There are four simple disciplines of effective listening. They are mostly of importance to men, who are notoriously poor listeners, especially with the women in their lives. This is not because they are not interested. It is simply because their minds are focused on something else and they are easily distracted.
The Disciplines of Listening.
Listen Attentively. The first discipline is to listen attentively , without interrupting. Listen as though the other person is about to reveal a great secret or the winning lottery number and you will hear it only once.
When she wants to talk to you, if you are a man, put aside all possible distractions. Turn off the television or radio. Put down the newspaper or mail. Face her directly, lean slightly forward, and concentrate single-mindedly on what she is saying.
The book His Needs, Her Needs points out that the most important need that a woman has from a man is affection. Affection is expressed by paying total attention to her when she speaks. Since you always pay attention to what you most value, when you pay close attention to another person while she speaks, you tell that person that she is of great value to you. This satisfies the deepest subconscious needs of a woman-to feel valuable, important, and respected.
Pause before Replying. The second discipline of listening is to pause before replying. Take a few seconds to carefully consider what he or she has said. When you pause, you avoid the risk of interrupting the other person if she is just reformulating her thoughts. You tell her that you value what she said and that you are giving her words careful consideration.
Another advantage of pausing, of allowing a silence in the conversation, is that it enables you to hear not only what was said, but also what was not said or what was said between the lines. The actual message soaks into a deeper level of your mind, enabling you to understand better and to therefore respond with greater awareness and sensitivity.
Ask for Clarification. The third discipline of effective listening is to question for clarification. Never a.s.sume that you automatically know what the other person is thinking or feeling. Instead, if you are at all unclear, simply ask, "How do you mean?" or "How do you mean, exactly?"
It is when you ask questions and seek clarity and meaning that you demonstrate to the other person that you really care about what he or she is saying, and that you are genuinely interested in understanding how he or she thinks and feels.
Feed It Back. The fourth discipline of effective listening is for you to feed back what the other person has said, and paraphrase it in your own words. This is the "acid test" of listening. This is where you demonstrate to the other person that you were genuinely paying attention. It is only when you can repeat back what the other person has just said, in your own words, that you prove to him or her that you were really listening.
Most problems in relationships arise because of poor communication. The couple does not talk together often enough or one or the other does not listen attentively when the other wants to speak.
Each person has an emotional need to talk a certain amount with his or her spouse. Each person also has an emotional need to listen a certain amount. The most compatible couples are those in whom the desire to talk and listen are in balance with each other. There is an easy ebb and flow of conversation, punctuated with comfortable silences. Each person gets a chance to fulfill his or her need for both talking and listening, and both parties are content.
Total Commitment Is Essential.
Love and marriage require total commitment on the part of both people. It takes tremendous discipline to go "all in" in a relationship. What"s more, this is also tremendously liberating. It is only when you are totally committed to a relationship with a single person that you are completely free to turn your attention toward fulfilling your potential in the other aspects of your life.
One of the most important disciplines in a marriage or relationship is that of faithfulness. Because we live in a highly s.e.xualized society, there are temptations and provocations around us all the time and virtually everywhere we go. It often takes considerable self-discipline and self-control to be completely loyal to your spouse throughout your married life.
There are two ways to help you avoid the regular temptations that can damage or even destroy the most loving of relationships.
First, make a decision, in advance, that you will never, never be unfaithful to your spouse. Like drawing a line in the sand, make the decision in advance that no matter what happens, you will not stray for any reason.
Second, discipline yourself to stay out of harm"s way. Refuse to go anywhere or do anything where temptation may exist. Except when essential for business purposes, avoid having lunch, drinks, or dinner alone with a member of the opposite s.e.x. Remember, there is safety in crowds.
Continually imagine, everywhere you go and in everything you do, that your spouse is standing right next to you, watching and listening to what you say and do. Imagine that anything and everything you do, no matter where you are, is going to be reported back to your spouse within twenty-four hours. Use your discipline and willpower to build and maintain a reputation for being a completely honest and faithful spouse.
Be Willing to Change.
Every marriage is a "work in progress." As time pa.s.ses, the nature of your marriage will change, usually in positive and constructive ways.
To keep your relationship happy, harmonious, and growing, you must be willing to change in response to changing circ.u.mstances, especially having children and watching them grow up. You need to be prepared to change with age, new jobs and careers, physical moves from one part of the country to another, changes in financial circ.u.mstances, and changes in health. Flexibility is absolutely essential to a long, happy marriage.
There are only four ways that you can change your life. First, you can do more of some things. Second, you can do less of other things. Third, you can start something that you have never done before. And fourth, you can stop certain things altogether. Whenever you are experiencing resistance or frustration or you are confronted with the need for change, ask yourself, "Is there anything that I need to do more of, less of, start, or stop doing?"
The Four Questions You Should Ask.
On a regular basis, you should sit down with your spouse and later with your children to have the courage to ask them these four questions: 1. Is there anything that I am doing that you would like me to do more of?
2. Is there anything that I am doing that you would like me to do less of?
3. Is there anything that you would like me to start doing that I am not doing today?
4. Is there anything that I am doing that you would like me to stop doing altogether?
When you have the courage and discipline to ask these questions of your spouse and your children on a regular basis, you will be amazed at the quality and depth of the answers you receive. You will get continual guidance on how you can modify and adjust your behaviors to maintain higher levels of harmony, happiness, and love with your spouse and the other members of your family.
Your Spouse Should Be Your Best Friend.
Love and marriage are perhaps the most important elements of a happy, fulfilling life. They require a lifelong exercise of self-discipline and willpower to create and maintain harmony. They require that you be open, honest, and candid at all times.
Most of all, a happy, a loving marriage requires that you see your spouse as your best friend. There should be no one in the world who you would rather spend time with more than him or her. There should be no one with whom you are more open and honest than with him or her. When you see your spouse as your best friend and treat him or her as such, you can create a loving relationship that lasts all the days of your lives.
As Emmet Fox, a spiritual writer and teacher, wrote,Love is by far the most important thing of all. It casts out fear. It is the fulfilling of the law. It covers a mult.i.tude of sins. Love is absolutely invincible.
There is no difficulty that enough love will not cure; no disease that enough love will not heal; no door that enough love will not open; no gulf that enough love will not bridge; no wall that enough love will not throw down; no sin that enough love will not redeem.
It makes no difference how deeply seated may be the trouble, how hopeless the outlook, how muddled the tangle, how great the mistake; a sufficient realization of love will dissolve it all.
If only you could love enough you would be the happiest and most powerful being in the world.
In the next chapter, you will learn specifically why self-discipline is so important when raising happy, healthy, and self-confident children.
Action Exercises: 1. What is the most important single action you could take, right now, to increase the love and harmony in your marriage or relationship?
2. What disciplines or practices could you develop that would improve the quality of your marriage for the other person?
3. Identify one behavior you could engage in that would improve your communications in your marriage.
4. Sit down with your spouse and ask him/her for ideas for things that you should do more of, less of, start, or stop doing.
5. Identify the two qualities that you most admire in your partner.
6. Identify the areas in which you and your partner are the most compatible.
7. Identify the most important values that you and your partner share.
Chapter 19.
Self-Discipline and Children.
"Right discipline exists, not in external compulsion, but in habits of mind which lead spontaneously to desirable rather than undesirable activities."
-BERTRAND RUSSELL.
You can calculate the value or importance of something you do by measuring the possible consequences of doing or not doing it. Something that is important is something that has significant potential consequences, like jumping out of the path of a speeding car. Bringing children into the world has consequences that can go on for eighty years (which is the average life expectancy of a person today) and beyond, into the lives of your grandchildren and great grandchildren. This is why becoming a parent is one of the most important things you will ever do.
As an adult, you are still affected today by things that your grandparents did or didn"t do to or for your parents. The way you treat your children is strongly influenced by the way your parents treated you. It has consequences that cascade down the generations, and it has an enormous influence on their lifelong happiness and well-being.
Your Greatest Responsibility.
When you have a child, a high level of self-discipline is essential in order to fulfill your commitment and deliver on your responsibility. The day your first child is born, you have taken on a minimum twenty-year commitment to do everything possible to raise your child as a happy, healthy, and self-confident adult.
At every stage of your child"s life, your words, actions, nonactions, and behaviors are shaping and influencing that child and determining how he or she will turn out as an adult.
The greatest need that a child has is for an unbroken flow of unconditional love and acceptance from his or her parents. Children need love almost as much as they need oxygen. The amount of love that a child receives, especially in his or her formative years, is the critical determinant of how healthy and happy he or she becomes as an adult.
How Children Spell "Love"
How does a child spell "love"? T-I-M-E. Children determine how valuable and important they are and develop their self-esteem and self-worth by measuring the amount of time that the most important people in their lives spend with them when they are young. There is no subst.i.tute for time, and once gone, you cannot make it up. Perhaps the greatest regret reported by parents is that "I didn"t spend enough time with my child when he or she was young."
When you become a parent, you must discipline yourself and organize your life so you can spend ample time with your child throughout his or her growing years. You must discipline yourself to cut back, reduce, downsize, and eliminate other activities that prevent you from being an excellent parent.
A WAKE-UP CALL.
Some years ago, a good friend of mine got married. He was an avid golfer, and he regularly played golf five times a week, often flying south in the winter for golf vacations when his local golf courses were covered with snow.
Within four years of marrying, he and his wife had four children. Nonetheless, he still tried to play golf several times a week, taking time off from his business during the week and playing on weekends.
Finally, his wife confronted him and told him that he was not spending enough time with his young children. His golf was taking up too many hours that would be better spent at home with her and with the children, especially during their most vulnerable and sensitive years.
He suddenly realized that his life had changed. The things that he could do when he was single were no longer possible when he had young children. Being highly responsible and self-disciplined, he immediately cut back his golf to once per week and rechanneled his time and energy into his family. He told me later that it made an extraordinary difference to his marriage and to his relationships with his young children.
Setting New Priorities.
When you get married, your life goes though a major shift. Your lifestyle changes, and many of your common activities lose their importance and urgency.
When your first child is born, your life shifts again. It often feels as if the first stage of your life-your youth-has dropped off, like the first stage of a rocket, and you are now on a different trajectory in life. In fact, it is not uncommon for couples to change their lives completely when their first child is born. They cut back or discontinue many of their previous social activities. They stop dining and drinking with friends, and they stop going out socially on the weekends.
They begin to build a different life together around their home and children. The children become the focus of their time and attention. The children become the primary subject of their conversations.
Responsible parents approach childrearing as the most important part of their lives. They plan and organize their time and activities so they can fulfill this responsibility at a high level.
Long-Term Thinking.
Children force you to think long-term. When you realize that everything that you do or fail to do with your children in their formative years will have a lasting impact for generations to come, you become far more thoughtful and sensitive to the things you say and the way you treat them.
When you are young and single, you can "let it all hang out." You can blow up, get angry, express your feelings freely, and "be your own person." But when you have a child, you need to impose a higher level of discipline and self-control on yourself.