I grew up in a family of interrupters. It’s the foundation for the speed and volubility of my speech. We created a break in wordstreams with “Ooh! Ooh!!” and adding on, then wait for the reply. Talking-over was our style of dialog. We brainstormed by finishing each other’s sentences back and forth. In such a way a story was complete, built in pieces of everyone’s memory and perspective. Our own private Rashomon (great movie! ty, Peter Dorn Ravlin). Perhaps not the best training for a therapist. “I know!” was moi with my hand up from 1st grade on, intending to start a lively discussion. A teacher in an adult class asked me, “Are you someone who thinks you need to know the answers before you’ve read the chapter?” Busted. I was anticipating rather than allowing the information to fill in cracks of my ignorance.

Most “miscommunication” is really misunderstanding due to incomplete attention, predicting—as opposed to listening—to what is being said. This results in jumping in and assuming, often incorrectly. Most of us are too busy forming our replies in the verbal part of our brains to truly hear their words. Instead we leap to explain, defend, clarify, and of course FIX. Boredom. Impatience. Inattention. Glancing at your phone? All are evidence of the discomfort of being in a one-down position of audiency. It’s impossible to let others’ truths in when we’re full up with our own thoughts.

The draft of this essay began last month, after noticing how peaceful it was to simply hear a friend talking about the struggles of having a family member for a business partner. They mentioned issues with no fear of being interrogated, interrupted, or advised. I experienced no judgment of them or the partner, neither aloud nor internally. I looked up to listen, and found the poetic to stretch toward from Sanskrit with the image of a loom, warp strings taut, ready to receive the weft. To hang on every word, stretching toward someone, is how to understand. We create tapestry by honoring with a moment of silence before a response. My friend’s story formed ribbons on the loom of my listening heart.

Synchronism abides! Just this week I saw Dan Lyons talking about his new book, STFU (as in “Shut The…”). He studied his own “overtalking” and learned that he was a talkaholic. “For most of us, talking is like breathing. You don’t think about it; you just do it. But when you start paying attention to how you speak, this leads you to think about why you speak the way you do. You’re forcing yourself to become conscious of something that usually happens unconsciously. Now you’re doing the kind of work you might do with meditation or psychotherapy. You’re turning your attention inward. You’re engaging in self-reflection and self-examination. You’re figuring out who you are.” He includes a Quiz developed in 1993 by Virginia P. Richmond and James C. McCroskey, West Virginia University researchers Do You Talk Too Much? (It’s 16 questions and you get an instant response without having to give your email.) I passed with flying colors 😉 Dan kindly includes the idea that we are born to be more or less talkative, and then given extra credit by the training, feedback, and suffering we experience for being quiet or talkative. Introverts and extroverts flow along this continuum, but it’s more than that. There is somewhere a perfect spot, where we are not considered shy or attention grabbing. I have yet to figure it out.

In reflecting on how instantly we all back-forth in conversations, it’s no wonder that we comfortably talk-over when in the same room. But in cell world, including Zooming, there’s complication due to “tech lag time.” We think the other person is waiting to hear from us because we are always a fraction of a second behind “real time.” This results in frequently mistaking them to be done, then we’re suddenly talking at the same time. It demands a wee hesitation, and an etiquette that would seem stilted if face-to-face. “Roger & Over” might make a comeback.

I am acutely aware of this conflict within my own neurobiology. It’s stressful for everyone. In these last pages of a very late chapter in my life, I am retraining to embrace simply holding space for the tones, rhythms, and patterns of others’ silences and pauses. I remind myself to “Just let them talk. Let them figure out what they are really trying to say. Silence is productive.” I practice the blessing of Sacred Pausing (ty, Tara Brach). This allows us to simply offer an encouraging question without anticipating the answer; to signal with a pause before an ask of any kind, giving permission to decline response. Rehearsing a comment before it leaves the lips is an art form unto itself. Listening to thoughts is a step above merely thinking them.

Below is a four-step process that allows us to truly hear with full heart and mind. It weaves a meaningful conversation when sharing with each other.

1. Avoid entanglement in auto-thoughts by becoming a thinker who doesn’t speak or act upon them. “Thoughts are like clouds blown across the sky.”

2. Think “Breathe, relax, let them finish, let silence have its turn.”

3. Build rapport wordlessly with soft mirroring of posture, breathing, expressions.

4. The hardest part? Don’t let the non-verbals reveal your reaction.

I used to teach listening skills to volunteers who were heading into truly hard stuff: hospice and chaplaincy, sitting for a shift of full attention for “No One Dies Alone.” Such brave souls, embracing space with those who are suffering. Their gift? Leaning open-hearted into the pain and fear. Not fixing, commenting, or putting themselves into the picture. It is enough to hold the frame. Their natural concern was “What can I say to someone who is suffering beyond my own experience? What if it reminds me of my own pain and suffering?” The answer each came to was Nothing needs be said.

I used a pretty awful lesson (forgive me, all): they would squat or hold out their arms until feeling real pain and the start of panic, then held on for thirty more seconds. The intention was to maintain a “moon face.” It is deep yoga to maintain a serene and accepting, unhurrying visage while craving the opposite: the impulse to complain, stop, make it go away. No sound, no expression, no revelation of how it feels. Just these few moments were enough to imprint how silence promotes patience as well as compassion.

As a final encouragement, Lyons studied the giants who listened more than talked. “Ruth Bader Ginsburg chose her words so carefully and took such painfully long pauses that her clerks developed a habit they called “the Two-Mississippi Rule”: finish what you’re saying and then count “one Mississippi … two Mississippi” before you speak again. The Justice was not ignoring you; she was thinking … very … deeply … about how to respond.”

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Uninterrupting