Practicing Active Listening

Can you recall a time when someone practiced active listening with you? Where you could tell they were not only listening to what you were saying, but what you weren’t saying? That experience where someone is integrating who they know you to be in the world, what you’re saying and what you’re not saying?

That experience of being seen and heard is a gift (that can also feel incredibly vulnerable and exposing).

I believe it to be a basic human need to be seen and heard in this way, and it requires practice from both sides.

Since you can only be responsible for you, here’s what you can practice:

• when you’re listening to someone, don’t think about what to say next. Put 100% of your attention on them.

• practice being ok with silence. When you’re not preparing what to say next, sometimes that leaves space, and for some that’s uncomfortable. But there are unsaid things ‘said’ in space, and it deepens conversations.

• be ok with not knowing. When someone shares with you, it’s a natural human response to what to fix or solve any emotion that comes up that’s slightly uncomfortable. That’s not your job. Instead, practice empathizing and being with them in it. This practice simultaneously says it’s ok to talk about this, and that I’m standing with you.

Cultivating this practice is simple not easy. It requires you to face what emotions you can’t be with withiin yourself in order to be with it in others.

What are your best practices for active listening?