What Makes a Good Listener

 

I would not consider myself a naturally good listener. But I pride myself on understanding the importance of listening and on putting in the work to listen well. It makes me feel good when people share something with me and tell me they appreciated my hearing them out. It occurs to me that it may be helpful for me and others to explore further what goes into good listening. To me it boils down to five things:

1. Availability. You can't listen if you're not around, duh. But I think it's more than that. How many people are we are around all the time and yet the setting is not right for a meaningful conversation. So it's not just being around for people but seeking out opportunities where there is sufficient time and space to go deep. For me that's usually a meal, a walk in the park, or a round of golf, but your platforms may vary.

2. Reciprocity. We are around people all day yet share so little of ourselves. And that is appropriate, since some conversations are for some places and settings and not all. But, I have found many relationships where the possibility was there to go deeper, and someone needed to break the ice. My own sharing about struggles and hardships is a bright flashing sign to those I feel comfortable sharing with, that I value their knowing something about me and that I in turn am willing to bear anything they would want to confide in me.

3. Curiosity. Every conversation involves a unique combination of two people and therefore holds the possibility of unlocking something in us that we hadn't previously accessed. Hence, I could've shared something with my spouse or my best friend or my therapist, but if I run it by someone else in my life they may have new insights I had not thought of before. So I find, when I'm on the listening end, that I ask questions and make points that others had not heard before, such that my curiosity about their situation allows them to break new ground in what they are realizing within themselves and sharing with someone else.

4. Empathy. The hardest part about sharing is wondering what others will think of us. How we are viewed by others is so important, and we don't want to ruin it by disclosing something that will make others think we are weak or bad or ignorant. The thing about empathy is, it takes us from thinking about someone's situation from our perspective and gets us to think about someone's situation from their perspective. Which makes it easier to avoid judgment and dismissal, and to express sympathy and solidarity, the former of course being traits of bad listeners and the latter being traits of good ones.

5. Confidentiality. Sharing in a conversation is literally entrusting something valuable to another person. If that person is sloppy or reckless with a valuable possession, we would not ask them to be a steward of it for us. So it is with confiding in someone. It is important to me that I am someone that is deemed trustworthy enough to be told something and keep it in confidence. 

Good listening is in high demand and short supply. I hope, perhaps using some of the tips in this post, we will all work harder to be good listeners. We can be a tremendous blessing to others in this way.