3 Things Good Listeners Consistently Do

#Listening #Silence #Reflection #Open-Ended-Questions #Triple5LightTherapy.com #BlackTherapist #Psychotherapy #LGBTAffirmingTherapy

Posted Oct 03, 2020

In the Fall of 2016, I was a fresh graduate of the exercise science master’s program at SUNY Cortland where I was also teaching and coaching strength and conditioning.

Frankly, I was in a rut. My relationship with my girlfriend was on the verge of collapsing and I was realizing I did not have upward mobility in my current position.

The rut came to a head when I received a text from my girlfriend saying we needed to talk. My stomach dropped. I couldn’t focus.

I sent a message to my advisor, Dr. Lind, who was a counselor before he was an exercise psychologist.

“Can we talk?” I asked.

He told me to come over to his office. I mustered together every ounce of strength I had.

“Don’t you cry, whatever you do, don’t you cry” I said to myself.

Dr. Lind told me to sit down. I don’t remember if I spoke first or just cried. Sentences were interrupted by deep sobs and sporadic expletives.

He didn’t interrupt, he didn’t offer advice, and as I continued to talk something happened. I started to feel better. And as I started to feel better, I noticed how he was interacting with me.

I learned that listening is a skill that most people do not possess and being on the receiving end of a good listening experience feels amazing.

My advisor taught me three things about listening: (1) the importance of silence (2) the value of reflections and (3) the power of open-ended questions. I took these three skills to heart. I practiced them when I spoke with friends and worked with clients.

The sparsity of good listeners concerns me. I believe the rarity of this skill is due to a lack of knowledge. If we don’t receive it, how can we know what it is like? If something can be learned it can be practiced. And if it can be practiced it can be improved.

If you want to improve the quality of relationships with your friends, significant others, and colleagues, consider what good listeners do.

They Provide Silence

How many times have you wanted to say more in a conversation, to divulge sensitive feelings, to allow yourself to be vulnerable, only to have the other person chime in? Nothing shuts you down like being interrupted or not having enough space to sit with your thoughts.

Being silent in a conversation can feel awkward at first, but it is the only way to give a person the chance to elaborate on how they feel. It builds trust and gives people time to think about what they want to say next. Often, our thoughts are imperfectly encoded into words. Silence gives people a chance to say what they mean.

Practice waiting 3-5 seconds after someone has said something before speaking. You will notice that they often have more to say.

They Reflect

Low-level listeners focus on what words mean to them and wait for their turn to talk. Moderate-level listeners focus on words. Proficient listeners focus on what words mean.

Imagine that I was having a conversation with you. The conversational process goes like this:

1. I have a thought.

2. I translate that thought into words.

3. You hear my words.

4. You make your best guess as to what my words mean.

Reflective statements make a best guess as to what the speaker means. Reflections are a powerful tool for understanding. It allows people to hear their words mirrored back.

It allows the listener to tell you whether or not you are on the same page. A powerful reflection happens when you can make the best guess of not only what the person is trying to say but also what they are feeling or what they need.

They Ask Open-Ended Questions

Open-ended questions continue the narrative, they invite discussion. Open-ended questions are used to explore perceptions and concerns. They cannot be answered with a yes, no, or one-word answer. There is a big difference between “how was your day?” and “tell me about the best part of your day?”

Start by paying attention to your questions. Do they invite one-word responses or do they further the dialogue?

Don’t expect perfection in your listening skills. Simply aim for improvement. This is all doable by providing silence, perceptive reflections, and open-ended questions in your daily interactions.

Most Americans will need a new ID to fly, starting in October

#RealD #DriversLicense #Travel #Airport #HomelandSecurity #TSA Think your driver's license is enough to get you through airport security in the United States and onto your domestic flight? Maybe not. Some two-thirds of US state driver's licenses are not compliant with a post-9/11 security law set to go into effect on October 1. Those who are not compliant will not be able to fly if they don't have other forms of "REAL ID-compliant" identification. Concerned about the impact on travel, the head of the US Department of Homeland Security loosened the restrictions this week, allowing the various state agencies to accept identity documents electronically. While Wolf says this "pre-submission" of documents will result in a faster application process, it's not clear how much faster it will be. The REAL ID Act, which established minimum security standards for the issuing of state licenses and their production, prohibits federal agencies from ...

A Poetic Reflection on The New Year by Sharon L DuBois

#Happy New Year #NewBeginnings #SharonDubois #2025 H ow many times has one year flown by, without my humble, wide-eyed A mazement at the awesome wonders and blessings contained within? Is it P ossible that I have forgotten about the seemingly small, occasionally overlooked, daily miracles?? P eeking a blind eye around a blind corner to the approaching tomorrow, neglecting the precious gift of all Y esterdays. Reminder to self: Express genuine thankfulness for my family, friends, my job, which provides harvest-yielding seed, & All Praises to My Heavenly Father, whose Grace abounds brand spankin’ N ew every morning, as evidenced by my health, life, and strength. With each drop of rain, and rising of the sun, I am made aware of the E ver-present opportunity to do a “new thing”, a “new way”, with a “renewed mind”!! No logical reason to W hine or complain about difficulties along the journey, “JUST DO IT!!” The sum total of each and every one of my Y est...

Stress may lead to lower cognitive function, study finds.

#Stress #Cardiovascularriskfactors #Yale, #JAMA #AfricanAmerican #Alzheimers #cognitivefunction A new study found that people with elevated stress levels are more likely to experience a decline in cognitive function, affecting their capacity to remember, concentrate and learn new things. Stress is known to take a physical toll on the body, raising the risk of stroke, poor immune response and more. It can also drive people to unhealthy behaviors like smoking and poor physical activity. The study, published Tuesday in JAMA Network Open, did find that participants with elevated stress levels were more likely to have uncontrolled cardiovascular risk factors and poor lifestyle factors. But even after adjusting for many of these physical risk factors, the researchers found that people with elevated stress levels were 37% more likely to have poor cognition. People who struggle with memory slips can be stressed because of the challenges that brings. But the new study suggests that the connecti...

Yale neuroscientists debunked the idea that anyone is “normal”

#Yale #Normal #neuroscientists #Study #Human Don’t you wish everyone would just act more normal, like you? I know I do. But normal is a relative state that depends on time, place, and circumstance. There’s no one right way to be a human, and that applies to mental as well as physical states. That’s why neuroscientists are advocating for more recognition of the bizarre normalcy of all complex humans in psychiatry—an argument that can help all of us take a bigger-picture view. A new study published in Trends in Cognitive Science on Feb. 20 debunks the myth of normalcy in people and animals. “ The Myth of Optimality in Clinical Neuroscience ” (paywall), by Avram Holmes and Lauren Patrick of the Yale University psychology department, uses evolution to show that uniformity in our brains is totally abnormal. What’s much more common in life, during its 3.5 billion years of evolving existence on Earth , is range and change, variety in and among creatures and ha...

Triple5Light Therapy

Search This Blog