Listening is a state of seeking to be changed by the other person.
Listening is less about the ears, than about a state of openness to change.
Hearing is different from all other senses in that it has a buffer, a short term memory of the last 8 seconds that we have heard. This allows us to pay little attention until we hear a word, our name or a silence and this triggers us to scan the last few seconds of audio intently. Most of the time we learn to listen with little attention.
This is a dangerous mode of listening to those whose relationships are important to us. We must learn another way of listening to people who we value and are important to us. We must “listen with our eyes”.
When someone approaches me with the challenge: “I have a really difficult time communicating with my second son”. My question: “how have you let him change you?” This is what makes a relationship – a sense that both have the capacity to affect change in the other. Where I don’t let you affect my views, you will not let me affect your views. This does not mean that we let go of rationality. This means we are open to the different priorities that another person uses to view the world.
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