Just Listen

A friend loves at all times, and a brother is born for adversity. (Proverbs 17:17 ESV).

I suspect that the most basic and powerful way to connect to another person is to listen. Just listen. Perhaps the most important thing we ever give each other is our attention. This is especially true if it's given from the heart. When people are talking, there's no need to do anything but receive them. Just take them in. Listen to what they're saying. Care about it. Most times caring about it is even more important than understanding it. Most of us don't value ourselves or our love enough to know this. It has taken me a long time to believe in the power of simple saying, "I'm so sorry," when someone is in pain.

I have often been told by clients I have counseled that when they tried to tell their story people often interrupted to tell them that they once had something just like that happen to them. Subtly their pain became a story about other’s pain. Eventually they stopped talking to most people. It was just too lonely. We connect through listening. When we interrupt what someone is saying to let them know that we understand, we move the focus of attention to ourselves. When we listen, they know we care.

I have even learned to respond to someone crying by just listening. In the old days I used to reach for the tissues, until I realized that passing a person a tissue may be just another way to shut them down, to take them out of their experience of sadness and grief. Now I just listen. When they have cried all they need to cry, they find me there with them.

This simple thing has not been that easy to learn. It certainly went against everything I had been taught since I was very young. I thought people listened only because they were too timid to speak or did not know the answer. A loving silence often has far more power to heal and to connect than the best intentioned of words.

There are those times when a response is called for, but not nearly as often as we think. This is especially true of men. We are by nature “fixers.” We tend to interrupt and immediately move toward a solution rather than simply listening. A real friend just listens… really listens. Who needs you to be their friend today? Determine to be a listener. The old adage that God gave us two ears and one mouth so that we could listen twice as much as we talk is very true. I love the poem I recently happened upon:

O, the comfort - the inexpressible comfort of feeling safe with a person,
Having neither to weigh thoughts,
Nor measure words - but pouring them right out - just as they are -
Chaff and grain together,
Certain that a faithful hand will take and sift them -
Keep what is worth keeping -
And with the breath of kindness blow the rest away.