“Genuine listening requires that you willingly bear witness to what someone else needs to say while simultaneously sparing them of your own solution, defense, dismissal, alternative reality, rebuttal, counterpoint, comparable story or more extreme example. This kind of listening is a very “active” part to play in a conversation. You have to believe for those moments that none of the things you might say could possibly be as valuable as hearing someone out. You may need to employ every ounce of your strength of character to actually pay attention and not butt-in with your own bit. That kind of attention paid to another is powerful medicine.”
—Gil Hedley

uring my training, the monks at the Zen monastery were all taught a facilitation technique in which we would simply repeated back to the person what they had said to us. Very much like a parrot would, without any extra “spin” added on our part.

“My wife made reservations for us both to attend an event and I had other plans. Now we’re fighting.”

“So, what I hear you saying is that you’re fighting with your wife because she made reservations for you both to attend an event and you had made other plans.”

The beauty of this process is it helps keep you, the facilitator, out of the drama the other person may be bringing to the conversation. You’re not trying to be “helpful” (in your not so helpful ways) by giving advice, feedback, commentary, judgment, entanglement, better ideas, or fixing attitudes. You’re simply bouncing what the other person said back so he can hear it as he said it. Often times, this is enough to spur the conversation forward toward bigger insights.

What’s incredible is this process is not just useful in facilitation, but it’s also handy in everyday conversations. Especially if the topic is emotionally charged for you and you’re in danger of “losing your cool.” Now, you can keep your energy out of it and avoid a fight by reflecting the other person’s energy back to them, like conversational Jiu-Jitsu!

You can even practice this with children. A father in my online retreat started saying back what his son said to him and it transformed their relationship for the better! I like to practice it with children myself because often times kids simply want adults to pay attention to them. How awesome that I don’t have to do anything other than say back to them what they’d said.

If we look deep-down, acceptance and attention are all we’ve ever wanted. No wonder listening actively is some powerful medicine!