The Art of Listening

When we spend time with family and friends, we often have so much to catch up on that we end up in an “everyone is talking at once” scenario, and I often find myself contributing to this potentially rude behavior. We are all so excited to share and ask questions that we can forget to breathe and listen.

A stark contrast is the dead silence of the audience (aside from the occasional deep breath or sob) when survivors of severe trauma recount their horrific experiences. When we take the time to let survivors talk, we give them witnesses and help them hold a tiny sliver of their pain. There’s a time to talk, and there’s a time to listen.

We start the new year with Haazinu, and the very first word of the parsha is “listen” When Moshe shared his final words with the Jewish people, he not only wanted the people to listen, he wanted the heavens and earth to be witnesses to figuratively listen as well, as he commands them: הַאֲזִינוּ הַשָּׁמַיִם וַאֲדַבֵּרָה וְתִשְׁמַע הָאָרֶץ אִמְרֵי-פִי”

“Give ear, O heavens, and I will speak; and let the earth hear the words of my mouth.” (Deuteronomy 32:1)

In our fast-paced world, we often listen only to react, or we listen only to the surface noise. 

At a leadership conference I attended, the speaker asked the audience to pair up with someone else they had not yet met and give them one minute to introduce themselves. During that one minute, we were to listen intently, just listen. It was amazing to hear how much information could flow in 60 seconds from one stranger to another when it was uninterrupted.

This deep listening perfectly mirrors our journey through the Yamim Noraim, where Rosh Hashanah centers around the Yom Teruah and Lishmoah Kol Shofar, hearing the sound of the shofar and the wake-up call that comes along with it. We need this essential preparation of listening and being alert before we can transition to Yom Kippur, where we finally find our voice to engage in the heavy work of dibbur (speech) and confession and take our turn to speak. Rosh Hashanah was the rough draft, the unstructured content that came from our hearts. As we approach Yom Kippur, it is time for the final draft. To come before Hashem with the structure of vidduy and, after listening intently, we should now have the correct words to formulate our Teshuvah response.

As we enter Shabbos Shuvah, let us listen closely to each other, to ourselves, and to the opportunities Hashem gives us, and move that forward at the right time to a dibbur and to a final draft of a properly formulated response.

Reader’s Reflection

Reader’s reflection: What is an area in your life where you can recognize that it was meant to come in stages?