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Thoughts on Listening

1/24/2015

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I’m one of those people who often finds herself getting talked at. People talk at me because I listen to them. I can’t help it. I’m fascinated by people. I want details. I want gore. I want to know what your aunt said at those Mayan ruins to provoke her second husband to leave her for good and fly home alone from their Mexican honeymoon. This penchant of mine, I suppose, might be why I’m a writer. Listening is one of those skills we writers need. We spend our days listening, observing, ruminating, storing things away.

But this kind of one-sided listening can only go so far. No matter how entertaining someone is, if he or she does all the talking and no listening, the listener starts to wither inside. When people fully dominate conversations, no matter how riveting their stories, our energy is sapped. People who are unable to listen are lonely because they don’t truly know anyone (nor can they know much about the world or even life itself.) We’re wary of these non-listening talkers. We cross the street to avoid them. The talkers don’t realize that when they’re doing all the talking, we diminish in their presence. We slump in our chairs and feel uninteresting and depleted. Think of when people laugh at your jokes and you keep getting funnier and more animated. But when people stare blankly at you, the jokes die. It’s the same principle.

So we must learn to listen. I believe listening is a great gift we can give each other. 

Listening to people makes them feel energized. The act of listening encourages people to release what’s buried deep inside. In essence, when we listen fully to people—focused eye contact, nodding, really listening intently—we are cheering them on to express their true selves, to come to an understanding of who they really are. When we are eagerly listened to, we unfold and expand, creating more of ourselves as we talk. Ideas and revelations start to grow within us and come alive. Listening is a powerful and creative force. I remember once telling a group of friends a story about something that happened to me in my 20s on a Greek island—something vaguely supernatural that I’ve still never really been able to explain. As I told the story, I noticed their faces changing. They’d set down their wine glasses and their eyes were wide. “Why haven’t you ever written about this?” They were incredulous. My first book about my life as a traveller had just been published. I hadn’t even thought to write about this Greek adventure until I told them the story that night.

Talking and listening to each other is good training for writing. When we tell stories we see firsthand what people find compelling, which parts of the story have the most energy. Sometimes when I tell a story, people surprise me by being curious about something that I hadn’t thought was especially significant. They press me for more details. This is useful later when I write the story. Listening is also a way writers can help each other find new directions. “You should write about that!” is something writers need to say to each other often.

As I go through this life, I notice some people are lousy listeners. For some reason it always surprises me. A real conversation is like an alternating current that recharges both parties. A one-way current eventually burns out whatever is on the receiving end. (Actually, I’m not sure, electronically, if that really happens, but it certainly happens in the situation of  chatterboxes who can’t shut up. On the receiving end of these people’s onslaught, we the listeners are fried.)

In this new year I encourage you to avoid people who don’t listen and instead, seek out friends who you can’t wait to have an inspiring two-way, thought-provoking, mind-expanding conversation with, where you give each other the gift of listening.  

Then transform what you learned into writing!

 

 

 

 

 

 

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What Writing Gives Me

1/24/2015

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When I was halfway through writing my first book many years ago, I remember reading in Bird By Bird: Some Instructions on Writing and Life, by Anne Lamott, that the best part of being a writer isn’t getting your name in print. It isn’t all the excitement and accolades that accompany being a published author. The best part of being a writer, she said, is the writing itself.

Damn, I thought. Writing is such hard work. How can that be?


A year later, I realized she was right. The writing is the best part. The writing is what energizes and enriches me, deepens my life in more ways than I can count. Once you’ve finished writing your book and it’s in the hands of others—publishers, editors, the media, readers—you’re no longer behind the wheel, taking your characters places they need to go, deciding which verb conveys exactly the right mood, letting the phases of the moon dictate how the night sky looks. Once your book is out in the world it’s no longer yours. The publisher might even change the title on you, as my first publisher did.

So the writing itself is what I always go back to—sometimes kicking and screaming and dragging my heels—but before long, I remember why I write: it makes me feel good. I feel an inspiration starting to grow, an image I can’t shake, an emotion or idea that desperately needs sculpting into words. Sometimes I don’t even realize I’m feeling a certain way about something until I start writing about it. Someone once wrote, “How do I know what I’m thinking if I haven’t written about it?” I get this. I need to write whatever I’m feeling strongly about for the ideas to take shape. Writing organizes my thoughts and sets free my feelings, ideas and opinions. Even if nobody ever sees what I write, it doesn’t matter. It’s still liberating. It still invigorates.  

I love the feeling of transforming something from my own experience and sending it out into the larger world, writing about something that while personal is hopefully also universal, an experience that might induce others to nod in recognition and feel less alone.

Writing is immensely cathartic. What was interior becomes exterior, and when it’s exterior it’s tangible, made more real. Writing lets me live parts of my life over again, even the painful parts. The second time around I can re-examine and reflect, work out why I took one particular road in life over another, attempt to recall who I was in the past, what I thought, and wonder if a part of that younger me still exists.

Writing forces me to observe life in detail, to live in the moment. I find that my two passions, writing and travelling, feed off and enrich each other. When you’re on the road, everything around you takes on a vibrancy you may not have experienced since childhood. When you’re in a new place, you absorb fresh life around every corner; you see everything from a crooked angle. Time stretches and your senses sharpen. In other words, you’re paying attention. And paying attention is a writer’s job. If you intend to write about what you’re seeing, you’ll be even
more aware of the details of the moment. You’ll look more closely, listen more clearly, taste more carefully and continually reflect on what you’re experiencing. All your senses are heightened. As a result, your writing—and your travels—will be deeper and richer.


Writing also gives me a sense of accomplishment. I taught school for years and I don’t think I was very good at it. I’m terrible at any kind of retail job— unless I can read a book behind the cash register. I’ve probably had over 100 jobs in my life and although some have been fun, nothing has suited me like writing has. Writing, although hardly a profession that pays much these days, has in many ways saved me from being an aimless wanderer. It roots me to solid ground. What I have not earned by way of money is more than compensated for by wealth of experience. Writing has shaped me as a person in a way no office job could.


But above all, writing gives me redemption. If I write about an experience I can lift it up to another level, helping me and my readers understand more about the world. I thought about this recently when writing my latest book. It’s not a travel book, but it discusses a terrifying journey nonetheless. Writing about how my son developed Obsessive Compulsive Disorder in reaction to his grandfather’s death made me consider how writing about a difficult and traumatic experience can bring out the truth of who we are. What we find out about ourselves is not always pretty, but it’s real and it’s human.

*My post above also appears in this month's QWF Writes (the Quebec Writers' Federation blog)   

 

 

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    Laurie Gough

    I'm an author of books about my travels, a freelance writer, an adventurer, a mother of a little boy, an environmental activist, and someone who daydreams about finding the perfect place to live.

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