Listening to Others
4.8 Questions for Reflection and Listening Practices to Consider
I provide several “best practices” in listening in the following section based on classic and contemporary research, and on TED talks. Which practices seem worthy of testing in your everyday life? Identify one practice that appeals to you. In your imagination see yourself performing the activity sometime in the next twenty-four hours or next week. Then, when the opportunity arises, perform the practice and assess how it serves you.
Good listener and Radical Deep listener
When reflecting on your habitual patterns of listening to those in your close personal relationships, would you say your behavior aligns more often with the “good listener” or with the “radical deep listener”?
When you reflect further, what aspects of the good or radical deep listener might you begin to “play with”?
Biological Cascade and Choice in Listening to Others
When you experience being negatively activated in a conversation (stressed out), can you recognize the biological cascade of events flowing through the body and then choose to respond with empathy? If this is very difficult, consider adopting a mindfulness meditation practice to assist in coping with the biological stress response and/or employing Truitt’s neuroscience-based practices combined with self-havening. These practices may develop more freedom to purposefully choose a more compassionate response when you feel negatively activated in a conversation.
If you are willing to engage in a mindfulness practice to cope with stress, what kind of meditation might you enjoy? Where would you practice? When? For how long? See suggestions in the previous section on meditation to get started or to deepen if you already have a regular meditation practice.
Empathic Listening to Others
Are you more of a cognitive empathizer (identifying with the other person’s content) or an affective empathizer (identifying with the other person’s feelings) or perhaps you empathize with both?
Can you identify any practices in this section that you want to grow in? Which ones?
What small practice might you try to nudge you into becoming a more empathic listener?
Consider the nonviolent communication empathic practice of guessing your communication partner’s feelings and needs. What low-stakes situation might you explore to practice guessing the feelings and needs of your communication partner in the next twenty-four hours? After practicing, discuss your empathic attempt with your communication partner. What went well? What could be modified for next time?
How well developed are your feelings and needs vocabularies? Unless educated in these areas, most individuals could develop a more diverse and richer feelings and needs vocabulary.
To begin increasing your emotional vocabulary, take a five-minute tour of the Atlas of Emotions to discover the nuances of your emotions.
To develop a needs vocabulary, visit Neef’s free online book, the Human Needs Matrix, and m