Dr. Mary C. McDonald
We have become a society that has raised multi-tasking to an art form. At a recent meeting I attended, one of the members of the group was bragging that he had just finished talking on the phone while responding to e-mails at the same time. The man next to him asked, “Was it a conference call?” Then he went on to boast, “I can do a conference call, answer my e-mail, and be meeting with someone in my office, all at the same time.” What dubious distinctions. I wonder if anyone was listening? What if all the others involved were doing the same thing?
It is said that imitation is the sincerest form of flattery. Actually, I think listening is. To be truly present to another person is more than flattering. It is love in action. It is a respect that comes from reverence, and a sense of awe when encountering the unique mystery of another person. Listening restores ceremony to the empty ritual of just talking. A speaker needs a listener. Connectedness to others happens through our feelings and emotions when we listen, unconditionally. It has nothing to do with judging, or agreeing, or even liking. It is about acceptance, about understanding, and the spirituality of presence. It is about just being there for another person.
Words are made flesh when they bring meaning, when they create community and make our experiences truly human. Listening to the words of others, and others listening to our words, can bring healing, reconciliation, understanding, peace, joy, insight, consolation, comfort and hope. To listen is to love. It is the kind of love we read about in Corinthians, Chapter 13. In fact, if we substituted the word listening for the word love, it would go something like this:
Listening is the gift of love. Now I will show you a way which surpasses all others.
Listening is patient; with children who ask endless questions, with friends who just need to talk, with a grandparent who tells the same story over and over again.
Listening is kind; it appreciates the trust of a secret, it responds in compassion to the pain of another, it accepts the need of another to share his or her story.
Listening is not jealous of the accomplishments or happiness of others, but responds in joy.
Listening is not snobbish. It does not put on airs. It does not criticize the grammar while missing the message. It seeks to communicate and to create community in the lived human experience.
Listening is never rude. It does not judge what is in the heart, or mind, or thoughts of another. It seeks to understand. One who is listening hears only the words spoken by another, not the words in his mind that are waiting to be spoken.
Listening is not prone to anger, but recognizes the trust of another as he seeks to share his thoughts and feelings, and bring meaning to his actions.
Listening does not rejoice in what is wrong, but rejoices in the truth, and, when hearing it, affirms all who speak it.
Listening, truly listening to another has the calming rhythm of a rocking chair, not the frantic pace of a multi-tasking society.
It is interesting to think that if we take the risk of just listening to another person, and responding in love to what we hear, we might realize that what we do in the simple act of listening will live on in the hearts, and minds, and lives of all those who remembered that we listened.
