Listen for the Experience Behind the Words

We can hear every word and still miss a conversation. We can even understand the message and miss what it costs the other person to say it.

Someone says, I am fine. The words are clear. The pause before them may be less clear. Someone explains a decision in careful detail. We understand the reasons yet fail to notice the uncertainty carried in the telling.

Three depths of attention

Hearing registers sound. Listening to a message follows what is being communicated. A deeper form of listening also attends to the speaker's experience of communicating it: their hesitation, urgency, relief, effort, or care.

Laurence Platt calls this last move listening someone rather than only listening to someone. His phrase marks a useful distinction, provided it remains an invitation to attend rather than a claim to know another person's inner life.

We can be wrong about what a pause means. The ethical response is curiosity, not diagnosis. You sound unsure; have I understood? Was that difficult to say? Is there something I missed?

Speaking has a corresponding depth. We can produce accurate words without being present to whether they land. We can also speak with the intention that another person actually receive what we mean.

A conversation becomes more exact when both people can check the words and the experience around them.