one of the major breakdowns in most relationships whether it is between parent / child, husband / wife, siblings, boy/girl friend, or just close friends, is the lack of listening. most people dont know how to listen effectively.
when i ask people about listening they generally say that they are good listeners. very few people would admit that they have a listening problem. what most describe to me is that they do lend an ear to what is being said - they hear, but they are unable to reflect what was said to them.
i know that we could talk about the semantics of the terms listening versus hearing. i do think listening goes deeper than simply hearing, which in my opinion contributes to most relational problems. i believe relationships between the various parties as i mentioned above, could be helped if individuals would only learn how to listen.
listening requires eye contact, focus, ears, and sometimes hand to body contact to assure the speaker that they are being heard. i want to share four guiding principles that relates to listening.
FIRST GUIDELINE - LISTEN TO UNDERSTAND NOT TO JUDGE

as simple as that may sound, the truth is we often fail to really know what others are saying or meaning. sometimes we assume we know what the other person wants to tell us as soon as a few key words are spoken.
example: have you ever had someone interrupt in the middle of a sentence to respond to what they thought you were saying, without having you complete your thoughts? this becomes evident by the way they responded. their response is totally out to left-field.
obviously this becomes a listening problem but often the problem is a little more subtle.
if you use yourself as an example this would help you understand the above statement.
have you ever been in a conversation especially one that could border on being a bit heated? do you recall yourself waiting just for the other person to take a breather so that you could jump in and share your thoughts without having a complete picture of what the other person is saying? i know that i have on occasions done that.
this would not be listening to understand. your thoughts ll share more on this on my next blog entry. stay tuned.

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