The Art of Listening

AM Psalm 80 • PM Psalm 77, [79]
Lev. 25:35-55 • Col. 1:9-14 • Matt. 13:1-16

Listening skills are truly an art. In my training in Counseling, learning how to listen was a key component in my education. I learned that there are many different types of listening which all have different purposes. Putting those skills into practice is the backbone of effective, healing communication. One has only to google “the art of listening” to see that it is an important skill across many disciplines. In Education for Ministry, effective listening skills are considered vital to a group’s successful functioning, and space in our manual is given to teaching those skills.

To paraphrase Zen Master Shunryu Suzuki, who said in a collection of informal talks on Zen meditation practice [“Zen Mind, Beginner’s Mind”], that ‘in order to truly listen a person must give up all preconceived notions and opinions. Otherwise what we hear will be an echo. Having preconceptions influences what we actually hear. Therefore, whether we accept or reject what we hear depends on how concordant the speaker’s words are with our own notions’.

Most all of us have been in a conversation with someone who simply does not listen. Perhaps the person is someone who is defensive or too attached to their own opinions. Maybe they are too absorbed in what they want to say next, or they have a personal agenda, such as making the speaker wrong or bad. No matter how hard one tries to effectively communicate with them, they are simply not going to really hear or understand what is being said. What they do hear is their own emotionally charged interpretation so that their preconceived notions and opinions play out. This is a sad and very frustrating situation. Often relationships between two people are damaged or broken because of the inability or unwillingness to really listen.

Jesus says in Matthew 13:13: “The reason I speak to them in parables is that ‘seeing they do not perceive, and hearing they do not listen, nor do they understand’.” Jesus knew that there would be no authentic comprehension of his teachings by many in his audience; that his words would be skewed. But Jesus found a means to communicate his teachings in a way that could not be twisted. Parables! A footnote in my Bible says that Matthew was not of the opinion, as Mark was, that Jesus taught in parables in order to conceal and obscure his teachings. I believe that Jesus knew that his parables would bring revelation to those who truly tried to listen, those who wanted to really understand what he was teaching.

All too often I know I am too preoccupied with God hearing me! As the Psalmist says in Chapter 77:1, “I cry aloud to God, aloud to God, that he may hear me.” I really want to get better at listening to God; at getting out of my own way and consciously practicing my prayers and reading and listening to scripture with a clear mind, a “beginner’s mind,” so I can begin to understand what God is to saying to me.

Written by Deborah Griffin

...who is enjoying the blessings of springtime and is praying for new beginnings everywhere.