Listening online

Listening is a skill. Some people tell me I’m a good listener. I have often laughed that I should be good at listening because I’ve attended (literally) hundreds of workshops and sessions about listening!

There are really practical things that help listening. Create physical spaces in which you can listen – reduce noise and distraction. Create emotional spaces in which you can listen – be present. Create time in which you can listen – focus on the subject which needs attention. Suspend your inner critic and your inner judge, your busy self, your need to be knowledgeable or to be right. Listen to what is being said, how it is being said. Listen for meaning not words or definitions.

There are more philosophical ideas that help listening. Carla Rinaldi, pedagogical consultant for Reggio Children, describes a ‘pedagogy of listening’ in which listening is a reciprocal relationship generated by curiosity and each person is seen, heard and held.

Some Indigenous people in Australia speak of dadirri or deep listening that comes from being still, waiting and ‘hearing’ the right pathway. Quakers practice this kind of listening in their silent worship.

As a facilitator, part of my work is to bring people together and support them to listen. When they do, they generate solutions that are innovative, purposeful and ‘bespoke’ to their situation.

Over the last few years and due to the pandemic, this coming together has often occurred on-line for a plethora of advocacy, advertising, training, learning, information sharing, relationship building and networking tasks.

There are, obviously, many advantages of on-line platforms. They offer opportunities for more people, from different locations, to come together purposefully and joyously, with reduced impact on our fragile planet. They enable us to access information from different sources during a discussion. They bring us face-to-face with others (unless our video is turned off) and give us an equal voice (unless our microphones are on mute).

I wonder if people listen?

I wonder if deep listening or the pedagogy of listening can be understood and experienced?

Do you have a task for a group of people in which you would like real listening to lead to understanding, awareness, sharing, generation and rejuvenation? Call me!