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Hearing Vs Listening and Active Listening skills
November 26, 2015
Though they are used as synonyms lot of times in general, hearing and listening are really two separate things. Hearing is involuntary and uncontrollable. But unlike Hearing, Listening requires an attention.
Hearing
| While Hearing you only notice a sound.
Listening
| While listening, you make an effort in understanding that sound or the spoken words and find its
| meaning.
Active listening is a mode of communication used in counselling, training and conflict resolution, Active listening involves listening with all senses
Steps for Active Listening:
Hearing
These are the important steps in Active Listening Process, we’ll see each step in detail.
Attention
Give the speaker your complete attention, and acknowledge the message. But always keep in mind that non-verbal communication also “speaks” loudly and plays major role.
Responsive Gesture
You should able to show that you’re listening – For that you can Use your own body language and gestures to convey your attention. This makes easy for speaker to understand that you are interested in the topic.
Understanding
From the spoken words take what is meaningful and apply it to the real life examples for better understanding.
Remembering
Though this step seems less important as many of us think that they can memorize anything or everything, but eventually unused information in our memory fades up as time passes.
Appropriate feedback
Generally speakers want listeners to demonstrate ‘active listening’ by responding appropriately to what they are saying. This can be verbal or non verbal.
Signs of Active Listening:
Smile
Eye contact
Gesture & Posture
No distraction
Mirroring in some cases
Tip for being active listener and for effective communication:
In active listening concern can be conveyed to the speaker by using both verbal and non-verbal messages such as maintaining eye contact, nodding your head or a smile, agreeing by saying ‘Yes’ which push them to go on with the topic. By these responses the person speaking will usually feels more comfortable and therefore communicates more easily, openly and honestly.
These are the small things followed by grate speakers and communicators themselves. Always keep in mind while listening or to be the active listener one should follow these unsaid rules.
