Witness

It's kinda funny, I just realized, that I had my talk on listening as a gift yesterday with a man who is a Jehovah's Witness. Only because I was talking to him about my thoughts on listening as witnessing and I hadn't even thought about the fact that witnessing is important to him and probably defined a little differently.

We were standing in the kitchen at work and he complimented us on everything we do. How did we get on the topic of listening? I can't remember really. I remember telling him my belief that listening is one of the greatest gifts we can give.

I really believe this. A lot of times I feel like I might not be doing enough for others and I focus on actions I might do to them or for them - like helping someone at the grocery store or making dinner for a neighbor etc. I think we often overlook the power of listening.

Listening seems passive to most people, like an inaction, like we're not doing - that's why most people are not good listeners. We get impatient listening because we want to be doing. We don't realize that listening is an activity and it requires skills. It also requires a good deal of energy and can be as exhausting as a marathon if you are not in good condition. Being a good listener requires practice, attention, and skill. Listening is an art.

I told this guest my theory on listening as witnessing. I told him about the professor I had in college who sat in on war crimes tribunals and how she spoke of witnessing. She told us that witnessing means actively being present to someone's story. That allowing someone to share with us a difficult story is a gift to the speaker. What she meant was that sometimes what someone is telling us is painful to hear. When people have something painful to tell, often times they find it hard to find a listener. We sometimes tune out difficult stories to avoid any emotional pain ourselves.

Being present to someone's story means truly seeing them. Being an active listener to someone is like saying, "I see you, I see all of you, you are here." This is what we all truly crave when it comes down to it. We crave proof that others really see us, that they see all of who we are and not just the "pretty stuff," the "pleasantries." We crave to be 100% authentic and someone really hearing us is like being seen, like proof that we are here.