My last post in this series was about staying receptive and curious when we’re listening, even in the face of a “difficult conversation” or a lot of emotional intensity.  On the same issue, a few commenters on Part One said they sometimes find themselves feeling exploited and resentful when they’re listening to someone.

I suspect you, like these commenters, have had the experience of someone “talking your ear off”—babbling on and on with seemingly no consideration for your time and energy.  When you’re experiencing a conversation this way, of course, it’s hard to find much joy in listening.

Recognize That You Have A Choice

One thing it’s hard to keep in mind when we’re feeling taken advantage of like this is that “it takes two to tango.”  To create a conversation where somebody is talking your ear off, the other person needs to talk a lot, but you must also choose to listen.  In fact, you have the freedom to stop listening and end the conversation at any time, and every second you keep listening you’re choosing not to exercise that freedom.

What often stops us from recognizing this is that we believe, on some level, that we have a moral obligation to keep listening to the other person.  After all, if we stopped listening—no matter how polite we were in ending the conversation—that might hurt the other person’s feelings.  And because it’s our job to make sure no one’s feelings ever get hurt, that option isn’t available.

Naturally, when we see ourselves as obligated to listen, rather than choosing to listen, we feel resentful and victimized.  Because we think it’s “wrong” to say what we want, we hold the other person responsible for predicting what we want.  We expect them to know, in other words, how long we’re willing to tolerate their chatter.  We start having angry thoughts like:  “Don’t they know I don’t have time for this?”  “Can’t they see I’m bored with what they’re saying?”

So, I think a simple shift in our perspective can help.  When you’re having a conversation and the other person is talking your ear off, see if you can keep in mind that, in every moment you listen to this person, you are choosing to do so.  Recognize also that making listening to people a “moral obligation” only brings anger and frustration into your relationships, and makes it impossible for listening to be fun—both for you and the person doing the talking.

Expressing Your Choice

It’s all very well to acknowledge that you’re choosing to keep listening to the other person from moment to moment, but what if you want to stop listening?  How do you let them know, in a respectful way, that you don’t want to listen to them anymore?

The best you can do, I think, is to simply tell the other person you have something else you want to do, in a way that doesn’t blame them for how you’re feeling.  By “blaming them,” I mean doing what I talked about earlier—making them responsible, in your mind, for predicting your wants and needs, and getting upset with them because they “should have known” you wanted them to stop talking (or at least to stop talking about the new blender they bought).

Some of us find it hard to imagine this is even possible.  We assume that, to tell someone we want to finish the conversation or move on to another topic, we have to say something like “you’re boring me” or “go yammer at someone else”—in other words, “I don’t want to listen anymore, and it’s your fault.”  Perhaps we’re accustomed to others talking to us this way, and we haven’t been exposed to other possibilities.

Let me give you an example of a “non-blaming” approach.  I’ve had a few moments recently where a client has wanted to keep our session going past the end of the hour, and I’ve simply told them “I hear what you’re saying, and I’m going to end the session now.”  I’ve straightforwardly told the client what I’m going to do, without suggesting they “should have known” we couldn’t go over time, or otherwise blaming them for wanting to extend our session.

And perhaps, if you’re concerned that they’re going to feel hurt, you can even let them know about that concern.  You might say, for example, “I’m worried that you’ll feel neglected when I finish this conversation, and I’m going to go do something else now.”  Many of us hold feelings like this back in the strange hope that, if the other person doesn’t know we’re worried about hurting them, they won’t feel hurt.  When you fully lay what you’re wanting and feeling on the table, this can bring a refreshing realness and vulnerability to the conversation.

Now, the reason I say this is “the best you can do” is that, as much as many of us would like to avoid having someone feel hurt, it’s simply impossible to do that 100% of the time.  We can’t hope to control all the factors that determine how someone else feels, which might include their childhood experiences, how their intimate relationships are going, their brain chemistry, and so on.  What we can do is take responsibility for our own feelings and choices, and when we do that we can actually make listening an enjoyable experience again.

If you enjoyed this post, check out the rest of the series:

The Joy of Listening, Part 1: Overcoming The Barriers
The Joy of Listening, Part 2: Empathic Reflection
The Joy of Listening, Part 3: Staying Empathic
The Joy of Listening, Part 5: There Are No Rules, Only Requests

Related posts:

1. The Joy of Listening, Part 3: Staying Empathic
2. The Joy Of Listening, Part 2: Empathic Reflection
3. The Joy Of Listening, Part 1: Overcoming The Barriers
4. The Joy of Listening, Part 5: There Are No Rules, Only Requests
5. Inner Productivity, Part Three: Listening To Ourselves