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How to Listen to Others

I sometimes like to look for inspiration for life lessons in film.  And today it happened. Last night I was watching one of the great film classics, “Dumb and Dumber.”  And I got to the part where Harry (Jeff Daniels’ character) is talking about why his old girlfriend broke up with him.  And he says this:

Yeah I called her up. She gave me a bunch of crap about me not listening to her, or something. I don’t know, I wasn’t really paying attention.

As my friend and author Steve Harper likes to say, we have two ears and one mouth and we should use them proportionally.  I agree with this 100%. But the movie got me thinking: Harry obviously listened to his girlfriend (he has ears, doesn’t he). But is listening itself important?  Or is it how you listen that’s important?  And is listening the same thing as paying attention?

The truth is we listen to people every day.  And a ton of books tell us how we have to be good listeners.  But can we take a cue from Harry?  If Harry had just “paid attention,” would his girlfriend had felt like he had “listened” to her?

Actually, there are many different types of listening.  In today’s post, I will talk about five of them.

Appreciative listening

Appreciative listening is where you listen to simply enjoy the listening experience.  This is the way we tend to listen when we are at a concert, club, or other fun venue.  Here you are listening for the joy of listening itself.  However, if you’ve ever talked to someone and it looks like they have “lost interest” in what you are saying, most likely they are utilizing appreciative listening.  Mostly likely they no longer “appreciate” what you’re saying.   This is what Harry was doing in the movie.  Obviously, he did not “appreciate” what his girlfriend told him.

Empathetic listening

Emphatic listening is when you are listening to support the person speaking.   We’ve all done this.  When our friends or spouses vent about their problems and we just listen to it, we are using empathetic listening.  We are showing how much we care when we listen like this.

I get the feeling that when Harry’s girlfriend talked to him about her troubles, she might have been looking for him to listen like this.

Comprehensive listening

Comprehensive listening is listening to organize the information given by the speaker. When you re listened like this trying to apply the information to your personal experience. Some examples might include taking directions, trying to figure out what to do next, etc.

Discerning listening

Discerning listening is listening to gather information.  With discerning listening, you are listening to find the main message.  An example might include going to a seminar and trying to find out what the whole point of a speech is about.

Evaluative listening

With evaluative listening, you are listening in order to solve the problem of the person speaking.  For example, if someone is telling you about their annoying co-worker, the evaluative listener will problem offer up different ways in which the person can deal with the co-worker.

Evaluative listeners are typically in problem-solving mode.

Now, how does this all apply to you?  Surely it can apply in more ways than I can talk about in one blog post.  But consider this:

You are venting to your friend about your bad day looking for a little sympathy, and your friend starts telling you about ways in which you could have made it better.  How does it make you feel?  Do you think your friend is really listening to you?

He is, just not the way you wanted him to.

So, keep these things in mind.  Try to see how you are listening to others.  And be aware of how others are listening to you.

I’d like to give a brief plug for Tim Ursiny’s book, “The Coward’s Guide to Conflict” that introduced the ways of listening to me.

Did you find this helpful? Consider buying me a cup of coffee.

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