Quotes About Listening

Rob's story reminds me that how we listen is sometimes (always?) more important than what is said. Maybe that's why Jesus was forever asking people if they had ears to hear what he was saying. And I suspect it's also why the very first word of the great Benedictine Rule, which has guided monastic communities for 1,500 years, is this one little word: listen. Fifteen centuries of successful community built on the power of mere listening.

by stopping to be still in the ways described above, prior to opening my Bible, I can prime my heart to hear from God in a focused way with far fewer distractions.

The only way to fight nostalgia is to listen to somebody else's nostalgia

To love women. To pleasure them, to make them laugh. To be foolish for them. To protect them. To respect them. To listen to them. They are life-givers. To live is to love them.

It's a very important thing to learn to talk to people you disagree with.

If healing is what you want, your first step is to be open to the possibility that literal truth is not the most important consideration. The conviction that it really happened, the fear that it may have happened, the subtle searching for evidence that it did happen, can all get in your way as you try to hear what the felt sense wants to tell you about what it needs to heal.

Sometimes the silences, the gaps, tell us more than anything else.

What is at stake is a faith that can actually remain sustainable and meaningful because it listens to the challenges of the present as we follow the God who is always out ahead of us, ready to surprise us.

The most important thing in communication is to hear what isn't being said.

The most important thing in communication is to hear what isn't being said.

Don't waste your breath. You can't help the terminally stupid. If people hate government so much they don't listen to official advice, they can't expect government to bend over backward to help them.

Sólo después de haber escuchado el relato saben que han escuchado y sentido una llamada a la acción que les ha transmitido el narrador.

Cuanto más nos preguntemos qué sucederá después, más atención prestamos. Y cuanta más atención prestemos, más escucharemos, percibiremos y retendremos.

SheAlmighty had tuned each person in a musical key, and Kasper could hear it. Best in the brief, unguarded moments when people were nearby but didn't yet know he was listening. So he waited by the window, as he was doing now.

Their haste pulls them out of the conversation, or they try internally to improve the situation, or they're preparing what their next speech will be when you shut up and it's their turn to take the stage.

like many elderly people, she has developed a selective sense of hearing. She ignores me and continues on her own track...

Very few people know how to listen. Their haste pulls them out of the conversation, or they try internally to improve the situation, or they're preparing what their entrance will be when you shut up and it's their turn to step on stage.

Reading snow is like listening to music. To describe what you've read is like explaining music in writing.

People lack the talent of listening. They miss the experience of a fascinating law of nature: The moment when a narrator is captivated by his own story.

It sounds so trite but in relationships, you have to communicate.

An argument in apologetics, when actually used in dialogue, is an extension of the arguer. The arguer's tone, sincerity, care, concern, listening, and respect matter as much as his or her logic - probably more. The world was won for Christ not by arguments but by sanctity: "What you are speaks so loud, I can hardly hear what you say.

Then the LORD said, “I will surely return to you at this time next year, and your wife Sarah will have a son!” Now Sarah was behind him, listening at the entrance to the tent.

Then God heard the voice of the boy, and the angel of God called to Hagar from heaven, “What is wrong, Hagar? Do not be afraid, for God has heard the voice of the boy where he lies.

Now Rebekah was listening to what Isaac told his son Esau. So when Esau went into the field to hunt game and bring it back,