Intent Listening

"We don't learn from talking; we learn from listening."

That's what the results showed when I typed the key 'listening' on our most popular search engine. And my eyes were instantly saying, "It's easy," but the fact when it comes to practice, our brain finds it troublesome to do.

Listening means you take notice of and act on what someone says; respond to advice or a request (Oxford Languages). But when there are friends, loved ones, or just stranger who try to tell us a story about how bad their day was, did we listen? Or we just want to cut it off right away in the middle in order to share our own story?

Well, that question will be answered with the research from Lederman (1977) says that although adults spend about 42 percent of their time in listening activities, and children spend about 58 percent of the time in the same activity. It goes without saying that listening intently to a person is one of the most important issues facing us today.

Then what we have to do? Of course, change. And since we don't care about otheres need to be listened, this first has to do with our ego. Whenever someone tells us a story, put in mind that this is not about we, it is about them. The same when we give them a respond, be sure it's something related to their story, avoid to compare it to our story. Show our empathy not judgement to present our respect to them. That way people will feel more comfortable to be in our circle, since respect is a fast way to connect people.

Additionally, I put an acryonym which we can memorise easily to remind us about this goal (intent listening). Thank to Julian Treasure who talked about 5 ways to listen better on TED Talks. So, without further a do, this is the acronym. It called RASA.

• Receive : pay attention to the person
• Appreciate : making little noises like hmm, oh, OK
• Summarise : the word so is very important in communication
• Ask : ask question afterwards

Finally, I think those are pretty much the key on listening better that I can share with you. We just gotta practice it everyday with people around us, even a short amount of time as a starter is okay. As long as we keep going, we can improve our listening skill and be more confident in our personal and social relationship.

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Picture source : Pinterest