Comment by kelseyfrog | Hacker News Reader

Comment by kelseyfrog | Hacker News Reader

As someone who went out of their way and studied being a good listener, none of these are wrong, but I don't see it as being the best way of learning how to be a good listener.

Reading about how to be a good listener can only get someone so far - watching someone demonstrate it and talking about it is the surest way to understand what it means.

Specifically, Reflective listening[1], Clean language[2], and the approach used by Eugene Gendlin[3], jump-started my own skill of practicing being a good listener. You may also hear the term "holding space" as a sort of umbrella term for this as well.

You would be amazing at how far these go toward creating a safe, non-judgemental, space for people. Simple, open-ended, genuine questions worded in their own language, has afforded me the opportunity to hear people open up from the very bottom of their souls. It's absolutely amazing that the simple act of listening can do that, but it does.

1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reflective_listening

2. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clean_language

3. Wiki reference, but best seen, of course, on Youtube https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eugene_Gendlin

On the flip side, if you are too good of a listener, people stop listening to you because they enjoy being listened to. You become the calm person that attracts all the anxious into their lives.

Sometimes, you have to stop holding space for others for them to finally understand that, no it's not ok what they are doing anymore. To help others listen to you, you realize you have to learn to scream, because as the author implies, the world is not good at listening.

"And then, wow, I met the rest of the world."

I got better at listening, and more curious in general. I've met a lot of strangers recently as I am travelling. I sometimes sit with people for hours, learn everything about their lives, and never get to say what I do for a living. Never a single "and you?"

I notice it happening at home too. Sometimes you'll talk with a friend for 30+ minutes, then think "I'm fine too, thanks for asking".

I was lucky to meet good listeners early on and learn from them. I wish more people's first partner told them "you should return the question sometimes".

I've been on several dates like this. The other person talks about themselves for 30 ~ 90 minutes, exclusively, depending on how charitable I'm feeling that day.

They don't ask me any questions about me at all. Like, not even one.

I ask myself if it's because they're like that on any date with any person, or because they realized at first sight they weren't interested in me, so it doesn't matter to them if they learn anything at all about me during the date, since they don't expect to see me again either way.

Sometimes I've tested this by doing a second date. They show up and talk about themselves non-stop.

But then I ask myself the same question as before.

Is it possible many otherwise neurotypical people can get into their 30s and 40s without ever having learned how to carry on a two-way conversation?

There is a friend in my life who I meet with regularly in a small group setting that falls into this category - never seeming to reciprocate.

When I imagine asking him, "What don't you ask questions about my life?" I assume I'd get a response something like, "You can tell me anything," or "I'm open to hearing what you want to talk about," or "You're free to talk about anything."

If I had to devise a quick mental model, it might seem like the difference between talking at someone vs talking with someone? I might have to think about that a bit more. Do you have any insight here?

> When I imagine asking him, "What don't you ask questions about my life?" I assume I'd get a response something like, "You can tell me anything," or "I'm open to hearing what you want to talk about," or "You're free to talk about anything."

I think this is the insight!

> If I had to devise a quick mental model, it might seem like the difference between talking at someone vs talking with someone?

(And I think this is semantics.)

Excuse me if I read that wrong, but I'd be curious why you think label "talking at" vs "talking with" is semantics.

I see a significant difference between the distribution of behaviors and utterances when I'm "talking at" vs "talking with". There's also a significant difference in response I seem to receive from people when I employ one distribution of behaviors vs the other. But, maybe you see it differently?

I agree. “Talking at” might as well involve a cardboard cutout of my face and a tape recorder that plays back “hmm” and “wow” utterances at random intervals.

My being there in person doesn’t materially affect what the other person experiences from me anyway.

I was trying to compliment you! When you talk about your friend, about what you might ask him, and what he might answer, I think you have insight there. I think that's valuable.

And I should have stopped there. But I went on to try to make a point about the quick mental model you proposed about "talking at" vs "talking with". Which I think leads to arguing about semantics (with others or yourself).

What you're saying about the difference between the distribution of behaviors and utterances sounds reasonable to me (if a bit abstract). I just think the specific insight into your friend's behavior is a lot more valuable.

D'oh! thank you. Leave it to the medium of text to throw a wrench into things!

Consider this:

What if your date finds you attractive already? Could be because of real or perceived popularity or high "status" in you? (I'm guessing you're a man?) And maybe you're ok handsome?

Then, what does it matter what you do during the days?

If you're high status enough already -- what do the reasons for that matter?

And so she'd rather talk about herself and her interests.

When you mentioned you tried a second date, I thought, I bet she'll show up.

(I suppose there are men who date cute women and they (the men) talk only about themselves and cars and soccer. What does it matter what she does during the days? When she's good looking already)

I kind of expect strangers to start talking about themselves if they are comfortable talking and not to talk when they dont feel like talking. I dont ask anything that can be considered private and let them pick what they want to talk about.

I feel like i've been in this space for a few years. I have some close friends, who I really like. But I realized that its almost all them opening themselves up to me. When I am struggling myself I find it really hard to open up and talk about what I want to talk about. I think some of it is something I can improve on myself though

This is also something I had to learn, not only to be a good listener, but also to be a good talker. It’s really hard to open up and talk easily about oneself.

This is about setting boundaries - being a good listener only when you are comfortable doing so.

Great point! I have a tendency toward co-dependency so understanding that being needed is different than internal validation is important. Being choosy about when and with whom one is listening is crucial. Burnout is real and always listening is a fast track to it. Anyone, including the listener, can tap the breaks and slow or stop things if they need to for any reason at all.

Wise words. In any kind of caring situation, the person giving care can most effectively do so when they themselves are in a good place, so it actually benefits everyone for you to leave some space for yourself.

I have also found that instead of screaming, staying silent is a very powerful technique. If someone is spewing nonsense or making personal attacks, I sometimes just "hm mm" to confirm I heard them, and then stay silent. Nine out of ten times they will backtrack immediately.

Indeed it's hard for someone to continue being unkind to someone else who is being friendly or at least polite back to them!

> watching someone demonstrate it and talking about it is the surest way to understand what it means

Do you happen to have links to any example videos demonstrating this or are you referring to in person examples

Sorry, but the nature of the material and the HN audience at large is leading me to hesitate. I'd be happy to share privately, the material that spoke to me. Contact info in bio.

Dr Burns' Feeling Good Podcast has examples of listening to people, possibly not the same exact thing the parent comment means, but his T.E.A.M.S CBT therapy stands for "Testing, Empathy, ..." and Empathy is where the patient tells their problem, and the therapist has to communicate that they heard it and empathise with it. Otherwise if the therapist does a "yeah ok got that, let's move on" the patient will get stuck not wanting to move on and keep going back over what's wrong, thinking the therapist isn't properly understanding why they are there. [Happens in life elsewhere, e.g. if you complain to a company and get a generic 'sorry' and you feel like you haven't been heard and try complaining again. Whereas if you feel heard and understood, you don't need to try complaining again]. There's a ton of his podcasts and this comes up in many of them; some talking about it:

    003 on E=Empathy
    014 on The Five Secrets of Effective Communication
    066 on The Five Secrets part 2 - Disarming people (by showing that you hear them)

Some demonstrating / using / modelling it:

    029 and 030 a recording of a therapy session with Mark
    049 recording of a therapy session with Marilyn
    other 'live sessions'

Detailed Database of podcasts: https://feelinggood.com/podcast-database/

>worded in their own language

Would you (or someone else that's knowledgable) be so kind to share your approach to doing this?

I find this to be hardest thing to do in the moment without feeling like a manipulative sociopath.

Well, yeah. It is manipulation. It's at best benevolent manipulation but that's what it is. That's what most human interaction is, though.

Caring enough to listen, then communicating that you actually did listen by repeating some of the words they said back to them. How is that manipulation?

In this context, wouldn't manipulation be where you don't listen then say some words which try to (falsely) communicate that you did listen?

(Contrast: not listening, and showing that with "I ain't reading all that. I'm happy for u tho. Or sorry that happened". Contrast: actually did listen but they think you didn't, leading to "I'm so angry about X!" / "How come X is bothering you?" / "I am not bothered by it, I am angry about it!, weren't you listening?!" poor communication. Where "what about X is making you angry?" instead reflects the feelings they said, showing you heard what they said, but does not seem manipulative).

There is a nuanced, but important point to make here regarding responsibility.

One of resources I watched (a therapist) described therapy as 90% active listening. It's important to be aware of that proportion and the tendency of people to really open up when someone is truly listening.

For example, I was at a bar talking to a stranger when they had to take a break. They were on the brink of tears because they were talking about something that was so deeply meaningful to them[1]. I missed the flag and will always think back to my responsibility - just to pick up on those signs and ask the person if they're doing ok. There's a vulnerability index which I like to reference that conceptualizes some of this.

The difference between open inquiry and probing/drilling is an important distinction to keep in mind when listening too. Laying some of these skills on too thickly can come across as more of an interview than a conversation.

1. Palestine

That's going to fall under clean language. There are some written examples on the aforementioned Clean Language wikipedia article[1] under the examples section.

The point I take away from it is the following question, "Who's doing the framing here?" If you're supporting the other person in framing things themselves, then it leans toward clean language. If you're interjecting your own framing, then it leans away from clean language. Personally, I struggle the most with trying to avoid labeling something as "good" or "bad" for the other person. They're full human beings with their own ability to decide how they feel about something and the best way, in my experience, to decide how you feel about something is to put it into words and notice the feelings that come up as the words are said.

If someone is interjecting their own takes, it gets in the way of that noticing.

I'm really curious what you think about manipulation when you envision yourself listening this way.

1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clean_language#Example

A lot of times I use what I think you term as unclean language to inject some energy into the conversation. Without it I feel like the conversation dies, so I relate with my own story, or pass a half-judgement, do something to fire them up. I don't know, it doesn't feel like the best solution, but it's the one I use, any thoughts?

Like many skills, learning to be aware is 80% of the work, 10% is the actual skill, and the remaining 10% is knowing when it's appropriate.

That's what works for me too. My experience tells me that just being aware of how much clean language I'm using and when I should and shouldn't be using it gets me to where I want to be. Being unaware, or trying to use as much as possible are, for reasons you mentioned, not the best approach.

Maybe the most interesting things about clean language is how little of it you actually need for it to be wildly effective. Applying just a bit when you sense someone opening up or being vulnerable is, in my experience, a loving way to receive that message gracefully.

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