5 ways to be a better listener

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Today’s read time: 7 minutes

You know that game where you look at scrambled letters and try to guess what the original word is? Let’s play.

Scrambled letters: SILENT

Hmm … the scrambled letters are an actual word. Weird one.

Did you get it? Probably. If not, take another peek at this post’s title.

Interestingly enough, scramble up LISTEN and you get SILENT. (Well, you also get NITSLE and ILNEST but that would’ve been a seriously lame intro.)

Rest assured: becoming a better listener is about more than just being silent, though that’s a good start.

Here are 5 tips to help you become a 10/10 lisTENer:

Make the content of what you’re listening to more interesting to listen to!

Nobody wants to listen to the boring, automatic responses we give to the boring, repetitive questions we often ask.

Sometimes, simple shifts can make a huge difference. For example, forget “how was your weekend?” and try “what was the highlight of your weekend?”.

Get off auto-pilot. Make a game of discovering, asking, and assessing questions.

Our default, especially around people we’ve spent considerable time with, is we think we know.

Trouble is: by thinking we know, we never actually find out. Remember that the reality each of us sees is the reality that each of our brains project for us and so no two of our realities are alike.

Stop assuming you know what the other person thinks, and, instead, view the conversation as an adventure in trying to get as close as possible to figuring out what the heck reality is for this other person.

#1 was about sprucing up the content you’re listening to.

This one takes the assumption of #2 (that you know nothing) and helps expand the depth of what you hear.

When someone says something as simple as, “I love traveling”, remember we all have different ideas in our head about what "traveling” means. Right there is an opportunity to better understand what that particular person means in that particular moment.

Certainly you could ask specific follow up questions like:

• how often do you travel?

• what’s the favorite spot you’ve been to?

• wha't’s the next place on your list?

Those are all solid! You would have to come up with them on the spot, though, and by nature of their specificity, they also narrow the content.

“Share more about that”, on the other hand, is the most open-ended, applicable, and useful listening tool to leverage. If you take nothing else from this, take that. Oh, and the other four tips, too.

You absolutely must be aware of your tendency to shift. Even though it’s in all caps, I’m not judging. You shouldn’t judge yourself or others, either. We’re all guilty of it.

Here’s what it looks like, to keep the travel theme going:

Person A: “I just got back from Europe last week!”

Person B: “Nice! We’re heading to Cali next month.”

It’s subtle. In fact, it might feel like the natural way you hold most of your conversations. We do it because we think it’s a useful way to build connections. Your subconscious thinks trip = trip, we both travel, yay!

However, it’s a shift in focus from other person → you. You’ve just shifted the focus from that person’s experience to yours. Instead, you might create more space through inquiry:

• Oh, where in Europe!?

• Who’d you go with?

• What are your top recommendations?

It’s tough to build this muscle since it requires you to relax a muscle you’ve spent years building up: your self-concern.

That last sentence? I promise: I mean it with love.

Again, we do this because there’s utility in doing it.

The software in our brain is constantly updating. Our interactions with the world help us edit our ideas and beliefs. It’s necessary for others to poke holes in them and vice-versa.

However, we tend to spend too much time there; too focused on whether or not we agree with a particular perspective and not focused enough on understanding it.

Here’s a 2×2 plot of agreement and understanding.

While each exists on a continuum, for simplicity sake:

• If you understand and agree with someone’s perspective, you’re in harmony

• If you understand and disagree with someone’s perspective, you’re in debate mode

• If you don’t understand and disagree with someone, you’re in conflict mode

• If you don’t understand and agree with someone, well then you’re confused

I’m not saying ignore your tendency to gauge agreement vs disagreement. We need a bit of tension amongst our ideas. I’m saying: relax it. It’ll increase the amount your mind and relationships are spent in more preferable states (harmony or debate).

Right as you find yourself getting set to question, pick apart, or disagree with someone’s perspective, see if you can catch yourself and, instead, seek a deeper understanding.

Best of luck in your journey trying to be a a better listener.

With deep appreciation,
Phil

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