A wise old owl sat on an oak; The more he saw the less he spoke; The less he spoke read more

A wise old owl sat on an oak; The more he saw the less he spoke; The less he spoke the more he heard; Why aren't we like that wise old bird?

The first duty of love is to listen.

The first duty of love is to listen.

A good listener is not someone with nothing to say. A good listener is a good talker with a sore read more

A good listener is not someone with nothing to say. A good listener is a good talker with a sore throat.

A good listener is usually thinking about something else.

A good listener is usually thinking about something else.

Listening is a magnetic and strange thing, a creative force...When we are listened to, it creates us, makes us unfold read more

Listening is a magnetic and strange thing, a creative force...When we are listened to, it creates us, makes us unfold and expand. Ideas actually begin to grow within us and come to life...When we listen to people there is an alternating current, and this recharges us so that we never get tired of each other...and it is this little creative fountain inside us that begins to spring and cast up new thoughts and unexpected laughter and wisdom. ...Well, it is when people really listen to us, with quiet facinated attention, that the little fountain begins to work again, to accelerate in the most surprising way. -Brenda Ueland.

An essential part of true listening is the discipline of bracketing, the temporary giving up or setting aside of one's read more

An essential part of true listening is the discipline of bracketing, the temporary giving up or setting aside of one's own prejudices, frames of reference and desires so as to experience as far as possible the speaker's world from the inside, step in inside his or her shoes. This unification of speaker and listener is actually and extension and enlargement of ourselves, and new knowledge is always gained from this. Moreover, since true listening involves bracketing, a setting aside of the self, it also temporarily involves a total acceptance of the other. Sensing this acceptance, the speaker will fell less and less vulnerable and more and more inclined to open up the inner recesses of his or her mind to the listener. As this happens, speaker and listener begin to appreciate each other more and more, and the duet dance of love is begun again. -M. Scott Peck.

And he goes through life, his mouth open, and his mind closed.

And he goes through life, his mouth open, and his mind closed.

A good listener is not only popular everywhere, but after a while he knows something.

A good listener is not only popular everywhere, but after a while he knows something.

Listen, every one
That listen may, unto a tale
That's merrier than the nightingale.
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Listen, every one
That listen may, unto a tale
That's merrier than the nightingale.
- Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, Tales of a Wayside Inn (pt. III,),