To Hear Someone

by jphiker

The Hebrew word for “Hear”, is “Shema”, it means something different than our English translation of the word. In Hebrew the word, “Hear”, it means something more like “doing”. It is a more active than to just hear someone. Hearing means doing.

This I found interesting and lead me to think how often I really don’t “hear” well. I am not very good at really “hearing someone”. You see by the Hebrew translation, it is something more active. It is doing.

To be a good listener is really does take action/doing something. It is not just hearing words but it is putting oneself into a doing/action position. First, I think it is important to take the effort to look at the person that it is talking to you. To turn and look them in the eye. To put down what you looking at and actually turn look at someone directly.

The next part of being a good listener is really hard, it is another action/doing step, it is setting aside my agenda or formulating my response as I am listening. It is a focusing action. To  focus on the person. To just simply, listen without judgemental thoughts. This is really quite difficult if we already have found that this person is someone we are in disagreement with.

The other important part of being a good listener is be actively involved and curious to understand each person’s situation. The action of being a curious listener, actively interested in trying to understand the other person, takes real effort.

I have been thinking about the issue of being a good listener. As a nation, I think we could do a lot better than we are doing right now. One way for us to draw closer together as a nation I believe is for us to begin to practice being better listeners. To actively try “to hear” each other.

One of the things that walking the  Camino did was it really “level set” us all to a similar situation. We were all doing the same routine each day, day after day. We could easily relate to each other’s situation. It was easier to relate and to “hear” each other.

I am working hard these days to be a better listener, to really hear someone. I dare say it is something we all could do better.

Blessings and all good,

John

Photograph of the Week

Stilly Winter Landscape

I posted this image this past week on my Blue Skies Facebook page but thought it would be good for others that are not on Facebook to see it as well.

I love the Stillaguamish River and this winter I have had several opportunities to see in many different winter conditions. To make this final image I chose to use a number of creative techniques in the post processing but I think it really works well for this image.