Listening is a combination of hearing what another person says and involvement with the person who is talking.

Listening skills include three skill clusters:

1. attending skills: see my previous blog
2. following skills: this blog
3. reflecting skills: next blog

The skills of using door openers, minimal encourages, open questions, and attentive silence enable the listener to keep the focus on the spearker's commnuncation.

In yesterday's blog, we talk about how to use door openers to initiate a meaningful conversation. Now, we can see how minimal encourages play a role in effective listening.

Minimal Encourages

Simple responses that encourage the speaker to tell his story in his way yet keep the listener active in the process are called minimal encourages. THEY ARE INDICATORS TO OTEHR PERSONS THAT WE ARE with them. ME will be sprinkled throughout a conversation to help the conversation gain momentum.

The most frequently used of the minimal encourages:

• PLEASE CONTINUE
• I am listening and I understand
• tell me more
• you betcha!
• oh?
• yes
• for instance
• really?
• i see
• gosh
• right
• and?
• then?
• go on
• so?
• sure
• i hear you
• darn!

Infrequent questions

Questions are an integral part of verbal interaction. Closed questions direct the speaker to give a specific, short response. They are often answered with one word like yes or no. Open questions provide space for the speaker to explore his thoughts without being hemmed in too much by the listener's categories.

The open questions help  the listener better understand the sperker without directing the conversation. Asking open rather than closed questions and asking only one question at a time give the speaker an opportunity to explore his situation in his own way.

Attentive Silence

The beginning of wisdom is silence and the second stage is listening. Silence responsiveness is essential to good listening. Silence gives the speaker time to think about what he is going to say and  enables him to go deeper into himself. It gives a person space to experience the feeligns churning within. It allows the speaker to proceed at his own pace. It provides time to deal with his ambivalence about sharing.

Silence can be a powerful force for a person whose emotions are intense. The real meaning of suffering discloses itself only to him who has learned the art of compassion. Silence can be a balm for sufferers. It is different from indifference, as a desolate emptiness which disturbs rather than calm. It is as if this silence had more meaning than countless words could ever have.

During the pauses in an interaction, we can do the following as good listeners:

• attned to other
• observe the other
• think about what the other is communicating
• consider the variety of responses

However excessive silence is as undesirable as no silence. There is a time to keep silent and a time to speak. To sit mute like a bump on a log does not constitue effective listening. It is merely a lack of response to the person with needs.