Compassionate Listening

   As part of making compassion a regular part of my life, and looking for as many ways as possible to try practicing compassion, I am focusing on a technique I’m calling “compassionate listening”.

   It’s a lot like just plain old listening. Actually, it’s more like active listening with the extra added attraction of engaging my heart in the listening process.

   In my years as a newspaper reporter covering a wide variety of public events, I had many opportunities to observe audiences, and how people listen. While there are as many types of listening as there are people, there are some definable categories.

   Here are a few categories I've identified:

   Absent listeners – these are the people whose bodies are present, but their minds are obviously somewhere else.

   Distracted listeners – these are the ones who listen some of the time, but spend the rest of the time rooting through their purse or pockets for something that they never find. They also often jiggle their leg, or spend their time texting on their phones.

   Confused listeners – somewhere along the line, these folks missed the point, but are trying their darndest to get a clue as to what is going on. They often can be seen looking around to see if others are as lost as they are.

   Focused listeners – stare intently at the speaker as if to make sure nothing escapes their notice. Are often the ones who will shush neighboring audience members who engage in conversation during the event.

   Active listeners – can be seen leaning forward, making eye contact with the speaker, their bodies mirroring the stance of the presenter. They are often the first ones to laugh when the speaker cracks a joke.

   As I see it, these are different ways to describe how present a person is, plotting out a spectrum of engagement from least engaged to entirely engaged.

   Most of us have also experienced these different types of listeners in one-on-one conversation. We know how it feels when we are talking to someone who isn’t paying attention to what we’re saying. We somehow feel diminished -- less than -- and we leave the conversation feeling an emptiness inside.

   Articles I have read in my new field of psychology talk about the counselor engaging in empathetic listening by being wholly present and feeling an unconditional regard for the client.

   Compassionate listening, I believe, takes this process a step further. Beyond being engaged, the compassionate listener becomes somehow involved in the other’s world. They endeavor not only to be present, but on some level become a participant in the other’s story, as if they are walking with the other person through the event.

   The reason I call this compassionate listening is because it serves the definition of compassion: recognizing the suffering of another, and feeling moved to relieve that suffering. By being a compassionate listener, it recognizes that we all are suffering, and by listening with the heart we are helping to lighten the burden of another’s suffering.

   It is reminiscent of the saying: “A burden shared is a burden lightened.”

   When I listen with an open heart, I am saying to the other person, “I hear you, I care, and I want to be with you.”

   This doesn’t mean that I plan on turning myself into a dumping ground for all my friends’ sorrows. Far from it. As I mentioned in an earlier post, self-care is paramount, because if I don’t take care of myself, I can’t be a good friend or a useful member of society.

   There is a difference between being a cup that holds everything that’s poured into it, and a stream that continues to flow and wash the banks clean.

   When I am listening compassionately, I don’t take another’s troubles into myself and make them part of me, rather, I listen and let them flow through me. In turn I reflect back my care and regard for them.

   Beyond being a comforting presence for a friend in pain, compassionate listening is also applicable in sharing another’s joy, or even in mundane conversations of daily life. As I said before, we all have a past that contains suffering, and having a compassionate listener can serve to ease some of the ubiquitous suffering of life.

   And we could all use a little of that.

~*~

   To learn more about the various forms that compassion can take, go to: www.CompassionSpace.com.