When the Other Person
Is Speaking in a “Code”
When you guess that the other is coding his message, it indicates that there are issues and/or feelings that are hard to express. The best way to help the person verbalize these feelings is to actively listen. Reflective listening can help at these times to decode the message and uncover the real point of what the speaker is struggling to say.
When Another Persons Wants
to Sort Out His Feelings
and Thoughts
Sometimes people want a solution to their problem. At other times, they are not solution-oriented and only want to explore a situation with a friend. It can be quite helpful at times just to share a dilemma with a friend without reaching any specific action plan. Unfortunately, some listeners grow frustrated when a speaker leaves without completing his problem solving.
During a “Direct Mutual
Conversation”
In many situations where listening is appropriate, the focus of attention is on the speaker. The resources of both parties are geared toward him. In direct mutual conversation, however, both parties share equally the focus of the dialogue. Both persons initiate conversation as well as reflect what the other says. In this case, a person shares his point of view after he reflects what the other has said. Direct mutual conversation is rarely appropriate for a light conversation. When talking about matters of great importance to one or both parties, or when conflict is involved, this type of conversation can be very meaningful.
When You Are Talking
to Yourself
Medical specialists tell me that we all talk to ourselves. When you talk to yourself about a significant problem, it is important to listen carefully enough to yourself to arrive at a sound decision.
Commonly, when a person talks to himself, he scarcely listens at all. Or he sends himself some gigantic roadblocks. Moralizing, for example, he says to himself, “You should do …” or he may give himself a put-down: “You’ll never be able to do it.” Or any other one of the dirty dozen.
More hopefully, you can reflect the content and especially the feelings of your conversations to yourself. You can summarize and psychologically attend to yourself during lulls and silences. It is simply amazing how helpful it can be to listen reflectively to yourself.
You can even listen to your body signals this way. A person getting a headache can reflect as though talking to his own body:
Me: You’ve had it with me working so frantically today. You are beginning to throb now.
Neck and Head: (Sends more signals of physical discomfort.)
Me: This is just the beginning, you say? It will be much worse soon.
Neck & Head: (The muscles are still tense from the day’s emotional pressure.)
Me: You want me to lay off and give you a rest before you develop into a full-blown headache. I bet you’d like a massage, too.
Now at least you have heard your body complain about the way you are abusing it. Simply taking a moment to listen sometimes helps. At other times, of course, change of behavior is required.
When Encountering New Ideas
in a Book or Lecture or at Work
I find that as I encounter new ideas, it helps to use active listening skills to decode the author’s meaning. I call this intellectual empathy. I learned it as a graduate student writing a paper on John Calvin, a thinker known for his deterministic philosophy. I surprised myself at the excellence of my logic in demolishing Calvin’s arguments, and my professor agreed that my logic was outstanding; but he added, “You haven’t wrestled with the problem Calvin was facing.” The professor was absolutely right. It is easy to criticize ideas even of an intellectual giant as long as one never addresses the complex problems he is trying to understand. I still don’t agree with Calvin, but I now realize that he was facing a much deeper and more complex set of issues than I was. I respect him for his questions and have since learned from him.
I have to continually work at intellectual empathy. It is so easy to dismiss the ideas that do not find instant hospitality in my mind. As I teach communication skills and other courses to managers, salespersons, educators, and others, I find it is a rare person who does not have to struggle to be open to unfamiliar ideas and methods.
WHEN NOT
TO LISTEN REFLECTIVELY
Some people ruin a good thing by using it at the wrong time. This is particularly true about reflective listening. When there is no specific reason for reflective listening, don’t work at doing it. There are times when the other’s needs will signal you to discipline yourself to reflect. Reflective listening is work, however. It is unhealthy for a relationship if one or both parties are always working at the relationship when they are together. Relationships flourish when there are many hearty, carefree moments. When a relationship is always work for one person, it soon becomes a “drag” for both parties.
When You Are Not Able
to Be Accepting
When you listen reflectively, the other tends to let his guard down. He becomes more vulnerable to you. If you become moralistic or judgmental or in some way demonstrate nonacceptance, he will probably be hurt much more than if you had responded judgmentally right from the start. If you feel you must “zap” someone with your pronouncements, do it at the outset and without seeming to be in a helping mode.
When You Do Not Trust the Other
to Find His Own Solution
One of the basic theories underlying reflective listening is that when the other person has a problem, he is usually the best person to solve that problem. The primary purpose of active listening is to facilitate his solution of his own problem. There are several reasons why each person should retain the responsibility for solving his own problems:
The other person with the problem has most of the data. No matter how effectively he discloses and I listen, the other will have more data on his situation than I can ever have.
The other person takes all the risks. If the solution isn’t as good as it looked on the surface, the other must suffer the consequences.
The other must implement the solution.
The other’s confidence and sense of self-responsibility are strengthened when he makes and implements his own solutions, He takes a significant step toward shaping his own destiny.
The other and I both benefit when he becomes less dependent on me as the listener/helper.
Some people don’t “buy” this theory. Parents, teachers, bosses, and others often think their greater experience and/or intelligence should provide the solution. Sometimes people agree in the top of their minds with the theory that the person with a problem is in the best position to solve it. In practice, however, they look on their solution as better than anything the other could possibly imagine. So they “push” their solution. When I am tempted to impose my solutions on the person with the problem, I try to recall the words of Clark Moustakas, a psychologist at Detroit’s Merrill-Palmer Institute:
Ultimately, I cannot be responsible for another person. I can only participate in his life, no matter what that participation may come to mean to him. But, in the end, he discovers his own meanings, his own resources, his own nature, his own being.
When You Are Not
“Separate” from the Other
The good listener is able to get inside the other person’s experience and yet remain separate. A boy told his father about an older “bully” who beat him up on the playground. The father was infuriated and insisted on calling the boy’s parents. He allowed himself to get overinvolved. He took over his son’s problem. A mother listened as her unmarried daughter said she was pregnant. The mother sobbed and said to this daughter, “How could you do this to us?” These “listeners” were not able to keep a healthy distance in the listening relationship. They were emotionally “triggered” by the other person’s disclosure, which made it impossible for them to listen effectively.
When You Use Listening
As a Way of Hiding Yourself
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br /> Some people consistently fall into the listener’s role. They rarely disclose. They rarely impact on other people. They are not real, and their listening is usually dysfunctional for them and for the speaker. Other people use reflection to shield themselves from another’s “negative” emotions. If the speaker is angry, and the listener doesn’t want to experience the other’s fury—he might simply reflect manipulatively. This seems to demonstrate how “mature” he is in handling the situation. If the listener doesn’t feel the force of the other’s anger, if he reflects without getting at least partially into the other’s frame of reference, he will probably be creating distance in the relationship. That kind of “cowardly” listening has no place in a genuine relationship.
When You Feel Very Pressured,
Hassled, or Depleted
It is important to be able to recognize those times when you may not be the best person to listen to a particular person. Maybe your inner self is out of kilter so that you can’t be a good listener to anyone at the present time. It has taken me some time, but I’ve gradually come to accept that reality. Each person needs several listeners in his life. There will be times when each of us will not be inwardly ready to listen. If the other feels he has no one else to talk to, that is really unfortunate. But that is his problem to solve, not mine. I will probably do more harm than good if I try to listen when I am not inwardly ready to be there for that person.
There is no reason why you have to actively listen to any person. As much as I love my wife and want to be present for her as a listener, there are times when I am unwilling or unable to pay the price of empathic listening. If she starts a “heavy” conversation at one of those times, I tell her that I am not prepared to listen well right now.
THE GOOD NEWS
AND THE BAD NEWS
The good news is that sometimes listening is a beautiful experience. The bad news is that it can be a heavy burden. As one listener admitted, “each act of listening that is not purely mechanical is a personal ordeal.” If you have made a disciplined attempt to utilize the skills described in previous chapters, you know something about the burden of listening empathically to another.
Listening is never easy. It involves overcoming the habitual tendency to roadblock. It requires a certain maturity, a certain self-transcendence, an openness to understand values and points of view very different from our own. When we really listen, our own ideas and values are sometimes altered. To listen well means to be vulnerable. If you listen empathically, your heart will certainly be wrung. Though the effective listener maintains some emotional distance from the speaker’s pain, he is not insulated from experiencing some of the hurt that is crushing the other. Then, too, one’s gift of listening may not be appreciated, or it may be exploited.
Listening is intensely demanding and therefore should not be entered into lightly. The experienced listener enters the helping relationship cautiously knowing that it involves time, effort, and sacrifice on his part. George Gazda points out that it is more respectful of the person with the problem or need if the listener weighs carefully the decision to help. Listening should not be entered into halfheartedly or carelessly. Nor should the listener enter a situation where it is likely that he will be ineffective. Such efforts are doomed to fail, and are likely to harm the speaker as well as disappoint the listener.
SUMMARY
Guidelines for improved reflective listening include:
Don’t fake understanding.
Don’t tell the speaker you know how he feels.
Vary your responses.
Focus on the feelings.
Choose the most accurate feeling word.
Develop vocal empathy.
Strive for concreteness and relevance.
Provide nondogmatic but firm responses.
Reflect the speaker’s resources.
Reflect the feelings that are implicit in questions.
Reflect during brief interactions.
People often inquire if there is ever a time when it is OK to do more than exercise listening skills when the other has a problem. Additive responses tend to be risky, but may sometimes be used after a base of trust has been built. Additive responses include responding with a touch, providing factual information, taking action, leading the other through a problem-solving procedure, referral, appropriate self-disclosure, confrontation, and “you-me” talk. After an additive response has been made, further reflective responses are usually advisable.
There are many occasions that call for reflective listening:
Before you act.
Before you argue.
When the other person experiences strong feelings or wants to talk over a problem.
When the other person is speaking in a “code.”
When another person wants to sort out his feelings and thoughts.
During a “direct mutual conversation.”
When you are talking to yourself
When encountering new ideas in a book, lecture, or at work.
It is important to know when not to listen reflectively:
When you are not able to be accepting.
When you do not trust the other to find his own solution.
When you are not “separate” from the other.
When you use listening as a way of hiding yourself.
When you feel very hassled or depleted.
While listening is often a delight, it is also a very demanding activity that should not be entered into lightly. If done well, it can be a burden for the listener; if done poorly, it may be a burden for the speaker.
PART THREE
Assertion Skills
If I am not for myself, who will be for me?
If I am for myself only, what am I?
If not now—When?1
—Hillel, ancient Jewish sage
CHAPTER EIGHT
Three Approaches
to Relationships
Open, honest communication. Learning how to relax and reduce anxiety. Getting more of your needs met. Learning social skills that form closer interpersonal relationships. Being able to verbally and nonverbally communicate your positive and negative feelings, thoughts, and emotions without experiencing undue amounts of anxiety or guilt and without violating the dignity of others. Taking responsibility for what happens to you in life. Making more decisions and free choices. Being a friend to yourself and maintaining your own dignity and self-respect. Recognizing that you have certain rights and a value system that need not be sacrificed. Being able to protect yourself from being victimized and taken advantage of by others. Discriminating as to when assertive behaviors may lead to negative as well as positive consequences.
Essentially, this is what we believe assertion training is all about. It is not aggression training whereby you transgress upon the rights and dignity of another person. It is not a means of manipulating or deceiving others in order to just get ahead. On the contrary, assertion training, as we see it, rests upon a foundation of respect—respect for yourself, respect for others, and respect for your own value system.1
—Sherwin Cotler and Julio Guerra, clinical psychologists
LISTENING AND ASSERTION:
THE YIN AND YANG
OF COMMUNICATION
In ancient Chinese thought, the terms yin and yang referred to polar categories, which, though very different, were interdependent and complementary facets of existence (see Figure 8.1). Yin and yang are necessary to each other. The goal of the yin-yang philosophers was the attainment of perfect balance between the two principles.
Figure 8.1. The yin-yang symbol.
I like to think of listening and assertion as the yin and yang of communication. Vital relationships involve both asserting and listening. The yang of assertion is the disclosure to another of what the speaker feels, needs, desires. The yin of listening is understanding and acceptance offered to another in times of stress or joy. Now yin, now yang is the way of vital communication. To the degree that a person is underdeveloped in either eleme
nt, her maturation is incomplete. To the extent that either listening or assertion is missing from either person in their relationship—to that degree the relationship falls short of its potential.
We have already noted the deficiencies in listening that abound in our society. Unfortunately, assertion is also quite rare. Experts in communications skills estimate that less than 5 percent of the population can be expected to communicate assertively.2 This means that nothing much of personal or interpersonal importance is being communicated in most conversations. Fairly typical is a novelist’s portrayal of the interaction between a mother and her daughter at an especially poignant moment for both of them. The mother commented sadly, “The real things never get said.”3
METHODS FOR DEVELOPING
ASSERTIVENESS
Just as there are specific skills that increase listening ability, so there are practical methods for developing assertiveness. Since the 1960s, more research and experimentation have focused on how to increase one’s assertiveness than at any other period of history. The topic has become extremely popular, as books and magazine articles on assertion have flooded the marketplace. Many agencies have held workshops on assertiveness and some colleges report that courses dealing with this area receive the heaviest enrollment.
One of the primary appeals of assertion training (A.T.) is its effectiveness. For example, a study by the University of Missouri regarding the worth of some of its assertion training programs indicated that 85 percent of the participants experienced some changes in their lives as a result of A.T. A similar percentage of participants said they were able to maintain or increase their assertiveness skills in the six to eighteen months since they completed their training.4 Obviously, there are significant qualitative differences between assertion training programs. Still, one of the main reasons for the popularity of assertion training is that its methods are extremely practical. Most people find it instantly applicable and have a high degree of success using it.
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