If you’ve ever spent more than three minutes with me in a relaxed setting, you’ll know one thing:
I’m a talker.
Even worse:
I’m an interrupter.
Terrible.
I am very aware that I want to be more of a listener, but I just don’t know how. I do listen, but as I listen, I find I just have a totally overwhelming desire to speak.
One of the things you can do when you want to change a behaviour is to train yourself to do an incompatible behaviour.
So here’s my experiment:
Before you make a statement, ask two questions.
I figure that if I ask a couple of questions, it will at least open up a bit of space to listen, and will delay me ‘adding value’.
I know this is a bit artificial and can’t be the last word on non-interruption, but at least it might function as first aid.
A beginning.
I will report back.
***
Hey, Talkers: What gets in the way of you listening?
(I have something brewing…)
Only half-baked ideas in the comments, please. And if you could avoid using the words ‘active’ and ‘listening’ next to each other, I’d be grateful.
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Hi Andrew
Love this suggestion, and as a chronic interrupter I will try to put it into practice!
The thing that most gets in the way of me listening is simply this: the other person says something, I have a response which I want to make, and then they keep talking (which of course they are entitled to do), and I have to hold onto my response. Because I know from long experience that I can’t hold very much in mind at once, and I know that if I don’t spend most of my attention on maintaining my thought, it will leave me. So I interrupt because I feel like I need to deal with each point as it comes up, or I will end up only dealing with the last point they make.
(This is one of the reasons I write a lot of stuff down in meetings.)
Also I interrupt because the other person is slow at finishing what they are saying, and often I think I know where they are going and wish they would just get there faster. I am not proud of this either.
Also, I recognise this ‘totally overwhelming desire to speak’ that you mention. For me it’s like a physical (physiological?) urge. It just builds up and builds up and the pressure of that in itself is a huge attention-suck.
Embarrassingly, ditto, ditto, ditto, ditto.
And ditto.
Maybe we have a condition?
I’ve … considered this possibility
Twitter: victoriashmoria
I wouldn’t necessarily say my interrupting is chronic, but if the conversation involves something I’m passionate about, that overwhelming urge becomes that much more…overwhelming.
Sometimes I even find myself carrying on my part of the conversation in my head while the other person is still talking. And then suddenly I’ll realize I have no idea what they were saying for that last bit.
Maybe when that happens it’s a sign that I need to get my thoughts out into the world – perhaps by writing about them on my blog, or putting a class together about the idea.
Either that, or it’s a sign of my need to be the center of attention?
Let’s go with the former.
I am wondering if there is some mileage in lookinh at the skill of being quiet *inside*….
And the presuppositions/beliefs behind the I-gotta-talk…
*musing…*
Yes! I am always anticipating what I am going to say next – its a habit I am trying to break.
Quieting my inside voice is what helps me- since becoming aware that I interrupt, I’ve been catching myself more (and apologizing for interrupting). I find when I have the urge to speak before the other person is finished, that it’s best if I just try to clear my head and listen to what they say. Sometimes the thread of conversation changes and I accept that.
A related habit, I think, is the urge to finish other peoples’ sentences.