Most of us start planning our response before someone finishes speaking, which means we miss what they're actually saying. Real listening means staying quiet in your head until they're done, not rehearsing your counter-argument while they talk.
You say something, your partner starts to counter it. How long does your mind take before it already starts the new argument back at that person while they're talking? Now here's where things go haywire. I've said something, you start to respond. After 5 seconds, I think I know where you're going, so I start to counter-argue in my mind, but I'm not saying anything out loud because you're still talking. After a minute, you've gone a completely different direction, but I haven't paid attention to that because I'm focused on my counter-argument. I now respond to your initial 5 seconds. What do you say back to me? See, you don't even listen to me. I wasn't even talking about that for the last minute. And now we are in a total place of frustration because we didn't learn how to listen, right? And so this is a key skill set around respect. If we're going to say that I'm someone who cares about a culture of respect, I have to be very, very intentional about listening.
