LISTEN

This is going to be a little tricky, but go on, I'm listening. To be a good listener, one must willing to first shut one's big mouth. I am thoroughly convinced, and someday some scientist will back me up, that if your mouth is functioning, your listening faculties are temporarily turned off. A good listener knows when to look into the eyes of the one speaking and listen to the words, to the eyes, to the body. The great listener knows how to park their ego to the side and become a sponge for that great torrent of words that their companion sometimes needs to pour out. Listening involves setting aside preconceptions, setting aside the day-dreams, and giving your full, undivided attention to whomever is doing the talking. Pride, ego, self-interest, arrogance, conceit, and self-importance all wrapped up in fine covering of smugness really destroy any chance of being a good listener. If someone wants to take the time to talk to you, they most hold your opinion and you in some esteem. The least you can do is disengage the jaw muscles while they speak, adding a few monosyllabic rejoinders from time to time so that they know you are listening. Your turn will come, and it will be obvious. One of the greatest acts of love one human can give to another is the gift of listening. This shows respect, charity, kindness, consideration, and, above all else, empathy. While your peer is talking, take time out to listen because you might, even against your will, learn something important about them, yourself or the world. Silence in the face of chaotic cacophony is often a sign of wisdom. Silence will give the listener a chance to find that all important truth, to understand the world in a broader context, to understand their place in it. If you talk while others are talking, if you cannot refrain from telling your tired little jokes, if you cannot focus on the wisdom of your neighbor, your girl or boy friend, your mother or father, people will not only not hear you, eventually they will stop listening altogether. If you want people to hear your ideas, you must first be willing to listen to theirs.