.

This distance not only occurs between Christian and non, but also between Christians themselves. If you notice, the use of Christianese is considerably decreased between close friends and private conversations. It is possible that this is due to the dropping of social facades or fears, which might also be the reason Christianese is used in the first place. Honestly, I do not know. However, I can imagine myself speaking in vague, interpretive Christianese to get myself out of a conflict. “It’s not that I disagree with what you’re saying, it’s just that I feel like God desires me to have a passion for seeking his vision and purpose rather than doing what you say.” I know this works because I have used it many times before to avoid conflict.

An unintended, or sometimes intended, result of speaking Christianese is to avoid speaking frankly or honestly. It’s pretty lame, actually. If there were a Miss Christian America pageant, I could imagine the winner saying something like, “I have always desired to seek God’s face and pray for Him to change my heart so that I can be used to pursue His vision for the world.” In other words, “World peace.”

Anyway, I am trying to change my language such that every Christianese word that I use can be easily translated. I use the words “want,” “like,” “enjoy,” “love,” “hope,” and “happy” as much as possible now. To quote C.S. Lewis, “Nature never taught me that there exists a God of glory and of infinite majesty. I had to learn that in other ways. But nature gave the word glory a meaning for me. I still don't know where else I could have found one.” Perhaps we should not be inventing meanings for obscure words, but we should be using common, secular, and comprehensible language to describe our most intimate relationship. At the very least, I could start to understand my friends again, and they could begin to understand me. God knows I have a heart for it.