SEEK FIRST TO UNDERSTAND, THEN TO BE UNDERSTOOD

Seek first to understand, then to be understood

Seek first to understand, then to be understood (Habit # 5)

-Stephen Covey

Commentary by Sudhir Krishnan

First off, the above quote can be easily understood via law of attraction. Whatever we want to attract in our life, we must first become that. We attract what we are. It follows then that when we put an effort to understand others, others will be better able to understand us.

In any communication, our natural need is to be understood by others. However this need to be first understood creates many barriers in communication, and many times we come out of a conversation feeling less than satisfied. We end up feeling misunderstood by the other. The need to be understood is a very important human need. It is our psychological survival. That need kicks in soon after physical survival is guaranteed. We recently covered an article on “Maslow’s hierarchy of needs”  Please see the article here:

http://www.facebook.com/notes/inspirations-by-sudhir-krishnan/maslows-hierarchy-of-needs/214941885188701

Stephen Covey terms the need to be understood as “Psychological Air”. A person who feels misunderstood by us is gasping for psychological air. They want to open up to us, but unless we give them the air their mind needs to survive, they simply cannot open up. We need to make them feel understood first - and that involves active listening. The problem is that due to our own need to be first understood, a majority of people in their conversations are either talking or preparing to talk - we listen very little. There are five levels of listening:

1. Ignoring - not really listening at all
2. Pretending to listen - the intermittent “aahh yes”, without anything registering
3. Selective listening - hearing parts of a conversation
4. Attentive listening - focusing on all the words (but only to the words)
5. Empathetic listening

Empathetic listening is the highest of all - it is listening with the intent to understand. It implies that we not only fully listen to the words, but also to the emotions, and the body language. Here is the breakdown of how much information is typically conveyed via each medium:

• Words - these convey 10% of overall meaning
• Sounds (the way the words are said) - these convey 30% of meaning
• Body language - these convey 60% of meaning

This impies that to really understand the other person, we need to listen not only through our ears, but more importantly through our eyes and heart as well. In empathetic listening, you listen for feeling, you listen for meaning, you listen to really understand. You are looking for a communication from another soul. Thus if you want to make the other person feel understood, you must practice empathetic listening.

Many of us have a tendency to rush into judgement, and fix things by giving advice. We focus on the logic of the situation. This is no different than a doctor giving a prescription without diagnosing the root cause of the problem. This simply falls short of solving the problem at hand. No amount of logic will help unless the other mind has opened up to you first - and you get it to open to you with empathetic listening. Just empathetic listening solves a lot of communication problems by itself. Many times people are not even looking for a solution to the problem - they just want to feel understood.

Finally, this secret of first understanding the other was known to all our realized saints as well. Here is the second part of the Prayer of Saint Francis, that reflects this knowledge:

O Divine Master,

grant that I may not so much seek to be consoled, as to console;

to be understood, as to understand;

to be loved, as to love.

For it is in giving that we receive.

It is in pardoning that we are pardoned,

and it is in dying that we are born to Eternal Life.

Amen.

Stephen Covey