Short interview excerpt where Michael Fishman argues that listening — not speaking — is the more challenging and underdeveloped communication skill. He describes the common failure of formulating responses while someone else speaks, calls listening a learned, coachable muscle, and highlights how genuine listening changes others' perception via subtle signals.
Chapters
I'm with all this relationship building stuff and I think for every one of us, it's the foundation of why we are successful and why we are appreciated in the world. The big mistake that a lot of people make is to not remember that effective speakers outnumber effective listeners by about a million to one. And the more challenging capability in communication is listening, not speaking. And for people that think they have functioning ears and therefore they can listen, that's not accurate. And really the anatomy of that is that when someone is speaking and you're formulating your response as they're speaking, that's not listening, that's preparing to respond while someone else is speaking. And so you're not getting that. And they in their senses can feel it. Just like a dog knows when you're afraid of it. We're animals, we know when we're being listened to and we know when we're not being listened to. So if you even have a 1% suspicion that that's you, or you can't shut off your while people are speaking to you because you're formulating your response, get some coaching around listening because. And the other key, the key to stopping the mind in that situation is one, your commitment to acknowledging the other person by being present for them and listening to them and really giving them that generosity and also trusting that when they're done, you can generate like that without preparation. And so that's the anatomy of the process. But if you don't have that in place, I urge you to get a coach who can kick your ass around it because it's like it will open up your world. And when people know that when they experience no one stands around and says, oh wow, they're really listening. But it's like any response from the limbic brain, it's like they just get it. They just experience you differently. It could be the muscle tone in your face, it could be whatever it is that they as an animal are sensing about you, the other anim standing in front of them. So if your ears are working, it doesn't mean you can listen. And that's really huge. You're actually really good at that.
