A MAGIC WAND OF LISTENING.

If you take a moment and bring up in your mind a truly meaningful friendship, what do you notice is the most important quality of interacting with that individual? What do you value in that relationship? What makes it to continue to be enjoyable through the years.

I’ve asked this question often whenever I talk about what makes any relationship meaningful and lasting. Among the answers I hear that in true friendship there’s a chance to confide, there’s a space to be yourself, however you are – you are accepted. In friendship there’s an expectation to be heard, and that is what we ultimately longing to receive from other people, to invest our limited time in interactions with those who have developed the ability to listen.

We All Crave This.

When we are truly listened to, we instantly feel received, we sense that we belong and that gives us confidence to work with our experience as a process in a long sequence of moments that inform our life. We grow.

Have you noticed when we really don’t like someone or disrespect what is being said, we just tune that person out, or distract ourselves with anything to keep our attention away.

Very often when in a conversation, especially when upset, we don’t bother to listen to what is being spoken to us and instead we are waiting for our turn to speak, foolishly hoping that another person will listen.

Most people in dissipating relationships point out to the No 1 cause of a breakdown which is “communication problem”. And it is none other than inability to listen to what is actually being communicated.

How To Shrink A Relationship.

It felt very immediate and fresh, a sense of being completely severed from my relationship partner when I was confessing to her the assumption I made to act upon. It felt as if I was revealing the secret mechanics of my thinking without an agenda to find an excuse or justify a filament of validity of it. I opened myself bare gambling my imperfection for reciprocity in the other — a compassionate acknowledgment for bravery to step from behind bars of self-defense.

I gambled for a deeper connection. I played a cherished treasure of a nearly-always-right self-image for a safe passage to authentic place. I lost. The passage wasn’t safe, but it had brought me revelational perspective on hidden factor that slowly kills all kinds of relationships.

I wasn’t heard. Instead my partner interrupted me to reiterate to me how wrong and off the mark I was in my myopic view of a situation, how invalid my assessment was and I should have known much better. My self-disclosure was used to clobber me on the spot and naturally I felt stupid for attempting. My inspiration to be free from psychological armor, was faced with an armed attack. Of coarse it is an analogy, though it lured me into contemplative opportunity to see the modus operandi of “communication problem” that is the core culprit of all fallen relationships. Not being heard.

What We Want From The Other Is Not To Do Much.

Overtime we define for ourselves that what we want the most out of relationships is good communication. And when we look at what it is with more precision, we find out that is simply to be listened to. And that is not a lot to do. It is quite the opposite – not to do much.

We Are All Alone Unless Someone Is Listening To Us.

When we are in communication, we are not expected to fix anything in what being spoken to us. All what’s needed is our compassionate presence, an unconditional regard for what communication partner is saying. And that is an unspoken acknowledgment that what they are saying has importance.

Intuitively we all know what we need to do next or how make things right in our life situations. Saying them out loud to our partner or friend sometimes all is needed for us to generate internal movement towards action. Therefore more often than not simply to be a witness, being present to someone else’s experience all is required from us listening, to become a catalyst for positive resolution.

Because when we are present without imposing our interpretation, an agenda or a self-repressive pattern projected as an impulse to fix someone, we actually provide an environment of acceptance for whatever the experience is for our partner and it removes inner resistance that keeps the whole structure operational. Healing becomes available naturally by simply listening.

Genuine listening is required if we are intend on knowing the other person more deeply. When we share an important inner experience with the other, it is critical that the other party is listening intently.

Because what we are attempting to convey is already twice removed from the experience itself, which for that reason will always remain an uncommunicable secret.
Why is that? When we look at it, we are aware that there is an experience that arouses in our consciousness. We attempt to give it a meaning first. After that we do our best to find words that would be closest to conveying the meaning of experience. But those are only scantily attempts for the substitute of the experience itself.

When after so much inner effort to approximate the inner situation with words, we share it with someone we feel bond of trust, and when it is not reciprocated with empathy to give it validity, we feel utter neglect, rejection and disappointment.

Heart-Centered Listening Requires No Fixing.

Now it is clear to see from this point of view what happens if instead of a sympathetic listening, our partner jumps into fixing our thinking mode, thus effectively undermining our courage to share, and destroying all efforts we’ve mustered to convey that which was valuable to us. The bond breaks.

Sometimes we do jump into fixing mode prompted by good intention. We just can’t tolerate seeing the other in pain. Perhaps when listening to something that represents a lot of suffering and emotional discomfort, it could be very painful for us and we are prompted to jump in with advise to rescue the other person from being in a state like that. We need to hold our urge and let the other person find completion and a relief naturally through the confession they attempt to confide in us.

There’s one more challenging scenario where listening skill is of very high value. It is when someone trying to communicate to us what they did wrong, or something they are remorseful about. Very often there’s a tendency to take advantage of the open door of self-disclosure. We prompted to walk in triumphantly driven by a conquest of rightness and start pointing out to their responsibility, to where they were wrong and should do better.
Well, if we do that we need not expect to find this person to confide in us again — the confidence is broken.

Listening With The Heart.

• When in communication, remember that this as a precious opportunity to build relationship with the other.

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• Recognize that the other person’s experience is important for them and they doing their best to convey it.

• Be mindful of the impulse to go into fixing the problem for another person, knowing that they have all the resources to deal with it.
• Acknowledge them for the courage to share. Let them feel love and acceptance from you.

• Ask them to clarify anything that brings more awareness to what they wanted to share.

• If you have something to say, ask if they would be interested in hearing your suggestions or feedback. And if they are (when you take this approach, they mostly are), provide them with sincere feedback.

• And if someone confides to you about what they have done wrong or unskillful, correct them with compassion, not with anger.

Intimacy Through Listening.

And if a relationship on a brink of demise, using these techniques combined with sincere intentions, can bring it back from the dead to flourishing. After all intimacy is a byproduct of the honest self-expression. If there’s a space for it yo can imagine what can happen. You can take it from here.