Active Listening

‘Are you listening?’
‘Of course, I am.’
No, actually, we are not.

Listening is assumed to be easy but it is definitely not. When we listen, we mostly listen to our own selves. The words said by the other person, their gestures, their tone of voice, everything we experience in a conversation, remind us of ourselves. Whatever we hear or see, we compare, contrast, and refer to our own lives. We cannot easily listen properly to the other person – that is something that needs to be learned and practised.

We are human, so we are imprisoned in our own selves. We cannot get rid of our ‘glasses’; our predispositions, prejudices, judgements, previous experiences, opinions, thought cycles through which we see the world – through which we ‘listen’ to other people. Active listening is something that we have to learn and practise endlessly because it goes against the very nature of our humanity.

Active listening is when we manage to switch ourselves off, and properly listen to the other person. When we stop judging, comparing, thinking about ourselves. When we actually hear and try to understand what the other person is saying, and when we listen equally well to all that is not being said. When we try to see the world from the other person’s perspective, momentarily forgetting our own.

There are innumerable barriers to active listening. Some are really harsh, like prejudices; others actually seem helpful on the surface but they are just as harmful, like constructing and rehearsing our own answer in our heads while the other person is still talking. We have to completely switch off, and focus only on the speaker. Not only on their words, but also on their body language and non-verbal clues that are often much more telling than their actual words.

Don’t be afraid of silence. Silences are just as important as the verbal and non-verbal conversation combined. Silences give space for the speaker to gather and organise their thoughts, to re-think and reflect on what they’ve just said, to formulate and rehearse their next sentences, to get in touch with their feelings and emotions, to make a decision, etc. Silence gives space for you, the listener, to process what you’ve just heard, to let it sink. Silences can challenge the speaker to move their topic forward. Shared silences can be intimate experiences. The timing of silences is crucial though. Untimely silences can be unproductive, unhelpful, anxiety-provoking or downright frightening. Silences shouldn’t be too long.

Questions are double edged swords. They might seem helpful, but quite often they are really not. Trust the speaker. Trust them to be able to continue their speech, to clarify what they themselves feel needs clarification, to ask the questions from themselves. Most of the time you just need to be silent and wait. And that is definitely not an easy task to do. You might feel helpless staying silent; you might want to act by asking questions, giving advice, telling about your own experiences, etc. Don’t. Just stay silent, wait and listen. Don’t make the speaker lose their train of thought, don’t stir the topic of the conversation, don’t direct the speaker’s thoughts. Just listen.

We need to be aware of the barriers of listening inside and outside ourselves. It is probably the hardest to be constantly aware of how our own thoughts and feelings get in the way of our listening to others. We might dislike or judge the speaker; we might compare ourselves to them, or even identify with them. We might get triggered, we might derail, thinking about our own personal situations. We might get bored and start daydreaming while the other person is talking to us. We might try to read their minds, to placate, to rescue them, to ask unnecessary questions, to give them advice, feeling right. We might feel inadequate ourselves, we might be rehearsing what we are going to say next. We might minimise what we hear, we might start making promises. We might self-disclose when it is inappropriate. We shouldn’t do any of these. We should switch off our own thoughts and feelings completely, or rather put them aside while being aware that they are all barriers to active listening.

We should take care that the environment is adequate for facilitating active listening. It should be a safe and private space with no distractions, no interruptions, e.g. mobile phones and computers have to be switched off. We should sit at a slight angle to each other, making eye contact possible but not necessary. We should have an appropriate space between us, keeping in mind cultural differences if applicable. We should be absolutely clear about personal and professional boundaries, and communicate those with the other person clearly.

It is hard to actively listen to another person, but it is equally hard to listen to our own thoughts and feelings. Look around when you are travelling on a bus, or waiting in a waiting room. How many people are busy tapping their phones, bombarding their minds with different visual and acoustic information each second? That is much easier than looking into themselves, immersing themselves in their own thoughts and feelings.

Try it for a moment. Just listen to your inner self actively.