Thursday, September 28, 2006

Do I really listen to people?

I'm asian and my supposed first language is chinese. But because I spent alot of time overseas when i was young, i did not learn chinese. I am what you would call self-taught (i.e. not good) at chinese. However some of the characters are really meaningful. My friend just pointed one out to me! The "ting" character which means "listen".

Its very representitive of what "listening" really is. And I wonder to myself: "how much do i really listen when people are trying to communicate something to me".

There are several parts, the ear symbol on the left, the "10" symbol on the top right, the "eye" below it and then followed by a "1" and at the bottom right the symbol for "heart".

So listening means to listen with the ear, watch closely for all expression and body language as if i had 10 eyes, and focus on understanding what is being communicated with all my heart... uh...lets see thats often not what happens. Arent most fights/marriage/family/relationship/etc problems of misunderstanding?

Often we may get caught:
  1. Not listening/Pretending to listen
  2. Not noticing subtle signs (no 10 eyes)
  3. listening but distracted (not with 1 heart)
I am personally trying to listen with the full meaning that this chinese character when people talk to me. I have to say that I have gotten better but this kind of thing is a long process of practice till it becomes part of my character.

posted by Coach Jonathan Wong @ 9/28/2006 09:54:00 PM Comments: 0