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Are you listening
So you understand
What to say
-安天美
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Listening requires more than the mechanical act of hearing. It demands our full presence and a willingness to temporarily set aside our own thoughts, judgments, and the constant internal dialogue that often drowns out others' voices. The poem's opening question confronts us directly: "Are you listening?" Not passively receiving sound, but actively engaging with what's being communicated.
This deep listening transforms ordinary conversations into opportunities for profound connection. It's the difference between waiting for our turn to speak and truly receiving another's experience. The spaces between words often hold the richest meaning like the hesitations, the subtle shifts in tone, the unspoken emotions that colour what's being said. When we attune ourselves to these nuances, we honour the full complexity of human expression.
Our modern world seldom rewards this kind of presence. We're surrounded by noise and notifications, pulled in countless directions, and encouraged to multitask rather than focus deeply. Against this backdrop, choosing to listen fully becomes a radical act to create islands of genuine attention in an ocean of distraction.
The second line builds upon the first, revealing the purpose behind listening: "So you understand." Understanding isn't merely collecting information; it's allowing ourselves to be changed by what we hear. When we truly understand another person, their perspective becomes part of our own expanded worldview. Their truth doesn't replace ours but enriches it, adding dimensions we couldn't access through our limited individual experience.
Understanding requires a willingness to temporarily inhabit someone else's reality. It asks us to loosen our grip on certainty and open ourselves to perspectives that might challenge our own. This is empathy and it isn't a weakness. It's the source of our greatest strength as communicative beings. Through understanding others, we gain access to collective wisdom far greater than what any single mind could generate.
The path to understanding isn't always comfortable. It often leads us through territories of confusion, dissonance, and the painful recognition of our own biases and blind spots. Yet these growing pains are necessary for genuine growth. Each moment of true understanding represents an expansion of our capacity to hold complexity and contradiction.
The poem culminates in purpose: "What to say”. Our words have power. They can heal or harm, unite or divide, illuminate or obscure. The poem suggests that knowing what to say emerges naturally from the soil of attentive listening and genuine understanding.
This sequence challenges the common pattern of formulating responses while others are still speaking. When we listen with the intention of crafting our reply, we miss the opportunity to be fully present. The poem offers an alternative approach: first listen completely, then seek understanding, and only then consider what response might truly serve the moment. This creates space for words that respond to what's actually being communicated rather than to our projection or assumption.
The ethical weight of speech extends beyond individual conversations. The words we choose shape our collective reality, influencing the stories we tell about ourselves and each other. In a world fraught with misunderstanding and division, speaking from a place of deep listening and genuine understanding becomes an act of healing. It creates bridges where there were walls and fosters connection where there was isolation.
Despite our sophisticated technologies and complex theories of language, the essence remains unchanged: listen deeply, seek understanding, then speak. These three steps, practiced with sincerity, can transform our relationships, communities, and perhaps even our world.
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<aside> <img src="/icons/backward_blue.svg" alt="/icons/backward_blue.svg" width="40px" /> Breaking Free
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<aside> <img src="/icons/forward_blue.svg" alt="/icons/forward_blue.svg" width="40px" /> Embracing Flux
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