Today I had an interesting chat with our 8 year old grand son.
He actually turns 8 on Monday but we took him out for breakfast early so his parents could have time with him on his actual day.
We were sitting at the table and he looked at me and said, “I have never seen your bedroom.”
I said to him, “it really isn’t too exciting and it’s a bit of a mess.”
His reply to me, “sounds a lot like our house and actually the whole world is a bit of a mess.”
Yes it is true, the whole world is a bit of a mess; and it seems to be pretty obvious to this little guy we have a lot of work to do to better ourselves.
Spending time with the grand children is priceless. Especially if you can get them alone.
Our grand daughter’s usually come together since the 14 year old’s are twins.
They do almost everything together. The oldest grand daughter is 19 now and working full time and driving my hand me down car. She is really growing up fast.
It’s a good question to ask ourselves, how often do we stop and just chat with each other?
It is precious to listen to them, I found a saying that said, “listen and silent have the same letters with different meaning.”
When we become silent and truly listen we can hear many profound things.
I can hear inflection of words, tone of talking, the meaning of how it is said, I listen to hear and not so much how I am going to respond. Active listening is an art. A gift one can give.
When I was in counseling he would often tell me, “I am listening to what you are not saying as much as what you are saying, I am watching body language and mannerisms.” At first it made me nervous.
Then I got used to his ‘leaning in to listen’.
It felt good to have someone listen to my words, even if I had to pay him.
He clarified a lot of confusion and misuse of ideas within my recovery.
It was good.
So my question for you, when was the last time you really heard someone?
I mean leaning in and listening with a heart ‘interest’ for what they are saying.
Let us challenge ourselves in the next week or two. See how often you listen and then respond.
You might be surprised at what you find out.
The word listen contains the same letters as the word silent.
I think this is something to think about.