Effective Conversations: The Art of Listening and Support

We all have moments when words fail us. Often this is because the words we need are swirling in a fog of emotions; sometimes leaving them hidden seems more appealing than taking the risk of putting a distressing situation into words.

Beginning a conversation about difficult truths can feel daunting because we fear making somebody feel distressed. Of course, a conversation does not cause distress: the difficult situation the person is in causes their distress. Talking about the situation – whether it is concerns about a family member, losing your job or being bereaved, mental health or financial problems or having a serious illness – doesn’t make it worse. In fact, many people describe a feeling of loneliness when their family and friends, scared of causing upset by talking about ‘it’, simply avoid them altogether. Being distressed and not being able to talk about it can feel worse for many people.

A safe place will usually offer some privacy. It might mean freedom from interruption, or somewhere that is familiar and reassuring. It may mean waiting for the person’s supporters to join them, either to listen or to be participants in the conversation, giving the person a sense of security; or it may mean beginning sooner, so they can seize a chance to talk without the pressure of extra people in the room.

The right time may mean when the person feels secure. It may mean freedom from symptoms: when someone is seriously ill, for example, they may want a chance to take their painkillers or to have a snooze before an important conversation, so they are able to concentrate better. They can advise us when is a good time to talk. This is an invitation: we are offering someone a choice.

In the rush of daily life, we consume information without taking a lot of it in. We have to, or we would be overwhelmed: radio, TV, social media, family, friends, colleagues, clients; phone calls, text messages, emails, conversations – we are bombarded by communications’, yet it’s rare that we feel we are truly communicating.

During an important conversation, when we want to communicate effectively, how we listen can be more important than what we say. Careful listening helps us to understand the perspective of the person we are talking to. Our understanding helps us to pace the conversation: not too much at once; taking their view into account; hearing their thoughts; noticing their emotions. We are keeping in step, dancing with care.

Every model of psychological practice has this advice in common: to listen without judgement. The person speaking needs to be able to describe their experience, partly so that we can begin to see the situation as it looks and feels to them, and perhaps more importantly so that in describing it fully, they too can gain a new perspective on something that they may have been immersed in too deeply to allow clarity. Fearing that the listener may be judging their words, their story or their coping will discourage transparency.

The silences during a conversation are when both participants do their thinking. If a discussion is simply to give information, it doesn’t need much silence. You may be telling me what time we are meeting this evening.

The presence of silences during the conversation has the effect of slowing everything down. Slowing down allows us to focus better on what is being said, and for many people this slowing also reduces any anxiety they felt coming into a conversation that might be important, emotional or long-awaited.

The way we listen affects the speaker’s confidence. If we listen as ‘experts’, the speaker may fear exposing their uncertainty, or they may move from useful problem-solving to seeking our advice. If we listen as ‘critics’, to judge or point out errors, they may fear exposing their mistakes. If we listen with a vested interest, they may feel unable to explore negative emotions or hurts.

Listening is a soul-to-soul task. When we meet as equals, we create a space to listen deeply. The person with a dilemma or concern is an expert in how they are feeling and what they are going through: we must recognise that expertise. Genuine humility always levels up. Levelling up is especially important when we are listening to someone with whom we are in serious disagreement. To hear them, and to allow them to feel heard, we must listen to their views with the same respectful interest we would expect were the roles reversed.

The key to staying in safe territory is to be curious and supportive. When we ask someone questions, they can decide how deeply they want to answer. Helpful questions invite the other person to think, reflect and share their ideas, instead of replying with a simple yes’ or ‘no’, or one piece of information.

Questions that help someone to remember their own resilience or to come up with possible actions to address their difficulty can enable them to begin problem-solving. It is astonishing how often people who feel completely stuck can nevertheless think of advice to give a friend in the same position – using questions helps to change perspective. By using helpful questions, we enable someone to explore whether there could be another way of looking at this dilemma.

‘Don’t cry’ is a common response to seeing distress. It is kindly meant. It doesn’t imply ‘You are bad for crying, but rather I wish you didn’t feel so upset that it makes you cry. It suggests ‘1 want to make it better for you’, and signifies concern. The problem is that this wish for a distressed person to appear less upset translates into a judgement that their emotions are inappropriate. Our exhortations to ‘Cheer up!’ or our attempts to change the subject to something more positive simply tell a distressed person that their suffering is not welcome here.

When someone is suffering, their thoughts and emotions are theirs alone. It is the extent to which. we are prepared to see their perspective, acknowledge their experience, and allow ourselves to feel discomfort on their behalf that dictates whether our response is perceived as pity, sympathy or empathy. Often we do not fully discriminate between these responses (tea and sympathy can be a maxim for any of them), but the differences are important when we are engaged in support for a person in distress.

Source : Listen by Kathryn Mannix

Goodreads : https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/58676989-listen