Slow down. Listen.
A few months ago I was with some friends and we were talking about current day news and journalism. Before having tv on-demand along with dedicated news channels, you pretty much just had a couple of hours each day dedicated to news on your favourite tv program. Technology has advanced so much in the past decade alone to the point where there is now what I’m seeing and experiencing as information overload.
The amount of time we have in the day hasn’t changed, but the amount of things that we have allowed access into our lives has and I don’t know about you but I know that I have experienced the sense of being overwhelmed with so many things going on at the same time — this is both at work and in my personal life.
With so much information being thrown at us and demands made of us by those around us, we easily get sucked into the never ending state of ‘busy’ — go, go, go. There’s no time to think, we’ve got so much to get done.
Think about this — ever since we enter school, we are being fed information, things that we ought to learn that will somewhat help us in our future to get a career. As we progress throughout the years, the questions that we ask narrow down to understanding solutions that already exist rather than inquiring about what else could there be.
I work with so many talented people on a day to day basis and what has recently saddened me the most is that they are not working at their fullest potential simply because they’re doing what they’re told to do instead of being asked what they think they should do. I’m sure you’ve heard people say “we’re going into solution mode”, which is a callout of saying we’re getting ahead of ourselves of designing a solution without fully understanding the problem we’re trying to solve.
“If I had an hour to solve a problem I’d spend 55 minutes thinking about the problem and five minutes thinking about solutions.” — Albert Einstein
I think one of the most important skills that we could ever learn in our life is the skill of listening — this applies to every facet of life. Whether it’s building relationships, leading people or solving problems. If we’d just listen better, we would learn better. One of the 7 habits of highly effective people written by Stephen Covey is “Seek first to understand, then to be understood” — if all of humanity could do this one thing really well, I think we’d really transform our world into a better place.
“Most people do not listen with the intent to understand; they listen with the intent to reply.” — Stephen R. Covey
Here’s one thing we can do together to become better listeners:
ask more questions, make less statements.
A quick personal share as I wrap this up… Like most relationships, my wife and I have arguments. I’ve come to a realisation that the reason we do is because I failed to listen to understand her — I’m usually focussed on how I felt and how inconvenienced I was without any considering her view. I do my best to always apologise because no matter what the reason, I could’ve responded better to the situation. I’m very grateful to be married to a wonderful woman who is very forgiving and understanding. This reminds me of a scripture I learned from the New Testament in the book of James that says, “let every man be swift to hear, slow to speak, slow to wrath”. Such wisdom!
I’m going to continue to become a better husband, father, friend and coach — by becoming a better listener.
James Zhang
My why is to help and inspire other people to live a full life through unconditional love