Deep Listening: An Introduction

Conversation largely consists of two parts at a high level: ‘speaking’ and 'listening’. There is a lot of emphasis on speaking and there are many development practices for it, but not as many such practices on ‘listening’. I think listening is also very important and it goes beyond simple ‘hearing’. In this article, I will touch base on listening and how to make conversations more effective with ‘deep listening’. I will also discuss two broad methods to develop and practice it. Let’s dive into it.

When a conversation is happening, people may be ‘thinking’ to come up with something to ‘stay on top’ of it. Sometimes, people may be preoccupied with previously conceived notions on the person they are talking to or the topic at hand and formulate an ‘opinion’. In some cases, people ‘appear’ to be paying attention, but their ‘mind’ wanders off and are actually ‘processing’ something else. Sometimes, people respond right away if they hear something that they disagree with before the conversation ‘ends’ meaningfully. I can go on and on to list several such real life situations where conversations are not effective and unfortunately sometimes can be harmful.?

Often, people are ‘meant’ to say more than what they are actually ‘saying’. Something may be building over a period of time in that person and you may not be on the ‘same page’. Not everyone you speak to will have great vocabulary or make a good choice of words to express what they really mean. Sometimes there can be a ‘hidden’ message ‘in between the lines’ that is not explicitly coming out. So, ‘listening’ in conversation should be able to receive other essential information that is encoded in the tone, expression, and delivery.?

‘Deep listening’ is required in order to ‘listen’ to what the other person is actually ‘saying’ without missing any bit of information’. It is possible only when you are paying ‘complete attention’ and you are immersed in the topic. You are not judgmental or reactive to the conversation. While listening, you are just receiving ‘new’ information. But how do you develop such deep listening? I would simplify by splitting it into two ways: ‘internal deep listening’ and ‘external deep listening’.

Internal deep listening is about listening to yourself. You can practice it when you are ‘alone’. For this, you will have to be comfortable to be alone first without distractions for at least 20 minutes. There is an inner conversation that happens when you are alone; maybe even a plethora of conversations will take place. You will have to identify the one that you want to process and discard everything else. You ‘‘listen’ to it with full attention including the whole context without missing anything. If you can stay with the topic without letting your mind wander off to some other topic, you are successful in listening deeply to yourself.

To explain an ‘external deep listening’, let’s use a familiar real world example and please picture yourself in it as you read though. You want to grab a drink with your friend and have entered the bar and noticed that it is occupied and have been asked to wait to be seated. While waiting, to your discomfort, a lot of loud chatter is happening as everyone is conversing and it doesn't make sense at all. After a while, you and your friend got a seat and ordered your drinks. Pretty soon you strike up a conversation with your friend and you both are ‘communicating’ with each other comfortably. Now, let’s analyze this scene. The chatty noise that was so loud a few min ago, is still so, maybe even more as you have added some more to it, but you are not bothered by it now. You are able to ‘engage’ in the conversation and discard what is not ‘relevant’ by processing only what you are ‘interested in’. That is possible because of our inner ability to do so and as humans, we are gifted with it. The ability to summon such skill when you need it is very powerful and is the basis for ‘external deep listening’.?

While ‘listening’, you should also withhold your judgment, advice, or auto response (let’s call it buffering of information). Once you buffer completely, put your analytical skills to work and come up with the best course of action for response. Buffering can help you to refrain from instant responses, and that can help smoothen conversations and even can eliminate potential escalation of tension that can occur when both parties are ‘talking’, but not ‘listening’ to each other. Buffering can be healthy only when you can ‘absorb’ information without building up additional stress inside you due to withholding responses. It can be developed with good ‘breathing’ and ‘mindfulness’ practices. Note that every conversation does not have to be ‘deep-listened’ and many start casually but pretty soon can take turns requiring deep listening. Identifying those that require deep listening as they happen is very important.

Deep listening brings your ‘presence’ to the conversation. It promotes ‘trust’ by connecting people at a deeper level. Elephants are known to have deep listening ability as their herds are deeply connected with ‘compassion’. Deep listening can be your passport to knock on the door of ‘Emotional Intelligence’, which itself is a topic for another day. It can be developed and the way to start on this journey is to be ‘mindful’ first. Here is the link to an article that gives you an introduction to 'mindfulness'.

As we get close to the article, I hope I have touched the basics and importance of deep listening and raised the necessary awareness with some tips. I sincerely hope that your conversations become more effective, may the difficult ones get less strenuous, and may your relationships get stronger with deep listening.?

Wish you all the very best!

Hari Miriyala