I just read an article on Facebook about how Millennials are more likely to go to therapy than any other generation. The article hypothesized many reasons for this: the decrease in pragmatic and social skills due to digital socialization, their parents not modeling what to do with emotions/hardships, and being sheltered from life’s hardships. Whatever the reason, it seems like we are all searching for the same thing, the space to be heard and to be understood. It appears that as future generations grow up they will be familiar with the idea of safe spaces. They will know what signs to look for, what language would denote a safe person and if it does not exist they will be empowered to advocate for it themselves.
But what if being known and understood, or feeling safe is not about external places or people. What if it starts with yourself? How well do you know yourself, your story, your proclivities, and your pathologies? When you know yourself you don’t need others to validate your experience. When you know yourself, you share to create a shared experience, one in which you are open to hearing varying viewpoints and understand that differences do not have to breed disconnection.
Active listening is the vehicle used by most therapists and life coaches. It’s a process in which a person is allowed to share their story and the listener listens without judgement. It includes restating the main points of the conversations, listening for the underlying emotions and allowing time for the person to reflect on the words they chose to use to share their experience. It’s listening for meaning. The problem in most relationships is that people are too busy to sit and listen and since active listening is a process it takes practice to develop the skills, practice at the risk of others feeling unheard or misunderstood while you develop mastery. The biggest failure in active listening may be that many of us fail to listen to ourselves.
Journaling can be a process in which we start to practice truly hearing ourselves. Sitting down before the day starts or when we have time to breath and writing down our experience without judgement. When I first started journaling, I wrote as if someone else would read it. I left out the extreme emotions, the expletives the raw feelings. I wrote about dates and places, I kept it factual. But I knew the facts already, I didn’t need to develop a deeper understanding of the facts, I needed to learn my perspective and how my perspective may influence the next outcome.
At first, it seemed like if I made time to journal my life would go haywire and the time I set aside would be swallowed up. Or I would sit in front of my journal, with nothing to write or criticizing what I did write, afraid about the formatting or spelling, not wanting to ruin the pretty paper that accompanied by newest Target find.
I don’t know what happened but one day I just started, perhaps I had so many emotions that I did not have a choice but to pour them out on paper. What I found that day was that my paper was a great active listener. It captured my main points, I could re-read and find emotions and patterns of responding to similar situations. I realized that I could document my experience on the lines and then be more present for the people around me. If I forgot to journal, my life would start to feel like a blur. And like the great Millennial that I am, I could take my journal to therapy and share my experience between appointments more succinctly, I didn’t have to wait two weeks to gain a better understanding or to challenge myself. I could listen to myself first.
How do you listen to yourself? Have you tried journaling? What barriers if any did you experience? Do you struggle to be an active listener? Are you a better listener to others than for yourself?
Views From the Woods 