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Listen to Understand

talk.bradwoods.io

127 pointsbradwoodsio31 comments

Great article with lots of practical ways to implement it. In my view this is a superpower and I find I can usually do it if I'm not stressed or tired.

As follow-up thoughts:

- It's important whom you listen to. Consider it a gift you're giving and give it only to those who you think deserve and not abuse it or make you consistently feel bad about something.

- Those listeners are also very healthy in/for a group,e.g., at work.

- Listening is a big part of managing a team. People's thoughts are often all over the place and it's your job (partly) to structure these, within a person and a across a team. People that feel heard are much more inclined to listen.

- For starters: Just make an effort to ask five open-ended questions in every conversation you have. You will see how people open up after some time. This also works for family, dates, colleagues, ...

It takes energy, attention, and emotional bandwidth, so it's reasonable (and healthy) to be selective about where you spend it. Otherwise you end up being an unpaid therapist for people who never reciprocate.

Yep glorified emotional tampon.

It’s great advice.

If you can be intentional going in to a conversation then I think the chances to serving the other person through listening becomes much higher.

It’s truly a gift…offering someone your time and attention. Possibly the most valuable gift you can give - I don’t mean that facetiously.

The Gottmans talk about bids for attention. It’s random comments inviting the other person to engage.

This sounds really similar.

Yet it's simple, but not easy, which is usually a sign it's pointing at something real

The author is describing active listening. You don't have to come off like a bot when reflecting either, "man that sucks" and just leaving space for the other person to keep talking goes a long way.

Anyone here that feels they could do better on this would benefit from a few sessions with a decent therapist.

Curious, on the word usage.

In section 2, you wrote,

“Have you tried asking the <lecturer> if you can get <marked> just for your section? Or if that person can be removed from the group?”

In my mind, I swapped those 2 words- Lecturer and Marked with Professor and Graded

Author is probably Australian, I would use the same words.

Just checked linkedIn, yep they are from NSW.

My hunch on the author not from the west checks out.

Academic titles and usage obviously differ between countries. The lax usage of "professor" is pretty unique to the US, so I don't understand why you would presume that.

> Humans are wired to be egocentric. When we hear something related to a past experience, it triggers memories and associations — which we then want to talk about. Shifting the attention from her to me. This is my default state when I'm not focused. I'm not really listening. I'm just waiting for my turn to speak.

On a completely unrelated note, many autistic people express compassion by sharing similar experiences to communicate "I understand how you feel because I can relate to your experience".

I guess the author is a good example for why this tends to upset people (and especially allistic/non-autistic people).

On an also completely unrelated note, the example phrases/questions the author gives at the end read like having a conversation with ELIZA.

Being told to "listen" by someone who's submitted 57 links to his own site and zero from any other sources, and who also doesn't comment on submissions other than his own.

> doesn't comment

they're listening

Earlier on HN, much more detailed: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45719829

Good article, this is something I struggle with and am trying to ve better at. I wish there were similarly concise and technical explanations of other social skills

That is so useful. Thank you for sharing your advice.

Sometimes listening is hard bc you don't really care or the speaker's way of relaying content and presentation is very boring.

I think there’s often a gender difference here, picture the (very) stereo-typical “blabbering wife” scene.

When we’re driving, my girlfriend will often talk about her day, walking me through her thoughts and feelings, while I just want to zone out after work. We used to get annoyed at each other when I didn’t want to listen.

Eventually, we talked about it and realized what was going on. She needs to process her day out loud, and I need silence to decompress. So now I’ll just tell her, “I’m not really going to be listening fully right now,” and she’ll talk anyway. It’s become a routine, one I actually enjoy now, because there’s no pressure to keep up or respond perfectly.

Would it be better for her if I used this technique of active listening constantly? Sure. But it'd take a lot of effort from me that I just simply dont have driving home from work.

"Being interesting" is often just "being present"

My brain after reading the advice section is like.

“Oh so pretended to be ELIZA”

Not sure how far off it is.

I think the distinction is that ELIZA doesn't care about your feelings but (hopefully) your partner does. So the fact that someone is willing to spend their time listening to you feels nice.

ELIZA is kinda modelled off a stereotype of things that somebody who is so good at this they get paid to do it say, so... thats not that bad advice.

This article is not terrible, but it is yet another article about listening that treats it as the direct exchange of information rather than as one dynamic in the embodiment of a relationship.

If you “talk about yourself” by sharing a similar problem, that is called commiseration. This can be a comforting move because it doesn’t put pressure on the other person to respond, yet implicitly expresses that you understand the feeling (assuming you are choosing a good example from your own life to share).

The particular technique of responding doesn’t matter as much as establishing the kind of relationship where either side can assert themselves as needed, and feels that the other side will let them. That way, the person who feels more need gets what they need.

My wife and I are coming up on our 35th anniversary. She’s very quiet and I am loud, so I have to force myself to leave a lot of space for her to assert herself (this has become easier over time, partly because I know that she will always give me what I need in the end, so suppressing myself never feels like a penalty).

I like the technique suggested in this post (draw her out by asking inviting questions about her situation). I only object to labeling the sharing of oneself as “egocentric.” In a loving relationship, your ego automatically serves your love-sworn. Offering of yourself can be exactly what she wants.

I am a listening trainer, and have taken over 1,500 people through a basic session in active listening. But that said, I agree with you that what matters is having a good relationship, and that involves using different communication skills at different times.

I listen as part of my life and work, too. I've been training people since 1995. I am also a psychology and social science enthusiast.

The listening class I took in 1988 was one of the most helpful classes I have ever taken. I appreciate and use active listening. But listening is a complex process that goes far beyond mere absorption of information.

Instead of demonizing the ego, which is a tired and reductionist trope, let's appreciate the roles that self-image, self-care, and self-sharing play in that process.

"How did that make you feel"

It made me feel like I'm talking with someone role-playing a therapist; it's just my worldview but if I want to talk about how something made feel I will talk about it but dislike to be directly inquired, is evident that this is way of thinking is more common in men than women of course.

It definitely depends on rapport and how authentic someone is being. If someone asks me this and I know they genuinely care about me, I'd be happy to share. If there's less rapport, it will definitely feel like a person who can't read the room is trying some sort of social mind trick.

There are a lot of ways to inflect this question. To ask it bare is usually not the best.

Note in the authors third approach they first validate the feelings and then ask for more details. That is a really great move. Tailoring that to the vibe of the situation is where it’s at. It really does work like a charm.

Solid advice for as long as one can stand only listening. My experience is as mentioned in the post, people are egocentric and don't bother listening. That's why I stopped telling others how I feel or how things are after a while, and only superficially pay attention to them. Saves me some energy as well.

Careful, this is the setup for many a man's lonely later life.

I am alone, not lonely. And enjoy it well enough.

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