Have you ever given enough importance to developing your listening skills? If you have not, what stops you? And let us see who all benefits from developing their listening skills when engaging in a conversation? Is it the listener? Is it the speaker? Or both? Developing your listening skills will help you in many ways; for example, you can make others feel important and valued in their personal and professional life. You can inspire and influence others if you have effective listening skills.
Varied Listening Experiences
Do you experience getting disrupted before you finish your points when you are in a conversation? Sometimes, it is unintentional because the other person is not aware of developing listening skills and using their listening skills.
Have you ever been involved in a scenario where you were seriously putting across your points; however, the other person is more curious about checking or replying to their phone messages instead of paying attention to your talk? I had been there several times. It is frustrating. This situation is another best example of lacking listening skills and not using listening skills. Likewise, it shows the importance of developing listening skills in daily life to create a meaningful conversation.
Did you ever converse with someone who whispers uh-huh, nodding their head, even without hearing a single word you said? How did you feel? I have experienced it several times and thought it was a total time-wasting activity. It made me feel unimportant at the end of the conversation. Another incident shows the importance of developing your listening skills to make a fulfilling experience in everyday life.
So, I decided to develop my listening skills and listen to others effectively. To develop and employ listening skills effectively, you will have to consider it as a discipline and practice them. Because its benefits are enormous, it will help you boost your personal and professional relationships. In this article, you can read the techniques I learned to develop my listening skills. Are you planning to develop listening skills? If you are, keep reading.
Developing Listening Skills Through Artful Listening
The art of listening is nothing but listening with a dedication to hear and understand what the other person is saying or aiming to say. However, sometimes they may not say what they intend to say.
You may have to be an artful listener to listen to what they want, but do not say it intentionally. It is about understanding the other person’s feelings. An artful listener can feel the speaker’s (other person’s) feelings. Through artful listening, you develop listening skills and create space for other people to be heard.
To engage at this level of listening, you may need to discover the other person with whom you are conversing at the moment of speaking. Developing listening skills is an ongoing process, you can do it with mindful practice and also know valube assest.
Furthermore, through this way of listening, you empower the speaker with the support, recognition, and regard they are craving.
Now, let us recall the last time you engaged in a conversation with someone. Perhaps, you went to the discussion to be heard. In addition, you wanted the listener to listen to your ideas, thoughts, stories, feelings, and achievements.
Although you started the talk to be heard, it crashed. Neither of the participants is heard or validated. Neither you nor the other person did not get the feeling of being nurtured or validated. What does it usually lead to?
In this scenario, the emotional damage caused is vast. If it repeats frequently, it can damage your friendship or relationships.
Thus, it is good to commit before you start the conversation. Consider this conversation is only about the other person. Indeed, you intend to let another participant leave the conversation feeling better about themselves than before speaking to you. Therefore, enter each chat to develop your listening skills and employ your listening skills.
Listen With Your Heart For Developing Listening Skills
Secondly, you should learn to listen with your heart and intuition rather than your mind. You are familiar with listening with our conscious mind, the part of the mind that helps us distinguish between good and evil because we have been trained and experienced that way of listening.
You manage the affairs of life with conscious minds, using all our knowledge and ideas that have been gained in our conscious minds.
Likewise, have you ever noticed the process of thinking with your conscious mind? It seems like reasoning or contesting. For instance, I talk about my vacation, and you narrate yours.
While receiving verbal instructions to do certain things in a particular way, sometimes you disagree (at least that is what you think when listening). But do not voice your opinion due to varied reasons.
Besides, have you allowed your mind to use the superior listening ability that your body is naturally created to do? If you have not, you can begin by hearing what is precisely said, what is intended to convey, what is not yet revealed, and what is felt. If you develop the skill to listen with your heart, you can achive a lot in your personal and professional life. So, paying attention to listen with your heart is a crucial step to develing your listening skills.
Practicing Super Listening Skills to developing listening skills
Now, you are probably curious to know where you want to begin for developing your listening skills? The answer is straightforward. You may start now, keep doing things for develop your listening skills. Delaying won’t do any good for you. Intead, it might delay your success on a daily basis. So, Are you ready to take some simple steps for developing listeing skills?
To practice the super listening skills, you may want to quieten your mind, see fully, and understand where the person is coming from. To say precisely, mindfully pay attention to what emotional state that person is going through now. Here, you will wipe clean all the pre-notion about this person from your mind. Be fully there for listen-only about this person. Thus, you can listen to the other person with your whole self. Keep practising it to developing listening skills.
Be Aware of Your Typical Listening Ways
Additionally, you want to recognize the typical listening ways you use to filter the conversations every day. Do you experience any of the following? Does it resonate with you? Being aware of these patterns will help you identify, “are you using any of these?” Being self-aware is the first bold step towards developing listening skills.
I am busy with my matters. I do not have time to listen to familiar stories.
Stop beating the bush, get to the point and save time.
You already said the same thing before. So, I know what you are going to tell me now.
I have different ideas that are workable.
My ideas are better than yours.
Those beliefs limit you from being fully present. Thus, you can create empowering beliefs to replace your typical listening ways.
For example, one like this, I am fully present to listen only about you. I am fully committed to empowering you.
I am giving importance and validation to your ideas, stories, and feelings.
Instilling you with empowering beliefs will help develop your listening skills and use them in daily conversations.
Are You Hearing or Listening?
You listen to many things daily such as alarm clock, radio, T.V, mobile talks, etc. Further, you might have talked to your family, friends, or co-workers. You were listening to these types of conversations all over your day.
Were you paying close attention to all these things when you heard them? Perhaps, you are listening to all the sounds from your surroundings.
No matter what exactly happened all those times. The point here is hearing and Listening is not the same. They are different. Then let us see the main difference between these two activities. Knowing the distiction between hearing and listening will help in developing listening skills. When you are clear about the differnces, you can do self monitoring, How many times in a day you are trying to develping listening skills.
Hearing is a physiological process in which you register the sound you heard with your ears. It is passive. In listening, you hear the sound, comprehend them, and act as per your understanding. So, it is an active process. If you have effective listening skills, you will be listening for crucial points—it facilities you to gather vital information. Therefore, better listening skills help you act in a better manner.
You have practical listening skills to listen for vital information and comprehend quality information. Further, you can understand the speaker with who you are conversing in a better manner and positively impact the person. You can influence and spire your speaker by employing your super listening skills. So, focus on developing your listening skills, it is a daily activity.
As an effective listener, you can build rapport and encourage the speaker to be open to sharing their thoughts, stories, and ideas.
Suppose you are talking with someone who has poor listening skills, then the other person will not have the ability to understand the speaker and his situation. It will be a barrier to effective communication.
Furthermore, the speaker will not get encouragement and validation from the conversation, and sometimes it can be a waste of time. Think about the importance of developing listening skills, and how it will help you be an effective communicator as well as an effective time manager.
Excellent Listening Skills to empower
Some people are great at listening. Perhaps, you know someone who is a great listener. Or you might have gotten a chance to engage in conversation with a great listener.
Indeed, who does not want to be listened to?
Why do people love to be listened to? What benefits do you gain from engaging in a conversation with a great listener?
When someone listens to you with care and empathy, what you say and how you feel about the situation, it makes you think further and open up. So, you feel relaxed because of the effective listening skills of the listener.
Listening is a blessing that anyone can give to others. Many efforts are needed to be a great listener. And anyone can acquire those skills, but the constant practice is required. When you become a great listener, you put aside your complaints and concerns for a while, keep your focus on someone else’s issues and listen to them.
Developing Listening Skills To Influence
Think of an instance you are in a conversation with someone; you position yourself in talking mode most of the time and spend less time listening. What would be the result? You would be reducing the possibility of getting information from the other participant. Here, you may miss a big opportunity to gain ideas and learn from your loved ones and co-workers.
Additionally, if you try to persuade someone with your argumentative talk, it will not create much impact on the listener. Instead, switching to a listening mode will be beneficial. You can collect information from the listener that would be useful to you. Briefly, developing listening skills is useful and it can assist to manage these situations reasonably well.
3 Knowing Common Types of Listening Skills for Developing Your Listening Skills
Casual Listening
You do casual listening most of the time. In this listening, you listen, think, and talk. You focus on other people and what they are saying, and at the same time, you focus on what reply you want to give.
Moreover, it is a natural activity and needs less effort. Casual listening occurs in our daily conversations.
Active Listening Skills
In this listening, the listener gives more energy to listening and processing information. Spend less time speaking. Also, the listener spends time focusing on the speaker to understand him entirely, asking clarifying questions, repeating the data, and offering observations.
Deep Listening skills
When you engage in deep listening, you can experience what your speaker is being and what they are saying. If you are involved in deep listening, your mind will be quiet and calm. You are fully present to the person you are listening to, and the listener has little sense of awareness of themselves.
If you practice active listening, you will want to understand speakers’ viewpoints fully, even if you disagree with them. You can convey it back to the speaker to make sure you listened to them accurately. What an amazing way for developing listening skills! Do you want to work towards developing listening skills, while you are reading these lines about developing listening skills?
Simple Ways To Make Sure You Listened Correctly.
You can use some simple methods such as paraphrasing, clarifying, summarizing, and reflecting to ensure the accuracy of your understanding and devloping listening skills.
Paraphrase- You repeat what you listened to from the speaker by using different wordings and in a concise form. Here you specify What exactly you heard from the speaker.
When you paraphrase, you let the speaker know you are trying to understand their message and perceptions. The feeling of being valued encourages the speaker to open up and speak. Likewise, it allows them to hear again and focus on their thoughts. Through this process, as a listener , you are developing listening skills.
2. Clarifying
When you need clarification, ask the speaker to describe what they said. When you seek clarification as a listener, the speaker gets an opportunity to check how much the listener understood. Further, it allows the speaker to recognize what has been said vaguely. Asking for clarification is a helpful technique to develop your listening skills. Perhaps, it is a learning for the speaker to understand the importance of developing listening skills, here you indirectly provide an opportunity for the speaker for developing listening skills as a valuable asset.
3. Reflecting
Here, as an active listener, you receive the information from the speaker and then pass it on to the speaker. While reflecting to make him, you make clear you understood their feelings. It sends the message to the speaker you are trying to understand his content and emotions. It is another powerful tool to develop your listening skills from now on.
4. Summarizing
As an active listener, you recognize and combine vital points the speaker has said. While making sure what matters to the speaker, you create a feeling of importance to the speaker. This method is yet another powerful method for developing your listening skills.
What are the usual barriers to developing active listening skills?
Imagine you are in a conversation with someone. Even while listening to speakers, if you try to fix their issues by suggesting or advising. These acts of fixing will hinder your active listening. So, to develop listening skills, you may have to refrain from thinking about fixing the speaker’s concerns while you are in the process of listening.
Further, while listening to another person, it is better not to engage in praising, judging, changing the topic, or interrupting comments. Avoid all these actions so that you can assure you are developing your listening skills. By engaging in devloping listening skills, you are really helping the speaker as well as you.
Conclusion
I hope this article will remind you of the importance of devloping listening skills. It will encourage you to sharpen your listening skills and reap its benefits in the coming days. Moreover, through developing listening skills, you can make others feel valued, and heard. Consequently, you can influence and inspire the people around you by developing your skills.
Ask youself these questions for assessing your current listening skills:
Answers will help you be aware of the idea of developing listening skills and how to execute them in your life.
What are the things you will take to devloping listenening skills?
When do you need to develop listening skills?
Do you need help to devoling listening skills?
Who can help you devloping listening skills?
What areas you get benefitted by deloping listening skills?
Photo by Anna Vander Stel on Unsplash
