Listening? Why the heck is Listening important? Well let’s dive deep into that today. I left you off last time with this quote:
“Sometimes, to talk to someone, you just have to listen”
So, this quote is quite profound. And it is not just random gibberish. It has great practicality to it. It tells you how to listen deeply to others. And I have come to understand it, albeit with time and trials. Wait, I guess I really haven’t mastered it yet. But I’ll tell whatever I know.
Sometimes we want to listen to other people, so we try to talk to them. That is a good start to creating emotional intelligence in relationships. We ask them questions, we ask them about their activities, their day, their interests, about different stuff. In our mind we are really trying our best to get them to talk. But actually, we are only asking them about things we want to know about, not the things that maybe they want to tell others. People, many times, don’t want to (emphasis on “want”) tell others about the important stuff, but they need to (emphasis on “need”).
But that happens only when they are prompted to tell those things the right way. We ask about many things, but subconsciously, we have already prepared our mind for some answers. And we are constantly trying to find those answers in whatever the other person is saying. So we are not listening to them. We are only to trying to listen what we want them to say.
One would imagine “why is listening so much harder than talking?” well it actually is. Listening is an art. You have to lock in, clear your mind, be ready for anything and just calm down. You have to have such a calming aura that your calm and trustworthy energy radiated and gets absorbed by the other person. Creating a safe space for conversation is the goal. Only then will he open up to you. The more he feels that you are listening to just whatever he wants to say, without adding your own two cents, the more he will tell. You have to keep this up to build trust through listening.
And please be my guest and judge the other person. No problem in that. But make sure you do that at the end. If we keep judging others after every statement they give, are we actually listening? Are we really present in the conversation or are we just making our own assumptions based on incomplete conversations? That “First impression is the last impression” rubbish, I think we as a whole human race should eradicate this pathetic notion. So judge at the end, knowing that you have listened, with an open mind, and understood the words as well as the feelings the other person wanted to convey. And if they were not able to fully convey those feelings, second chance people, second chance. Everyone deserves it.
Frankly, I have not mastered this technique myself, this at of listening. Judging wrongly, not listening completely, or taking wrong meanings, been through it all. But the thing is, I know I will improve, because I keep self-evaluating, and I do it for the sake of my loved ones. Failure is the best teacher and I try to learn a lot without being offended by it.
Who the heck is this Confucius guy? I thought it was some random fictional dude who they put infront of every profound quotation. But I guess he is a real guy from edo period Japan. Let me check……. Okay my bad. I guess he is not from edo period. Far older than that. And his name is Kong Qiu. Oh he is also not Japanese. He is Chinese. And he has got some really nice wisdom for all of us. Some really nice quotes. I found some nice Confucius quotes about knowledge:
“To know what you know and what you do not know, that is true knowledge.”
Hey, this quote is like that Socrates quote that I live by so dearly. This is ancient wisdom and it reflects so much of the essence of this community. True knowledge is actually knowing both, what you know and what you do not know. Because if you realise only the things that you know, it makes you arrogant or gives you false hope that you have knowledge of everything. When in actuality, you would know only that which you can see in that tiny bubble in which you live and nothing outside it. Only when you expand your worldview and start realising the things that you do not know about, you understand that there are things in this world that you had no knowledge of and there is so much for you to learn. That is what makes you humble and creates in you the true thirst of knowledge.
“Real knowledge is to know the extent of one's ignorance.”
This quote as well. It is amazing. But why is admitting ignorance important? I mean, ignorance does have a negative connotation to it, and we do not really like if we are called ignorant and it seems like a derogatory word. But actually, simply not knowing something is ignorance. So, according to this quote, we can only start on the journey of knowledge and wisdom and clarity and understanding, once we realise how ignorant we are to all the knowledge in the world. if we don’t realise that, we will be comfortable in the small amount of knowledge that we have because we know nothing of what is outside of that bubble. Think about it. A very crude and tiny example of this can be something like this. Imagine that you were born in a village in a faraway land in the deserts or jungles, you would never know of the existence of self-driving tesla cars, right? You would think that carts pulled by horses and camels are the best of the vehicles. Or you might know of desert jeeps or motorcycles. But a cybertruck, no way.
I took you to the deserts and jungles to explain this example, but believe me, you can understand this in your daily life while living in this vastly connected world. I have been surprised of different trends and practices of the people, just by moving to different cities and was astonished to see things and realised ‘wow, I never realised people can be like this’ or ‘I never could have thought people do this and this if I had stayed in my home city among my family and in the same circle of people I have known my entire childhood’. Once you fly high enough to be able to feel the boundary of the bubble you are in. you realise how small of a world it was you were living inside.
Okay one more quote by my man Confucius, maybe we can leave it at that and I’ll let you think about this one on your own. I will also need some time to grasp the true essence of this quote:
“By three methods we may learn wisdom: First, by reflection, which is noblest; Second, by imitation, which is easiest; and third by experience, which is the bitterest.”
Share your own listening experiences in the comments below and tell me when you did a great job at listening to someone 🤩 and when you were not that good 😢!
Do you have any favorite Confucius quote that you want to share?
