Listening Isn't Nice - It's Justice Work

This morning in my Process Work Consult group with the fabulous Susan Hatch, I presented a case, and the conversation caught fire. Twenty therapists leaned in, eager to explore a core challenge in our field:

We must be unattached—to our interventions, our ideas about the world, and especially to helping or changing the client.

Now, you might wonder: Then what the hell does someone pay us for?

What I’ve found is that real transformation happens when I take a power-with stance rather than a power-over stance. It’s not about being passive or meek—it’s about holding skill without making therapy about me. When I do that, the client can fully inhabit their own experience, trust themselves, and make their own changes from a place of deep self-trust. I’ve been reflecting on this with a colleague who does it beautifully—he owns his expertise while deeply listening and honoring each client’s process.

This is rare.

I’ve attended so many workshops where what makes me uneasy is not the intervention itself but how the therapist wields their power.

?? Take Fritz Perls working with Gloria: Watch this clip. Notice how she tries to find power with him—but he dictates, pushes, and doesn’t offer a relational path forward. No shade to Fritz, Gestalt was the first modality I trained in and I have spent many years in Gestalt groups throughout my life and I enjoyed them. But the power was really weird. So I kept hunting for models that tracked power.

?? Now, watch Carl Rogers with Gloria: This video. He begins differently—he’s in an I/Thou relationship from the start.

David Wallin teaches a great workshop dissecting Perls, Rogers, and Adler and their work with Gloria. I have taken it twice so need to give him credit for this awareness. And what always stands out to me is this: Therapists need a lot more training on power.

I’m grateful for Arnie Mindell’s work on power in Process Work, and Juliane Taylor Shore takes it even further. She pointed out recently that some humanistic therapists, can, in their effort to avoid misusing power, shrink into a kind of meekness, hesitant to take up space. But relational trauma is about power. When someone has been harmed, it’s often because they felt powerless to change the situation.

That means therapists must be mindful of not replicating power-over or power-under dynamics. Of course, this is impossible to perfect—every client perceives a therapist’s power differently based on identity, background, and experience. But this is exactly why curiosity and humility around power matter. Without them, “power-blind” listening can create real disconnection in the relational field—whether in therapy or any other relationship.

?? So what does power-with listening actually look like?

1?? Listen with openness. Not with an agenda, critical analysis, or judgment. Juliane calls it Witnessing Mind—it’s similar to the Buddhist concept of Beginner’s Mind, psychoanalysts call it listening with the third ear for the unconscious, or Mindell’s concept of listening with a Process Mind. It’s about total curiosity regarding the content, the embodied process, the unconscious, threat, incongruence and power in the relational process to name just a few.

2?? Ask for consent before intervening. “May I interrupt you?” "Can we try something?" "How does that land for you?" It is small but huge. This signals that the other person’s power and process are as important as your intervention or ideas. This is why, in active listening training, you ask "Did I hear you correctly?" after reflecting. It is a power-with-move.

3?? Show humility. In Deep Democracy, a large-group form of Process Work, facilitators say, “I am not sure what will happen, but let’s see.” There’s always an acknowledgment of “As I understand it, but my understanding is limited.” Or someone might say "What my teachers have taught me" which I love so much. It is such a different energy. Perls' video shows very little humility—and Gloria gets triggered and struggles to stay engaged.

4?? Check your own power. As Susan Hatch pointed out today, if you need to be the helper, the healer, the transforming facilitator, the professor, the savior—or even the good listener—you’re actually in a power-over stance. And that shifts the entire relational field. But if you are afraid to share what you know or lack the skill to lean into the relationship from a power-with stance, you may fall into a power-under stance, which can make the other person feel uncertain or even frightened.

?? Why is listening justice work?

Because listening—real listening—restores agency. When someone has been silenced, dismissed, or unheard, listening reclaims space for their voice. It equalizes the relational field. It acknowledges history, power, and the deep human need to be seen. Done well, it is an act of resistance against oppression.

I’m struck by how difficult it is for people to step out of the helper/healer/good person role. It has been especially poignant as I spend time in the nonprofit space with Sidewalk Talk. We do deep work on power and embodiment in Sidewalk Talk’s HEAR Training, but we’re taking it even further in our next edition coming in May.

I watch some listening experts give a training, but what interests me most is how they hold their power in the room. Can their listening be felt if they need to be the expert listener? In recent years, young people have started listening projects like Sidewalk Talk to gain social media followers, build personal brands, and become paid public speakers. Can their listening be impactful if they exploit the stories shared solely to make one's public speaking brand? I don't know. Maybe. And it is a weird power dynamic that has me curious.

One thing is true: I still have a lot to learn about my own use of power. A colleague once pointed out that while I’m confident, I sometimes hesitate to fully step into my expertise as a therapist—out of concern for misusing that power. In a way, writing more lately is part of my power-with practice. I have twenty-seven years of training in psychology now and I trust what I know more boldly. At the same time, I’m willing to let go of what I think I know when I learn something new.

If you want to explore how you listen—and how power might subtly influence your listening—you might want to get on the Sidewalk Talk HEAR email list. And of course, please join in or help out with our bus tour in May. We need local outreach helpers in Kansas City, St. Louis, Cincinnati, Columbus, and Pittsburgh.

Because listening isn’t just “nice.” It’s justice work—when done well.

Would love to hear your thoughts. How do you see power dynamics show up in listening?