The Lost Art of Listening

Chris Albert 00:00:00 (link to this point)

This is Chris Albert, and I'm here to remind you of one thing. Someday, you're going to die. Now that's not some morbid statement or scary idea. It's solid fact. Your time here on this earth is limited.

And we need to be reminded of this as much as possible for one simple reason, to live your best life while you can. This is the Warrior Soul Podcast.

You know, when we think of valuable skills that people want to achieve at some point in their lives, we think of a lot of different things. The ability to write, the ability to speak, the ability to network, To get to know people and to include them in your network of trusted people that you could rely on. We think of the ability to sell. We think of the ability to create. But a lot of times, we neglect one of the most valuable skills you could have when it comes to your success.

That's the skill of listening. So many of us go about our lives trying to generate as much as possible. We try to try to talk as much as possible. You know, today in the social media world, we have people putting their views out there, you know, across so many different platforms. People talking, people writing, people just trying to be heard.

But so few of us ever take a moment to listen. Now, you might be wondering, well, what can come from listening? Well, there's a lot that could come from listening. When you sit down and you listen, you learn. Right?

You learn about what people want. And when you learn about what people want, you can create things that that give them what they want. That's essentially the basis of starting any business or any business worth its salt for that matter. When you sit down and you listen, you learn about the people around you. You learn about their ambitions.

You learn about where they want to go, and that allows you to provide value to them. And in turn, that makes you a valuable part of their network. And so they're gonna be more likely to include you in the activities that they find fruitful. When you sit down and you listen, you get to learn about the experiences of others that you might not have had. You can learn from those experiences.

You can learn from their mistakes, and you can learn from their successes. And that can shortcut your own path to success. But so many of us are just so caught up in just trying to get as many of our own words into the picture as we can that we don't listen, so we miss out. When it comes down to anything in life, you wanna come in, you wanna listen first. If you're a leader coming into an organization, you wanna listen to the people you're eventually going to be leading.

Why do you wanna do that? You wanna find out what their obstacles are, what their challenges are, and what are the things that drive them and motivate them. A lot of people think that leaders need to come in and start yelling and screaming and and pushing people around, but that's not really how life works. And that's not a very good leader. People aren't going to be willing to follow that kind of person for very long.

And even if they're obligated to follow that person, they're not gonna do a very good job. You want people to be influenced to follow you. And in order to influence people to follow you, you need to know a bit about them. You need to know what drives them. You need to know what motivates them.

And the only way you could do that is through listening. So here's the thing, As you're going about your days, think about how you can listen better. Think about, you know, taking a moment every day to sit down with those who you're working with, those who want to work with, those who around you. Listen to them. Figure out what you can learn.

Try to listen to people who are much more accomplished than you are. You can learn so much. Try to sit down for a moment in silence and listen to the thoughts in your own head. That's essentially what meditation is. What you'll find is that a lot of the thoughts in your own head aren't coming from your consciousness.

Instead, they're coming from your unconsciousness, the primitive part of your brain that is more animal than human. And you'll find that a lot of those thoughts that are giving you anxiety, making you nervous, making you generally unhappy, well, they're not based on reality, they're based on something else. Fears that your unconscious is generating to try to keep you surviving. And in so many ways, listening can make you a smarter, happier, and more capable person. That's a short one for today, guys.

It's a late night. I'm working a full day, and I'm trying to get these episodes out to you guys regularly. I hope they're helpful. I hope you're using them to make the most out of this life, And I hope above all that you're making your own way out there, setting your own path, and living life on your own terms. Thank you guys so much for listening.

I will be back at you on Monday with an awesome interview from Ben Davis, ultramarathon runner and US army veteran. Talk to you guys soon.