Silent and Listen

Image Credit: http://liftedonwater.blogspot.com/2009/02/be-silent-and-listen.html

I believe that silence and listening births wisdom.

Talk is easy, but it’s much harder to be silent and listen. We like to be distracted since we are scared of silence. We have our social media, music, phone, Tv etc distracting us all through because we are not sure what the silence might bring. We don’t want to hear our thoughts and question ourselves. We want to be busy.

Silence is golden, we are able to reflect and dig into the inner being to try to understand what is going on. When trying to walk with someone through an issue, it's important that we understand them before they understand us. This can only happen when we shut-up and listen. In the multitude of words, we may display stupidity, but when we listen, not under pressure to say anything, we gain a lot of wisdom through understanding.

To some, silence is easy while to others it’s a punishment when we think of it. To some it’s a preferred way of recharging while to others, it means there’s nothing else to do and so we prefer not to get to it. Whatever the case, we intentionally need it. More so if you are connecting with someone who needs you to be silent and listen to them. We all know that friend who never listens to us, they are quick to advise us, comment and push their ideas down our throat. They never take time to listen to what we are opening up to them about. For that reason, they don’t appear in your top list of people to talk to when you need someone to listen to you. On the other hand, we treasure that friend who listens to us. We yearn for that moment to feel cared and understood because someone took time to. Someone didn’t jump into advising us or fixing us before even listening to what we are going through. We are admonished to be quick to listen, slow to speak.

Image Credit: http://slideplayer.com/slide/8921454/

Listening is the hardest thing to do and so if you are working hard to listen to someone going on and on what's bothering them. We listen at different levels. Different schools of thoughts have explained our levels of listening differently. For this article, I'll attempt to share the one that really resonates with me thanks to Lifeforming Leadership Coaching http://lifeformingcoach.com/. There are three levels of listening, maybe four.

Level 1: Self-centered listening “What does this mean to me?” Attention is on myself, my own needs, and what this conversation can do for me. When someone shares about what they went through or are going through, am busy thinking what does it mean to me maybe because I experienced the same challenges. Or am busy comparing myself with the person sharing. Am thinking of how better or worse they are than me. How lucky or unfortunate I am to have not gone through a similar experience. This way I can’t be of help to whoever is speaking to me. I may end up just talking about myself when they finish and maybe that’s not what they are looking for. Worse still, I may cut them short before they finish so I can let them know they are not the only one in similar challenge, I have also been through it.

Level 2: Other-centered listening “What does this mean to this person?” Attention is on the other person, and what is being communicated. Now, this could be good, unfortunately, we are just gathering data as they come. It's true we are listening but we are more occupied with really what the person is going through at the moment. It's way better than level one. We hear what they are saying and sometimes are quick to interpret and assume a lot of things. We may end up offering unsolicited advice or give some cliché responses like, "it’s Ok, or I understand what you are going through etc”. These in most cases are not always the best responses to give to someone. It may feel like we care but really we may be doing more damage. Most people really don’t want to hear such responses when they are going through something that is worth sharing with you.

Level 3: Intuitive listening “What does this really mean?” Attention is on the other person and the underlying meanings and significance of what is happening. This is a high level of listening and most people never get to this level. Rarely do we experience someone who listens to us at this level. At this level, we are really not even sure what to advise and so the best we can do is to ask questions. Give the person an opportunity to dig deeper into their lives and tap into the resource God has put in them to find a solution to their own unique situation. It's a firm belief in the uniqueness of individuals. You have to stop yourself from labeling people to really operate at this level. Treat the person talking to you as a unique individual, specially designed by God and is experiencing something unique to them. Occasionally what you could do here is to help the person appreciate a different perspective so they can hopefully challenge the narrative they are telling themselves that makes them view their situation like that. You may need to help them evaluate their belief system. This needs you to really be silent, quiet your mind, listen and let God work through you. This leads to high level of wisdom. It’s a show of genuine love and concern to the person sharing.

Image Credit: http://bigcheesecoaching.com/2017/04/shhh-are-you-listening-really-listening/

Level 4: What is God saying about their future. This is the highest level and it's not common as a human to operate on it. I won't say much on this one.

If this resonates with you, seek to be silent and listen carefully. Look for a small community of friends who you can learn to do this together with… Being accountable to a few and practicing with a few. It’s about building a community of friends to share each other’s journey of listening to others.  You have to be deeply committed to each other and desire to see each other grow in this journey. You have to create a support, encouragement and accountability platform for each other. The community has to be a small as possible so that there is active engagement by all involved.

Find a community around you and see if these conversations make sense to you…

Image Credits: http://christchurchcockfosters.co.uk

By Gabriel Achayo.