What is Active Listening?

We have spoken a lot about what active listening is not, now we are going to talk about what active listening is. In the student download area, you have got this little handout; we are going to go through that now. Remember, active listening is a skill, and you need to practice. The information in this document is your starter for ten, but it is really important that you take all of this information and you practice. So going to the first page, you have got a number of boxes. There are five key points in this document that tell you what active listening is. The first point, "Pay attention." Now, that seems obvious, but actually, paying attention, if you think about all of the distractions, actually paying attention can be quite a challenge. If you think about the distractions, not getting rid of them because that is too hard, but imagine that you are able to turn them down. You allow the distractions to be there, you are just going to work on turning them down so that paying attention to the person you are listening to is easier.

The second point is to show that you are listening, and using silence effectively. There are two bits to that; Showing you are listening is really important. When you start to practice active listening, I am not looking for you to be a robot, I need you to be quite human about it. Nodding, saying "Uh-huh," saying, "I understand," those sorts of things, just to show that you are listening. Obviously, all of those non-verbal signals; the head-nodding, the smiling at something appropriate. All of that stuff shows a person who is talking to you that you are listening, that you are hearing them. Using silence is really, really powerful. There are two bits to this: When somebody is talking to you, particularly, if they might be emotional if the story they are recounting to you is quite difficult to them; it might have been quite painful. There might be quite a lot of emotion tied into what is going on in the storytelling.

When somebody is in that place, it can take them seven seconds between the end of them speaking and the beginning of you speaking for them to understand what it is they have just said. Literally, their mouths might take over. You can allow them seven seconds of silence because, actually, in that seven seconds, it allows the individual to catch up with what they have just said, and they might actually change what they have just said. They might not have meant what actually came out of their mouths. This is not you sitting there just staring blankly. This is understanding that, actually, they might need that space in order to catch up with themselves and be clear about what it is they are trying to say. You do not have to use that all the time, but as you go on your active listening journey, you will start to understand why that is appropriate to use that seven seconds.

The next point is deferring judgment. Remember those distractions, remember I talked about ego in the last section? This is where we think we understand what that person is talking about because we might have had a similar experience. Deferring judgment is listening to somebody and not responding with your own judgement. So not telling them how they feel, not saying, "I know what you are going through," because, actually, you will never really know how somebody feels; you might empathize, but you do not actually know what is going on for that other person. You also can not advise. When you are active listening, your role is to be a funnel. You are listening to somebody else's story, none of your own experience, your opinions, your own thoughts, none of that should interfere with the story that somebody else is telling you. We all, as we listen, want to talk back, we want to give our own opinion, we want to say, "Oh, yeah, I had that similar circumstance myself." It is okay to think it, but if you are saying it, if you are expressing it, then you are not actively listening anymore.

One of the important points, though, when you are active listening is if you are listening to somebody who is quite emotional, or they might be stuck in a loop, so they are telling you a story, but they are just going round and round, they are giving you no new information. At that point, it is okay to interrupt, but interrupt gently. Maybe, you will say, "Can I just clarify what you are saying?" Or, "I understand you are saying, blah, blah, blah," just repeat their words, their last words back to them just to check that they are saying what they mean, but it gives them an opportunity to move on to another topic. Because if you are going round and round, and you are getting nowhere else then, actually, you have to question whether the session you have with somebody, the listening session, is being useful anymore. The next bit is about providing feedback. Now, when we are active listening, remember none of ourselves has to end up in the listening, because it is not about us at all. It is entirely about the other person.

But if you look at this handout here, you will see that there are some points you can raise. You can, again, clarify what they are saying. You can summarize for them, but summarize in a way that uses their words back to them, rather than trying to use your words because, particularly, at the beginning of your active listening journey, you might end up inadvertently getting some of your stuff in there, too. The last point is about responding appropriately. When you are responding to somebody, I said at the beginning, I am not looking for you to be a robot. If somebody is telling you something that is very funny, it may be quite distressing, whatever it is, then responding appropriately is important because it is all about showing that you are listening.

What you do not want to do is start letting your opinions come in again, though. One of the really, really interesting ones is where somebody is telling you a funny story that might actually be a bit of a segue to what they are actually telling you about, and you think, "Oh, I have got another story there." Just because they have gone on a little segue, it is still not okay for you to respond with your stuff; that is really, really important. But I also want to be clear, if something comes up that you think might be a safeguarding issue, if you think they might be in danger, the individual, or somebody they are talking about might be in danger, then, obviously, it is appropriate at that stage to be clear that you will report that to the appropriate authority. You are not just there to listen, no matter what.

I do not want you to be a robot. With all of this, open body language is really important. Now, I talk about open body language, and it means different things to different people. All I would say to you is try not to be closed, and by that, I mean try not to sit with your arms like this, or maybe your legs crossed. Try not to turn away from the person that you are listening to. You might find that you can mirror the other person's body language. If you are comfortable, if they put their arm up, you could put your arm up. If they touch their chest, maybe you can touch your chest. I would say, though, with mirroring, if it does not feel comfortable to do it, please do not do it because it can feel a bit awkward, but actually, you might find that it is something that you naturally do. When I have talked about body language to different groups, open body language to teenagers means something very different to open body language to middle-aged professionals, for example.

Teenagers would find sitting on the floor, legs crossed, leaning over to one side; that is absolutely fine because they are comfortable like that. It is very much about what feels appropriate in the moment. If you find that you have inadvertently crossed your arms, or that you are getting a bit closed, just unfold a little bit, try not to make it obvious. Being aware of yourself, while you are doing this listening is also really important. It is a little bit like patting your head and rubbing your tummy. And like anything, that needs practice. So being aware of yourself, being aware what you are doing with your body, with your face, those non-verbal signals, while making sure that you are not being distracted, and you are listening, and none of your opinions are coming through in the active listening session, it takes practice.

What I would like to suggest you do is you use your handout and study a little bit, and within three days of completing this training, I would like you to start practising active listening. You can do it straight away because you will be talking to somebody quite soon, I suspect. Whoever it is, it does not really matter, just start to practice everything we have talked about. Think about the distractions. Think about the body language. Think about how many times you would pseudo-listen or you would go to interrupt with your story. Just make sure that you are turning it down. It will take practice to get it right, and it will feel a little bit unnatural at first. When you start your journey with active listening, you will become really aware of all of the things that you are doing or being distracted by when you are just normal listening. Do not be hard on yourselves. Just keep practising. It gets easier; I promise.