Psychology The Role of Listener Assignment

Chapter 2 Listen Attentively

Schultze, Q. J., & Badzinski, D. M. (2015). An Essential Guide to Interpersonal Communication. Baker Publishing Group. https://mbsdirect.vitalsource.com/books/

Imagine you are young, single, and available. What would you do if you were attracted to someone? How would you approach that person? Would you schedule a date? If so, where would you go? Why?

Brother Mark Brown, who lives in a monastery near Boston, says that the best relationships are intentional. That’s why he spends an hour daily in personal prayer with God. It’s also why he uses a dating analogy when he leads church retreats on developing an intimate prayer life. He aims to get participants thinking about forming close relationships. “If you wanted to get to know someone better,” he suggests, “you would probably be very intentional. You might even develop some strategies.”1

The best interpersonal relationships are largely intentional. They grow out of right desire, ample time, and freedom from distractions—especially the “traffic” of everyday life. Above all, they are based on listening, which is the way of focusing on what’s important regardless of all the distractions. If we don’t listen well to others we’ll be lonely, no matter how many connections we have in person or on social media. By listening we get to know others’ hopes, joys, and emotional, physical, and spiritual needs. And we can begin to truly appreciate, serve, and even love them.

As we explain in this chapter, listening isn’t just hearing—it’s not even just about sound. First, we explore listening as a necessary but challenging way of attending to reality (to the way things really are) that will challenge many of our assumptions about God, other people, and ourselves. Next, we suggest that listening is essential for choosing relational life rather than relational death. Third, by listening “up” to God and then “out” to others, we can get to know them well enough to have mutually good and deep relationships with them. Fourth, the biblical model for such life-giving relationships is friendships that mirror Jesus Christ’s own friendship with us. Finally, the chapter shows that by God’s grace we can relate to others with empathy and sympathy.

Challenging Ourselves

Listening isn’t easy. Listening is messy. Complicated. Counterintuitive. We can’t become good listeners unless we first acknowledge how difficult it is for each of us personally. Novelist Ernest Hemingway puts it squarely: “Most people never listen.”2

Listening is not just hearing. It’s not even just about sound. Listening is attending to reality—to the way things really are with God, others, and us. It’s how we pay attention to what is outside of us rather than merely our own internal feelings, desires, and opinions.

Who in your life are truly skilled listeners? How would you know? Here’s how: In some ways they probably know you almost as well as you know yourself. They thoughtfully attend and respond to what they perceive as your underlying feelings, not just what you say or text to them. They can tell what you’re feeling partly by your nonverbal posturing, especially your facial expressions. They create within you what communication scholar John Shotter calls “a distinct and recognizable feeling of being heard.”3 That’s exactly what Brother Mark Brown aims to achieve for people in his workshops on prayer—a real knowledge that God knows, listens, and loves those who turn to him in prayer.

That’s not all. These true listeners sympathize and empathize with you. They hold your hand through tough times. They rarely criticize you as a person even when they admonish you for specific misdeeds. They know what hurts and helps you—and aim to aid you. They’re not your friends just because it makes them feel good. They’re your friends because they accept you for the way you are and yet desire the best for you.

Such soul-listening friends are emotionally and spiritually present in your life, possessing an uncanny ability to know what’s on your mind and in your heart.4 One of the first signs of friendship is realizing that you and your friend are opening up to each other’s real feelings and not being distracted by all kinds of other issues and messages. That sense of being personally, honestly accepted by another person is emotionally powerful. It echoes Jesus’s acceptance of us.

Sometimes couples who have lived together for a lifetime seem to be able to read each other’s minds. Their initial dating led them to a rich partnership. Often just how they look at one another is sufficient; they can read the nonverbal nuances—like subtle gestures or eye movements—that tell them what the other person is feeling or thinking. They’ve reaped the benefits of a lifetime of paying attention to each other.

Real listening is difficult partly because we want reality to conform to our wishes. We’re less interested in humbly grasping reality than in avoiding any communication that challenges our assumptions. We even deceive ourselves about ourselves. Just ask a recovering alcoholic, someone hooked on internet pornography, or a compulsive video game player. They try not to listen to themselves because it’s too painful. Meanwhile, they are busy selfishly trafficking in messages that make it hard to hear their own hearts.

One of the main tasks of a counselor is to get the counselee to open up. Then the counselor can actively listen to what is really going on in the troubled person’s life. Millions of people spend thousands of dollars annually to ensure that they will be listened to confidentially, without fear of being denigrated or rejected.

Many 12-step recovery programs like Alcoholics Anonymous provide a safe place for people to speak and listen to each other talk about their addictions. One way they protect confidentiality is to use only each other’s first names. By listening to each other’s stories of addiction and recovery, participants in these programs receive encouragement, hope, and practical advice. They avoid some of the shame that would accompany telling other people about their personal struggles.

FIVE WAYS TO AVOID WORKING FOR A HELLISH BOSS

Good listening often involves discovering information about people even before we meet them. Yet much of life is a series of “blind dates” with people we know nothing about. This can be extremely important in work contexts. Once we accept a new position, it’s too late to decide that we don’t want to “date” the boss.

Jessica Dean was very excited to get hired by a hot start-up company developing a new cell phone app—until she found out what her new boss, the owner, was really like: unprofessional, overdemanding, and untrusting. What could she have done to avoid working for “the boss from hell”? She could have listened to the right people to discover reality:

Google the boss’s name and company to find out more about him.

Use LinkedIn to find past employees and interview them about the boss.

Ask in the interview how long the job has been open—and why.

Ask questions about workplace culture and management style.

Observe how the boss seems to interact with others before, during, and immediately after the interview.

Adapted from Dennis Nishi, “How to Spot the Boss from Hell: There Are Ways to Size Up Your Job Interviewer,” Wall Street Journal, February 8, 2014, http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB10001424052702303942404579360784194736714.

Perhaps texting and social media provide means for beginning relationships in a relaxed way. “Casual, easy, and non-threatening—the simple beauty of text messaging is upending American dating culture,” according to USA Today. As one thirty-year-old man puts it, “Most of the girls I’ve hung out with lately prefer a group activity rather than one-on-one.” To get positive responses he texts invitations like, “I’m here with a group of people. Show up if you want to.” About one-third of males and females say it’s less intimidating to ask for a date via text than phone. Does texting make the invitation less personal? One woman says, “Guys are using text messages to send the same message to multiple women. . . . They’re kind of fishing for a response.”5

Texting can help people initially connect, but it can’t nurture a deep relationship because it doesn’t allow enough opportunity for listening. Couples need to build adequate mutual trust by listening on the phone or by video, and especially in person. Along the way, they need to listen to God, coming to grips personally with God’s likely view of their relationship.

Unfortunately, listening to God and to those with whom we’re in relationship can be accompanied by a fear of rejection. This fear is partly why so many people pretend that even a miserable relationship will somehow magically improve. It’s also why many Christians don’t really listen to God. What if we hear something we don’t want to face? What if we can’t accept ourselves in the light of God’s intimate knowledge of everything we think and do? Listening and being listened to can be very sobering. British Chancellor Winston Churchill, who led his nation during World War II, said, “Courage is what it takes to stand up and speak; courage is also what it takes to sit down and listen.”6

Many people lack the courage to listen to others without scrutinizing them. They’re quick to judge and slow to understand. As a result, their friends and family members don’t share their real struggles. They all live on the outside of each other, without acknowledging their own, interior persons. They talk. They respond. They live in a high-traffic message environment. But they don’t truly listen. Stephen Covey, author of The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People, says, “Most people do not listen with the intent to understand; they listen with the intent to reply.”7

If you’d like to test your listening skills, try talking with several friends about a sermon that you all just heard. Compare first what you think the pastor said. Then compare what the sermon meant to each of you personally—and why. How much of what you heard was what the sermon said, and how much of it was what you wanted to hear?

Listening to good listeners share their stories about listening is critically important for becoming a great listener. Who are the listening saints in your life? You might identify one person who knows you well. List three listening-rich ways that person uses to get to know you—perhaps hanging out, eating or exercising together, asking open-ended questions, or connecting privately with you through social media. Then identify someone you would like to get to know better and use the most appropriate of the three ways to communicate with them. As Brother Mark Brown suggests, relationships require intentionality.

Busyness gets in the way of listening too. If we’re hurried and frazzled—and thereby physically, spiritually, or emotionally spent—we can’t listen well. Listening requires mental preparedness. As one scholar of listening, Lisbeth Lipari, puts it, real listening takes time, energy, and courage to engage “with what is unfamiliar, strange, and not already understood.”8 Otherwise we live in a series of blind dates, never getting to know others well and never ourselves being known by others. Because we live with so much noise, we have to learn to be intentional about listening. What we need is not more messaging but the kind of solitude that prepares us to be fully present with and perceptively aware of others.9

Listening is a critical communication skill for fostering good relationships. There’s no shortcut. We can talk incessantly, text up a storm, and post like crazy online. But if there’s no mutual, heartfelt listening, we’ll feel lonely, neglected, and unsatisfied with life. Online dating sites and other digital ways of connecting are merely tools. They can’t guarantee relationships. They can only lead us to people with whom we can begin mutually listening for the sake of a deeper relationship.

We have to choose to become good listeners—and then follow through, step-by-step, day-by-day. In a sense, we’re all recovering nonlisteners who need to learn afresh daily what it means to listen. We need a Listeners Anonymous for addicted talkers.

SEVEN SIGNS OF POOR LISTENING

Judging others too quickly and harshly

Jumping to premature conclusions

Responding thoughtlessly

Basing opinions of others on first impressions

Failing to set aside one’s biases and prejudices

Seeing reality solely from one’s own, limited perspective

Focusing on self-centered agendas

Listening for Relational Life over Death

Listening is attending to reality rather than getting caught up in our own narrow, often self-serving view of things. It requires what scholar Ronald C. Arnett and his colleagues call “attentiveness to that which is set before us, rather than that which we might prefer.”10

When we truly listen to God—often through Christian community—we begin choosing life (healthy relationships) over death (destructive relationships). Relational death is separation and despair. When we are committed to listening, there is hope for our relationships. When we stop listening—when we cease paying attention to both God and neighbor—our relationships wither and die.

God says to the Israelites after they had wandered from the Lord, “Now what I am commanding you today is not too difficult for you or beyond your reach.” He adds that “the word is very near you; it is in your mouth and in your heart so you may obey it.” God concludes with the alternatives: “This day I call the heavens and the earth as witnesses against you that I have set before you life and death, blessings and curses. Now choose life, so that you and your children may live and that you may love the LORD your God, listen to his voice, and hold fast to him. For the LORD is your life, and he will give you many years in the land he swore to give to your fathers, Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.”11

Just like the Israelites, we first have to listen to God to get an accurate picture of reality. Jesus repeatedly calls on those “who have ears” to listen.12

God wants us to listen so that we may delight in him, in one another, and in ourselves. Without God, says theologian Ellen T. Charry, we are more likely to “float aimlessly at the mercy of volatile emotions and hormones or be seduced by less worthy companions than the maker of heaven and earth.”13 We can experience soul-satisfying relationships only if we are empowered by the Holy Spirit, drawing upon the same Sprit that enabled Jesus to connect with others.14 In other words, the quality of our relationships with others depends on the quality of our relationship with God.

When we “listen up” to God before we “listen out” to others, our relationships become richer, deeper, and more satisfying. Life for us becomes a rich life, not just physical existence or temporary happiness. Having attended to God’s love for us, we are more willing and able to love others. We’ve faced God humbly, and we’re better equipped to face one another with what the founder of Peacemaker Ministries Ken Sande calls “relational wisdom.”

SIX SKILLS OF “RELATIONAL WISDOM”

God-awareness—viewing all of life in light of God’s truths

God-engagement—acting in a way that pleases and honors God

Self-awareness—assessing honestly one’s emotions, desires, strengths, and weaknesses

Self-engagement—mastering one’s thoughts and actions to further God’s purposes

Other-awareness—understanding and empathizing with the experiences of others

Other-engagement—working with others in a way that truly benefits them

Adapted from Ken Sande, “Biblical Foundation for Relational Wisdom,” Relational Wisdom 360, http://www.rw360.org/biblical-foundation-for-rw/.

We flourish when, experiencing God’s love for us as broken and fearful persons, we rise faithfully to life’s challenges, creatively pursue our best passions, and look beyond ourselves so that others too can find lasting meaning and soul-satisfying relationships.15 Each time we choose relational life over death we step out of our loneliness and into community with God and neighbor. It’s scary. But by first opening up to Jesus, who accepts us unconditionally, we are far more likely to have the courage to open up to others and to listen to others without first judging them.

Outward Listening to Serve Others

Rick and Barb Wise were both twenty-seven years old when they decided to marry. Rick was a virgin—Barb wasn’t. Before they could wed, she discovered she was HIV positive. Barb recalled, “I stood paralyzed in disbelief. How could this be? I was in love. I was in love with Rick.” Her mind raced ahead, “Would Rick end the relationship?”16

Even though Barb’s prognosis offered her two weeks to a year to live, she and Rick soon wed. And Barb lived on, for over twenty years and counting. So did their relationship, as they listened to God and to each other in order to discern how to serve one another in such an unusual situation.

The more they listened to God, the more Barb and Rick also listened outwardly to others. They discovered that they could serve others by sharing their own story about the reality of living with HIV/AIDS. They talked openly about such things as Barb’s sexual past and deciding not to have children. They offered a glimpse of what it’s like to flourish relationally in difficult circumstances. Grateful to God for every day they would have together, they launched a nonprofit organization to teach others about “forming healthy relationships and hope in marriage.”17

We too can experience real life in the midst of our broken, challenging relationships. Each of us has a wealth of empathy and love, of joy and delight, waiting to be discovered anew through the gift of listening.

Do you want to be loved and to love others? Then avoid the distractions of everyday life and spend time discovering what’s on the minds and in the hearts of your own family, friends, coworkers, and church members. Lipari calls us to be “fully within reach of and open to receive the other,” listening “as a kind of hospitality, invitation, a hosting.”18 The alternative is what writer Frederick Buechner describes as living alone, in communion with only ourselves, in a buried life, like a seed in the ground that never germinates to enjoy the sun and the rain, the clouds and the winds.19 To listen to God and neighbor is to experience life-giving community. Every time you truly pay attention to someone, you honor him or her. Choose friends who will similarly honor you.

God blesses our relationships by granting us openness to him and others. God, as the greatest listener of all, demonstrated—through his own sacrificial love on the cross—that we should be loving servants. As the great biblical commandment puts it, we are to love God and our neighbor as ourselves.20 We discover how to practice such neighborly love by listening to God and neighbor—by committing to dates with God and neighbor in the midst of our hectic lives.

Flourishing as Friends

The most striking biblical model for such attentive, life-giving relationships is friendship. True friendship is based on mutual respect, understanding, love, and service. By truly listening, we can begin to overcome brokenness, rejection, and loneliness to flourish together as friends.

Broadly speaking, we all live in two types of interpersonal relationships: (1) relatively close relationships of friendship and (2) less intimate relationships of acquaintance. Friendships are dearer and might include family members, suitemates, romantic partners, coworkers, and other relationships between people who know each other relatively well. Acquaintances include those who do not know each other very well, such as next-door neighbors, members of the broader community, and people we interact with merely in the course of everyday duties like shopping and commuting. At work, for instance, we might know one or two coworkers well enough to call them personal friends, whereas the others are acquaintances whose names we know but whose personal lives we know little about. We’ll probably never listen deeply to them—and vice versa.

Our friendships always exist on a spectrum from superficial to deep and mutually self-sacrificing. Your social-media “friends” (really, acquaintances) would probably be interested in the fact that you were jailed for driving recklessly—they might even gossip about it. A good friend would probably bail you out. A truly faithful friend would want to swap places with you in jail if you had to serve time.

For two millennia, flourishing relationally with others has been called friendship. Epicurus, an ancient Greek philosopher, said, “Friendship dances around the world, urging us all toward blessedness.”21 For the ancients, however, friendship was culturally limited, primarily between upper-class males, especially political leaders and philosophers.

In Christianity, friendship took on greater spiritual and egalitarian significance. The North African bishop Augustine of Hippo, followed by the abbot Aelred of Rievaulx, reinterpreted the ancient Greek idea of friendship in the light of Scripture. They viewed friendship as two or three persons participating together in the life of Christ regardless of their social class or gender. Aelred wrote in Spiritual Friendship that women and men alike could serve as models of virtue and faith. All believers can thereby exemplify God’s loving-kindness.22

Jesus names his followers “friends” and calls them to intimacy with himself and each other. He taught that true friends are marked by self-sacrificial love rather than shared social standing.23 “My command is this: Love each other as I have loved you. Greater love has no one than this: to lay down one’s life for one’s friends.”24 True friends imitate Christ by using their gifts of communication selflessly to bless each other.

Using the gift of communication to self-sacrificially love one another is ideal Christian friendship. It’s a kind of nonsexual or platonic relationship focusing on one another in the midst of fast-paced lives. Such communication equips us to participate in a flourishing community of two or three Christians striving to imitate God’s own triune community—to be intimate and mutually sacrificial, working and celebrating together by grace. The Trinity—three persons in one God—is the ultimate model for such friendship. The Trinity is three perfect listeners who know and serve each other intimately, perfectly, and complementarily.

Listening with Empathy and Sympathy

Humans’ dual capacities for mutual empathy (feeling “with” others) and sympathy (feeling “for” others) are at the heart of friendship. These amazing abilities are at the root of our worst and best communication. We can use them both to exploit and to serve others. In the novel To Kill a Mockingbird, the father, Atticus, tells his son, “If you can learn a simple trick . . . you’ll get along a lot better with all kinds of folks. You never really understand a person until you consider things from his point of view . . . until you climb inside of his skin and walk around in it.”25

We’re created for such sympathy and empathy. They are the opposites of being lonely and self-serving. God says in Genesis that it’s wrong for Adam to be alone.26 In order to flourish, Adam needs a partner, someone with whom he can enjoy life and who has the same communicative abilities, so that together they may be responsible, delighted caretakers of God’s world. God creates Eve, a care-giving and care-receiving partner. The two of them can discourse with their Creator and each other. They become the first biblical friends apart from the members of the Trinity (represented in the Christian tradition by God’s words, “Let us make mankind in our image, in our likeness”27). Before Adam and Eve’s disobedience to God, they seemed to be perfectly intersubjective with each other; they could understand each other flawlessly.

When we choose life over death in our relationships, we aim to follow God’s lead with Adam and Eve as soul friends. We seek openness and mutuality with God and others.

SEVEN WAYS TO LISTEN WELL

Dedicate yourself—intentionally choose to listen

Take time—generously carve out a sufficient period of time

Select a location—carefully choose a distraction-free place

Focus attention—patiently stay in the moment

Be sympathetic—openly accept others’ feelings

Remain empathetic—nonjudgmentally put yourself in others’ shoes

Visualize support—genuinely smile and nod

Conclusion

From a Christian perspective, human beings are created for particular kinds of relationships, whether online, via phones, or in person. Communication is a means for forming relationships that honor God and demonstrate how we serve one another. Interpersonal communication, in particular, is faithfully using the gift of communication to foster shared understanding for life-giving relationships, especially friendships.

When the modern-day monk said that praying is like dating, he tapped into an ancient Hebrew view of communication as relationship building. The gift of communication equips us to grow in communion with God, others, and ourselves. Further, it enables us to form emotionally intimate relationships—friendships—that model sympathy and empathy.

As we show in the next chapter, technology, however, is not always helpful for building such friendships. Newer communication technologies, in particular, speed up the pace and quantity of our messaging, creating ever-more distractions that we have to contend with. Our lives can turn into a series of immediate message alerts if we fail to embrace single-tasking with those with whom we most wish to be friends and perhaps lovers.