Listening to the Past

My work now is to listen keenly and listen for what is said or not said. It wasn’t always that way, of course. (I’m talking about coaching and the listening skills required.)

I went back to my HS reunion recently and brought with me my acquired skills since those days eons ago. I felt an amazing sense of appreciation for those I met and spoke with … actually it’s clear I was listening to people. With 300 out of 800 in our class, sitting down to dinner with three women I knew from the second grade on was thoroughly delightful.

What was it about my school days that might be valuable now? Well truthfully, and the truth is at best interesting, I wasn’t listening to anyone other than myself during that time in my life. I was consumed by what others would think about me. My parents made less and less sense as I grew into my teen years. I didn't listen to them either.

I learned this a while ago and experienced it yet again: We keep people in place as we last “listened to our own opinions about them.” My reunion was more interesting because I knew this about how we remember: we remember how we listened (once upon a time). My surprises were that people who hadn’t seen or heard of me in 50 years remembered (almost to a person) that I was “shy, smart and headed for success.” I remembered myself as “not quite good enough, a failure then.” My script therefore was how I listened to myself and never how anyone else listened to me. Clearly, for the earliest days of my life, no matter what the facts (I was a straight-A student), all I heard in my VOJ (voice of judgment) was that I didn’t succeed and wasn’t going to make it unless I worked really hard (at what I did not know then).

More on listening next time ...