[typewriter clicking]
So listening is not the act of hearing the words spoken, it is the art of
understanding the meaning behind those words. And you know, when
people say ' you're not listening to me,' and we simply power it back, the words
that they just said, congratulations, your ears work. You know, that is the
act of listening. But the art of listening is creating an environment in which the
other person feels heard. Now you notice what I said there? The other person--
and I used an emotional word-- feels, right? I don't want to know that you
heard the words, I want to feel-- I want to feel heard.
Feel seen. I want to feel understood.
And that is a learnable practicable-- learnable, practicable skill. So it's,
and there are many parts of it. It's things like replacing judgement with
curiosity. Right? And that's a hard thing to do. We're a pretty judgy group. Right?
To be curious why someone has a point of view, it's creating a safe space
for someone to-- as my friend, Deeyah Khan calls it, 'empty the bucket.'
So even if we find what they're saying just reprehensible, right? You're never
gonna be able to actually have dialogue until, at least one of the parties gets the
opportunity to say everything, without judgement. And she calls it 'emptying
the bucket,' and once a person, somebody feels like they've completely said
everything, then they're more apt to listen to you. But usually what we do is
we defend, or we litigate, or we interrupt. We point out flaws in logic,
which is just frustrating. And when you point out flaws in somebody's logic--
because we're all imperfect when we speak, and we all choose the wrong words at
various times. 'And that's not what I meant, you know what I meant!'
is what we have to say. 'Well if you know what you meant, then
why didn't you say what you--' you can see how this spirals.
But it's things like when somebody says something, you know, and
there's really easy ways to do it,
things like 'go on,' 'tell me more,' 'what else?' and they keep talking.
And you go quiet, and they feel the space. And, 'tell me more, go on.'
And eventually, it's all out. And then, there's a safe space for you
to respond, and express yourself in a constructive way. But that's correct.
We do not teach listening. And listening is the way to create-- to build trust with
someone, you know? You make someone feel heard, they'll trust you. You know?
It is the way to find common ground in opposition. In simple cases in business,
but in more complicated cases in national politics, or in global politics,
or in war, you know? Why do-- you know, my-- Bill Ury, William Ury,
who wrote 'Getting to Yes,' he talks about the same thing. He goes,
'We have talk shows, but we don't have listen shows,' he says, 'we have peace
talks, but what we really need is peace listens.' You know?
And he, who's been at the table at the highest levels of peace negotiations,
he said people show up and start demanding what they want, and that's how the
negotiations begin. Nobody starts by saying, 'so tell me why you came here.'
There's a great documentary that I recommend, to learn this.
It's called, 'White Right: Meeting the Enemy' by Deeyah Khan.
In a nutshell, Deeyah is a Muslim woman living in the UK, who was trolled by
white supremacists, to the point where the police got involved because her life
was at risk. They told her stay away from open windows. That's how bad it got.
The way Deeyah responded was by moving to the United States, and going to meet
the white supremacists. And she brought her cameras. You can see it all happening
in this documentary. And basically, she gave them a safe space to feel heard.
Now, that sounds mad, like why should she give them a safe space to feel heard,
they should give her a safe space. Yeah, fine. Good, you know? It's never
gonna happen. Deeyah sits down with these white supremacists and she gives
them a safe space to feel heard, and this is extreme listening. And I say it's
extreme, because, I mean, they hate her. You know? They don't just disagree
with her. They want her off the planet. And she lets them 'empty their bucket,'
as she calls it. And then, conversation begins. And because they feel heard,
they start to trust her. And as they start to trust her, she becomes a friend.
And then, it creates this paradox, where I'm supposed to hate this woman, but I
trust her and consider her a friend. And what you see is one by one, these
white supremacists, these die-hard white supremacists start dropping out of
the movement, because they could no longer reconcile their beliefs with reality.
And if-- if it can happen in this extreme environment, then it can happen anywhere.
And all that is required for us to cross political divides, or you know,
disagreements at work, and things like that, is one of the parties has to learn
how to listen. It doesn't even require both parties to learn the skill, that's
the amazing thing. And it is one of the most remarkable, remarkable skills that
anyone can learn. The power of listening, yeah. So, the documentary's a great
extreme example of what it can do.