Three levels of listening

It’s Friday, let’s keep it short.

Want to go deep with your listening skills, and really connect with someone? Go to level three.

Level 1 - Listening for things you know about

This is the superficial level of listening, where most people are. They’re listening just to think up how to respond. They’re not hearing. In fact, sometimes, this isn’t listening at all. Like when someone says something about baseball, and they jump on it, talking all about everything they know about baseball, their favorite team, players, whatever.

Level 2 - Listening for information

Here’s where we start to connect with people. At level 2, you start listening with curiosity. You’re trying to learn, so you ask questions. Still, however, it’s still really all about you because your questions are just collecting factual data. “How many people were there?” “What was it like?” “How did it go?”

Level 3 - Listening for feelings and needs

Here we go. Now we’re really connecting. This kind of listening is more than self-affirmation or fact collecting. It’s paying attention to understand what’s going on with the other person, in the moment. This kind of listening takes time, patience, and is deepened by questions such as Why? How? And Who? -- to help the person get to the heart of the matter.

Go to level 3 and listen -- not for what you want to talk about, to offer advice, or to try to think of a smart-sounding response -- but as a way to help your partner get to what they really want to say.

This is hospitality. You’re hosting somebody, not rummaging through the drawers of their personal life and making off with their underwear.