Listening is one of the most important life skills one needs to live a truly good life. Jews are reminded daily how important listening is and to practice listening every time we say “Listen Israel, the L-d our god the L-d is one.”
Listening to Ourselves
Listening to our emotional pain is one of the most important aspects of listening to ourselves. We often choose denial of our pain over listening to it. Tanya had a sense that something wasn’t right between her and her husband, but continued to dismiss her feelings and rationalize them until the truth hit her in the face. Her husband’s phone left open on the kitchen table revealed that he had another woman in his life. Josh’s mother in law has poor boundaries. She is forever prying into his marriage. Josh was afraid of her wen he was dating his wife, but ignored his feelings and perceptions as being overly sensitive. Now, three years into the marriage he is suffering. If only he had faced his pain four years ago.
Our feelings in general and especially our emotional pain, such as depression, shame, guilt, anger, envy, emptiness, always have important meanings and lessons for us. Feelings are information. There is always a message and often a history attached to our emotional pain. Like emails, we can choose to open them or delete them. But deleting them can have serious consequences. Like physical pain, if we deny it we may discover later that a serious illness has developed which could have been avoided had we faced it earlier. The same is true with denial of emotional pain.
Dr. Carl Jung said, “Neurosis is always a substitute for legitimate suffering.” Our pain points toward the truths we fear to embrace about ourselves. We suffer because we fight reality, a fight we will always lose. When we face the truth no matter how painful, we always feel more alive. Theo’s boss was verbally abusive and tried to justify his boss’s behavior because he couldn’t afford to quit. When he finally admitted that he was suffering and did quit, he reclaimed his life. People have emotional breakdowns because they fear the truth. Only that which is false can break. Truth does not break. Facing the truth strengthens and empowers. The secret of inner peace is listening to the pain and uncomfortable and hidden truths in our hearts. When we choose denial, we become anxious, restless, and uneasy..
Listening to Others
Listening to another person’s emotional pain is one of the greatest acts of kindness a person can do. “People may not remember what you said or what you did, but they will always remember how you made them feel.” When we listen to another person’s feelings, we are conveying a powerful message: “You matter to me. Your life matters to me. Your struggles and pain matter to me.” When we don’t listen and dismiss other people’s feelings, we convey the opposite message: “You, your life, and all that’s unique about you don’t matter to me.”
Listening strengthens, soothes, and encourages. Remember how it felt to be understood by someone who took the time to listen to you? Remember how empowering it was? Remember when you tried to tell someone how you felt and they didn’t listen? Remember how awful it felt? How disappointed, disempowered, and perhaps angry you felt? When we listen to someone’s feelings we give them life. When we invalidate someone’s feelings, we destroy a bit of their will to live. This is why people who are isolated and don’t have someone who cares enough about them to listen, feel depressed and hopeless. Everyone needs a relational home for their feelings. We need a safe person who we know will listen and respect our emotional pain and struggles. How great it is to be one who listens!
This is especially true for children. One of the most important aspects of good parenting is to provide a relational home for your child’s feelings. When a parent listens to her child’s feelings, she is helping the child to listen to his or her own feelings. Children learn about their own feelings to the extent that their parents take an interest in their feelings. If the parent takes the child’s feelings seriously, the child learns to take his own feelings seriously. Validating a child’s emotional world is how the parent contributes to strengthening the child’s inner core and self-worth. When a child feels understood and accepted, he learns to accept and respect himself. Listening in an attuned way builds emotional strength. The opposite of all this is also true, when parents do not respect the child’s feelings.
Listening is a key to building intimacy and closeness. When our partner doesn’t listen to our feelings and needs or worse, invalidates them, we feel unloved, rejected, and alone Couples who don’t listen to each other can never have true “intimate conversations,” which build closeness and secure attachments. To have an intimate conversation, we need to be vulnerable and to be vulnerable we must feel safe. We only feel safe with someone who listens. When our partner doesn’t listen, we shut down and withdraw. Success in intimate relationships depends upon being able to have consistent intimate conversations. The fact that so many relationships fail indicates how difficult it is for couples to be open, vulnerable, and listen.
Listening to G-d
G-d is always talking to us. When life throws us a curve, what is our first response? Is it, “What is G-d teaching me?” or “Darn, this is the last thing I need. How can I fix this and get on with me life?” When we don’t listen to G-d, we miss the important messages He’s sending to help us grow and develop our potential. the good news and the bad news is that if we don’t listen the first time, G-d will give us another opportunity to learn the lesson. But He may have to speak with a little more force the next time to get our attention.
G-d is also speaking to us through world events. Are we listening? For example, world terrorism has many of us scared. Being scared ultimately means we are not listening to G-d. Rabbi Aryeh Kaplan , said something very powerful. “We are only afraid of evil when we see it as a force separate from G-d.” When we understand that evil is in service of G-d, we no longer have fear of it because we know it only exists as a message to teach us something important. Are we listening and getting the messages? Are we taking responsibility or are we hoping that it will just disappear? Because G-d loves us, He is always talking to us through our personal experiences and world events. Are we listening?