By Sharna Goldseker
Last week we facilitated a 101 Multigenerational Training in New York.
From time to time, we send musing about something we’re reading and think worth sharing with the group. Usually we send articles or research reports we think will be relevant to our work. This time, the Training reminded me about the significance of listening, and so I thought I’d offer some of what I’ve been listening to this week, as I was inspired to explore the subject further.
As you’ll recall, we spend a lot of time in the 101 Training talking about listening, active listening, asking open-ended questions, being curious, data collection and so on. To be honest, it’s something that’s become so ingrained in how we work, that in a way, I realized how much I take it for granted. I listen to people a lot in this work. And while I don’t feel out of practice per se, the Training reminded me to think about how I could flex new muscles and add more weight to my listening work–out routine so to speak.
Connecting flights to reach a G3 Retreat I facilitated this weekend gave me the opportunity to begin. So, I scrolled through a list of podcasts I had downloaded and saved on my phone for the times I wanted to new material. Truthfully, I rarely find myself tackling podcasts on that list because it always seems easier to check email, text someone or read an article. This time, however, I searched the list and dug out Krista Tippett’s On Being series and in particularl the episode Danielle had told me about where Tippett interviews David Isay, founder of Storycorp and the National Day of Listening. I had known about Story Corp and heard Isay speak at a Council on Foundations’ Family Philanthropy Conference in New York in 2011, but I found this exchange between these two devotees of listening pretty powerful.
While I had been thinking about listening in terms of “data collection,” asking a list of questions and listening for data to understand a client situation or see the fuller picture of what issues a family needed help with, I realized that I had forgotten an important lesson for a while. Listening is a power act itself. In fact, “Listening,” Isay says, “is an act of love.” Because, quoting Borges he goes on to say in fact, “‘the soul is contained in the human voice.'”
Whether I wait until the next one-on-one with a client or merely remind myself of this when I speak to my family before bed each night, I realize this is my new learning edge: to listen as an act of love. To listen to hear who the person in front of me is. Not just to collect data, but to listen in order to learn what they have to teach me about life, what I can discover about myself, and what gems can be revealed in the telling.
Somehow I suspect that listening that way will feel both like giving a gift to that person, because as we’ve all experienced in our fast paced world, others are hungry to be listened to and actually heard. And, I suspect that the gift won’t just be for those we listen too, but for ourselves too.