Regarding listening: Do you agree or disagree?

Question

"When I ask you to listen to me, and you start giving me advice, you have not done what I asked.When I ask you to listen to me, and you begin telling me why I shouldn’t feel that way, you are trampling on my feelings.When I ask you to listen to me, and you feel you have to do something to solve my problem, you have failed me, strange as that may seem. –From On Listening, by Ralph Broughton, M.D."

Do you agree with this? Do you typically offer advice or only listen? Explain. (I've always given advice, and didn't realize that was different from active listening. How do YOU "only" listen?)

Answer 1

That quote is correct in every way, very deep, which a lot of insight is needed to take it apart and fully understand its content.

When people start giving you advice they have already made up in their minds what they will tell you. A mindset has already developed. Without taking your feelings into consideration, they speak their minds. They are reading more into what is heard from you, taking what they "only" want to hear and coming to their own conclusions. An ear that hears the sound but does not put themselves close enough to listen to its meaning is trying to row a boat, with only one paddle in the water trying to reach the shore. Your feelings are getting trampled, the other person has not put the effort, if any into understanding each word that is said. With emotion, in what is said, the heart speaks, in a different way that is expressed in everyday speech. Making snap judgments on a problem before the brain has a chance to compile all the information makes for a misinformed outcome. One must make a picture of a word in his brain sometimes to see clearly what the speaker is looking at while only hearing the words that are spoken.
I hear what you are saying, I'm not listening to the information being spoken, is a crystal clear way of putting the above quotation in the proper perspective.

Answer 2

Yes I agree.

Active listening involves being engaged with what the speaker is saying without interjecting. It may involve a nod, or I understand, or hmmmm without proferring advice. The purpose of active listening is for the speaker to feel validated that they have been heard & understood without judgement.
It's about being accepted. When the speaker is finished and advice or opinion is required then you speak.

Answer 3

I'm like you , When someone tells me that they walked up to this guy and called him a jirk . I can't help but say ," Oh you don't want to do that , unless you were planing on ducking .
And if someone ever says to me , Oh lookey there , theres a lion over there , I think I'll go pet it .. to say nothing would be a failure,to do my part,,,,, the reason I'm alive , as far as he's conserned anyways. I should at least say " well pet him for me too" ~~~~~

Answer 4

I think it's true. We automatically think that because someone is explaining their problem, they immediately want a solution.

I think we instinctively know that by talking about something, we can release its negative energy and proceed to the solution process ourselves; but it needs a listener. That's why talk therapy has value.

Answer 5

First I listen and then if they want my input I give it to them. There have been times when I would give my input after they tell some of it and that was because they did something or something was done to them that was wrong and they knew it.

Answer 6

I try to listen to what a person is saying and wait for them to ask my opinion or advice.

Answer 7

i agree with it only a little bit... usually when i ask ssomeone to listen to me i want to have them give me advice and reassure me

Answer 8

Actually have heard salespersons call that process venting.