During a conversation, listening is as powerful as loving.
One of the greatest ways you can affirm value in another person is by giving them the gift of your undivided attention, the kind of attention that says, “I hear what you are saying because I value who you are.” You don’t have to agree with someone to show them their value as a person. Listening demonstrates that any person you meet is worthy of your respect and attention.
Our spirit wants to experience connection by being seen, felt and heard. When you ask and listen deeply with curiosity to whatever wants to be expressed, you are giving one of the most precious gifts you can give to one you love.
The cane is just not going to cut it. I shared with some of my colleagues that these brothers live in neighborhoods where they are getting whapped with a piece of stick all night, stabbed with knives, and pegged with screwdrivers that have been sharpened down, and they are leaking blood. When you come to a fella without even interviewing him, without sitting him down to find out why you did what you did, your only interest is caning him, because you are burned out and frustrated yourself. You say to him, ‘Bend over, you are getting six.’ And the boy grits his teeth, skin up his face, takes those six cuts, and he is gone. But have you really been effective? Caning him is no big deal, because he’s probably ducking bullets at night. He has a lot more things on his mind than that. On the other hand, we can further send our delinquent students into damnation by telling them they are no body and all we want to do is punish, punish, punish. Here at R.M. Bailey, we have been trying a lot of different things. But at the end of the day, nothing that we do is better than the voice itself. Nothing is better than talking to the child, listening, developing trust, developing a friendship. Feel free to come to me anytime if something is bothering you, because I was your age once before. Charles chuck Mackey, former vice principal and coach of the R. M. Bailey Pacers school.
Getting in touch with the lovelessness within and letting that lovelessness speak its pain is one way to begin again on love's journey. In relationships, whether heterosexual or homosexual, the partner who is hurting often finds that their mate is unwilling to 'hear' the pain. Women often tell me that they feel emotionally beaten down when their partners refuse to listen or talk. When women communicate from a place of pain, it is often characterized as 'nagging.' Sometimes women hear repeatedly that their partners are 'sick of listening to this shit.' Both cases undermine self-esteem. Those of us who were wounded in childhood often were shamed and humiliated when we expressed hurt. It is emotionally devastating when the partners we have chosen will not listen. Usually, partners who are unable to respond compassionately when hearing us speak our pain, whether they understand it or not, are unable to listen because that expressed hurt triggers their own feelings of powerlessness and helplessness. Many men never want to feel helpless or vulnerable. They will, at times, choose to silence a partner with violence rather than witness emotional vulnerability. When a couple can identify this dynamic, they can work on the issue of caring, listening to each other's pain by engaging in short conversations at appropriate times (i.e., it's useless to try and speak your pain to someone who is bone weary, irritable, reoccupied, etc.). Setting a time when both individuals come together to engage in compassionate listening enhances communication and connection. When we are committed to doing the work of love we listen even when it hurts.
Dr. Bone Specialist came in, made me stand up and hobble across the room, checked my reflexes, and then made me lie down on the table. He bent my right knee this way and that, up and down, all the way out to the side and in. Then he did the same with my left leg. He ordered X rays then started to leave the room. I panicked. I MUST GET DRUGS."What can I take for the pain?" I asked him before he got out the door."You can take some over the counter ibuprofen," he suggested. "But I wouldn't take more than nine a day."I choked. Nine a day? I'd been popping forty. Nine a day? Like hell. I couldn't even go to the bathroom on my own, I hadn't slept in three weeks, and my normally sunny cheery disposition had turned into that of a very rabid dog. If I didn't get good drugs and get them now, it was straight to Shooter's World and then Walgreens pharmacy for me."I don't think you understand," I explained. "I can't go to work. I have spent the last four days with my mother who is addicted to QVC, watching jewelry shows, doll shows and make-up shows. I almost ordered a beef-jerky maker! Give me something, or I'm going to use your calf muscles to make the first batch!"Without further ado, he hastily scribbled out a prescription for some codeine and was gone. I was happy.My mother, however, had lost the ability to speak.
In listening lies great power.Many are expert in speaking (while everyone hears), adept in analyzing in bits and pieces, very prompt in commenting, and always ready to stamp judgement of 'right' or 'wrong'.Very few are skilled in listening, first, with the ears and, then, with the heart. Those who do hold true, sustainable, and great power.
I am always impressed by the fact that even the tiniest amount of being listened to, the barest suggestion of the possibility of kind treatment, can bring such an immediate rush of emotion. I think this is because we are almost never really listened to. In my work as a psychologist, I am reminded every day of how infrequently we are heard, any of us, or our actions even marginally understood. And one of the ironies of my "listening profession" is its lesson that, in many ways, each of us ultimately remains a mystery to everyone else.
Good advice is not often served in our favorite flavor.
Listen to people from your heart, as if your life depended on it, and you will find that in turn people will listen to you with all of theirs.
The choices you make from this day forward will lead you, step by step, to the future you deserve.
Spend your time designing the greatest reputation a man could possess.
What you deserve will be down to you, and you alone.
Destiny and fate are of one’s own making, and riches and happiness are rarely found at the end of an easily-traversed path.
Make sure everyone, who works with you or for you, feels the need to tell others about the incredible experience.
Adopt the positive in everything you do, for there will always be positivity there to find, if that is what you seek.
That which is currently beyond your capabilities now, does not have to be so forever
My intention was, only, ever to help you see the light shining brightly in front, and inside, of you.
Tell your good news as an evangelist would. Do so with a passion driven by a need to help and solve problems that some people didn’t even know they had.
Embrace the fundamentals like the closest of friends, for they will be the foundation of your future success.
Whilst people have answered questions, I have only heard my own voice thinking of the next question.
I was so sure that I knew what they needed and what I wanted to sell them that I never stopped long enough to find out what it was they wanted to buy.
Finding happiness by delivering it.
Everything would have been for nothing just because I simply didn’t listen.
I should become happier at what I do and leave others happier than before they’d met me.
Speaking from the heart is simple. Listening wholeheartedly, however, is much, much more difficult and most rare.
You must have realised by now that when one really cares, really tries to help, the other party recognises the fact and, therefore, easily sees the logic in working together for the greater good, for the mutual benefit of both.
You’ve got to be driven to become successful.
In the past, I have all too often listened without hearing, asking questions when I had no intention of hearing the answer or understand my customer’s requirements.
Listening is a discipline. It’s all about being present at that moment in time.
I want you to start realising how far away you are from being able to listen professionally.
You listen like an amateur and fool yourself into believing it is enough when it is not.
Our archaeological ancestry lost hair while growing sweat glands to reduce panting in the hot African sun. One outcome evolved the origin of our speech. Another conquered our ability to shut the hell up and listen. Now? Politicians grunting "On the Origin of Speeches" past one another.