The Art of Listening

The 5 levels of listening, and how to know when to be where

Photo by Brooke Cagle on Unsplash

We were born with two ears and one mouth so we can listen twice as much as we speak.

The truth is that we often are too occupied with our internal dialogue to really be listening to the other person.

Good listeners are people that

• recognize the other part for who they are
• are curious
• accept different opinions
• mirrors feelings (communication is 80% body language)
• don't push own opinions and beliefs onto the speaker.

Good listeners ask the right questions

Open-ended questions are king (or queen). It shows that you are engaged and interested. Open-ended questions are questions that can’t be answered with one word and that prompts longer conversations.

Open-ended questions can be:

• What if you had (…)?
• How did you do that?
• Why did it happen?

You are not supposed to only use open-ended questions(you should try it one time though, it's very hard)but be mindful…