UNLOCK MORE AUTHENTIC CONNECTIONS THROUGH DEEP LISTENING
How I Learned the Power of Deep Listening
A Step-by-Step Guide to How Deep Listening Helped Me Connect to My Patients, My Mom, and Myself
We can learn important interpersonal skills with our minds, but we master them when we open our hearts.
This was true for me with the practice of deep listening. As a Buddhist, I studied the concept of deep listening through mindfulness and meditation. As a hospital chaplain, in a level-one trauma center, my patients opened my heart to the skills of deep listening.
After clocking in at the hospital I would walk down the long hallway to the spiritual care office. Over time I could feel myself drop into a deep sense of presence and mindful awareness. For the next eight hours, it was my job to be a peaceful presence for patients, family members, and staff members. Deep listening was my job.
Once I responded to a request to visit with a patient’s girlfriend. It was two in the morning when I entered and took in the landscape of the dark room. In the corner was a girl, young enough to be my daughter, curled up on the window sill staring into the darkness outside. I could feel her effort to make herself small in the room, and my presence only caused her to shrink even smaller.
I glanced over at the hospital bed where her boyfriend was in a sedated sleep. The stark white bandages on his left arm and head couldn’t hide the damage beneath. Drain tubes poking out here and there. Puffy fingers with splotchy bruised flesh peaked out of the end of the bandage.
For the next two hours, I sat with her, compassionately listening to her retell her story. Three men wielding machetes had attached them after they had been mistaken for a different couple. She recounted how her boyfriend had covered her with his body to shield her from the blows. How they both ‘played dead’ so the attackers would leave. And finally how she had raced house to house banging on doors to get help. I listened as she told me how her boyfriend might lose his arm. The girl’s face twisted with sour guilt as she showed me a small cut on her arm.
Her story continued to unfold. I held the space actively listening to her so that she felt seen and heard in her horrible experience. The first step in her healing was feeling safe enough to tell her story.
In a much less traumatic way, I recently discovered how deep listening showed up in my own life.
In November of last year, I placed my Mom in an assisted living facility, four hours from where I live. She could do most things herself and I felt confident this would be an improved quality of life. And it was, until it wasn’t.
After a few months, I started to receive regular phone calls from the facility. They expressed concern for a variety of small issues, that became bigger issues. This is when I realized deep listening is a superpower that creates meaningful connections.
When I saw the caller ID, my entire sensory system would go on high alert. I would listen to each word, pause, breath, and intonation, of what was spoken, and unspoken. I could tell within the first fifteen seconds where this call would end up. Was it a simple update? Or was there something more serious I needed to know?
It was different to use deep listening on the phone, with someone I loved. But I learned when I shifted to a mindful presence, I offered better support to both my mom and the caregivers.
If you want to improve your skills of deep listening here are my favorite tips
- Be present and engaged: When you enter into a conversation with someone give them your full attention. How often have you checked Instagram while on a Zoom call, or checked work email at the brewery with friends? Put the phone away, stop scrolling or checking email, and make eye contact. Relax into the importance of the present moment.
- Listen for the unspoken message: You may have heard 90% of communication is non-verbal. Dr. Albert Mehrabian broke down that 90% and found that 55% is non-verbal, 38% is vocal, and only 7% is from the actual words. Open your awareness. Notice how body language, facial expressions, and the energy of the words give depth to what is being said. I often think of unspoken messages as the underlying drumbeat of what’s conveyed.
- Be non-judgemental: In my Zen Buddhist tradition we say, ‘not knowing is most intimate’. Drop what you think you know about the person or what they are saying and be open to what needs to emerge in that moment. The person likely didn’t engage with you to be judged but rather to be heard and understood. Letting go of judgment is hard. Both you and the speaker win when you spend less energy judging and more energy being a compassionate presence.
- Empathize: Most of us become immersed in calculating what we want to say next. Instead, shift your attention to what that person might be feeling. From that vantage point, you can listen from a place of compassion and kindness. Imagine how you would think in that situation and would make you feel supported by the listener.
- Ask clarifying questions: As a chaplain, I’ve definitely missed important points. Embarrassing to say, but I even called a patient by the wrong name - in a prayer! Clarifying questions make sure you understand what the person is trying to convey. When you do this it shows the person you are listening and engaged in what they have to say.
Practicing the skills of deep listening will improve conflict resolution and build trust. It also increases authentical connections with others and improves your conversations. It is a secret superpower!
We listen from the level of our own understanding and investment in the conversation. We would all do well to be more invested in the conversations we engage in. In our fast-paced tiktoc world of sound bites, it pays to slow down, take a pause and practice the art of deep listening.
