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Listening with the Heart
I used to read the Ziggy cartoon strip avidly. I recall one wherein Ziggy passed a rather shabby-looking character who was sitting on the sidewalk propped up against a building. Beside him was a sign that announced: “Good Listener–25 cents for 5 minutes.” The sidewalk solicitor had greatly underpriced his services, for we happen to be suffering from a terrible shortage of good listeners. Like the biblical woman of valor, a good listener’s worth more accurately, “ is far above rubies.” Almost any day, blogs, webinars, and programs promised to make us better speakers. But where are the courses and projects to make us better listeners? At commencement exercises, we have often witnessed a prize awarded to the graduate who has shown excellence in public speaking. But have you ever heard of a prize awarded to the student who has shown excellence in private listening? When a prominent TV personality decided to quit a popular network program, he gave this explanation for his surprising act: “I’ve become increasingly aware of late that for the past 10 years I’ve been on the air doing a great deal of talking. I want to start looking, thinking, and listening to people.” Anatomically speaking, you and I are so constructed that we should devote more time to listening than to speaking. The Divine Architect endowed us with two ears, but only one mouth. Yet for many of us, the mouth is a sorely overworked organ and the ears are in a state of semiretirement. A bartender who was breaking in a young apprentice saw the novice hard at work trying to be witty and humorous with the customers. Unhappily, he wasn’t making much of an impression. Finally, the veteran called the young man aside and gave him the distilled wisdom of years of experience: “Listen, kid, listen. Don’t talk. These guys come here to talk. If they wanted to listen, they’d go home.” That veteran bartender knew a lot more than how to mix a drink. He was a keen student of human nature. He understood how desperately we each need someone who will listen to us, someone to whom we can speak of our fears and frustrations, our loneliness and our despair, our angers and our anxieties, our defeats and our disappointments; someone to whom we can recount our occasional triumphs and our self-enhancing accomplishments. We each need someone to release us from the isolation cell to which we are so frequently consigned because no one cares enough to liberate us by the simple act of listening. A good listener is worth considerably more than twenty-five cents for five minutes. Psychiatrists’ offices are crowded with people willing to pay substantial fees to satisfy their hunger to be heard. Many a family breakup is directly traceable to a failure in communication. There’s a great deal of talking and even shouting, but very little listening. One family therapist who has achieved much success in their work explained their method, “I really don’t do much of anything to get families together. I simply give each member a chance to talk while the others listen–without interrupting. Often, it’s the first time they’ve listened to each other in years.” Those words have the sharp sting of recognition. The next time we are sorely tempted to give someone a good “talking to,” let us first pause to ask ourselves when was the last time we gave that person a good “listening to.” Listening is not easy. If is were, there wouldn’t be such a shortage in that department. Listening to another, really listening with our whole person and entirely focused being, requires discipline, patience, and, above all, lots of caring. But how great are the rewards of listening. Through creative listening we exercise the magic that makes the other person feel so important, and at the same time we ourselves break out of our own isolation. We open channels of communication that enable us to touch and be touched, to expand others while we ourselves are enlarged. When G!d appear to King Solomon in a night vision and offered him any gift he wished, the wise monarch asked for neither power, nor wealth, nor glory. He asked instead for a לב שומע, “a listening heart.” It is a gift worth cultivating. For, ultimately, true listening is not done with the ears. It is done with the heart. Rabbi J.B. Sacks |
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