And Then I Was Surprised by What You Said: The Impact of Love and Listening On Community

By Dr. Richard D. Halley

Surprised describes the values that the author believes one must live out in order to be a truly effective listener. These values are explained and illustrated with stories from the author’s life. A set of skills is connected to these values and described in ways that readers can use in their everyday lives. The reader is lead to discover how true listening can lead to wonderful surprises.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Dr. Richard D. Halley
• Release date: Jul 13, 2011
• ISBN: 9781465766328

Book preview

And Then I Was Surprised by

What You Said:

The Impact of Love and Listening On Community

Richard D. Halley, Ph.D.

Third Edition

Text copyright © 2005 by Richard D. Halley, Ph.D.

Originally published by Kaia Publishing

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced by any means whatsoever, either mechanical or electronic, without written permission from the publisher, except for brief excerpts quoted for the purpose of review.

SMASHWORDS EDITION 2011

Smashwords Edition License Notes

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Edited by Caroll McKanna Shreeve

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Halley, Richard D.

And then I was surprised by what you said: the impact of love and listening on community

Original ISBN 1-890486-00-0

Reviewer’s thoughts about this book

AND THEN I WAS SURPRISED BY WHAT YOU SAID presents listening as a powerful solution to the misunderstandings that often besiege friendships, relationships, colleagues and the global community. A must read for those who seek to really hear what their associates and loved ones are saying." Barry Neil Kaufman Author of Happiness Is A Choice and Son-Rise: The Miracle Continues . Founder and Director of The Option Institute and Fellowship

It’s excellent! I wish there were even more stories. He writes them well." Andrew Wolvin Co-author of Listening. Now in its fifth edition, the most widely used college text on listening in the US.

AND THEN I WAS SURPRISED BY WHAT YOU SAID is much more than a book on listening. It is a book about being human. It is an invitation to be in relationship and in community with people. Listening is presented as the essence of being authentic in our relationships with people with whom we are intimate and with whom we have little contact. Edd Sewell Head, Department of Communication Studies Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University

When a book resonates so exquisitely in harmony with one's own values, it is difficult to critique objectively. As a reader, I felt personally validated in a significant way by spending time with your ideas on the importance of listening well. That, in itself, is a triumph for a writer – you have accomplished something quite special with this book. Thank you! All I am is a Listening consultant who wants people to listen to others more effectively by tuning in more effectively to themselves. Lydia Comty Consultant

Reading AND THEN I WAS SURPRISED. was very much like having an extended, intellectually stimulating conversation with a good friend. I came away feeling informed, a little bit challenged, and very much interested in continuing the conversation. Sherwin Howard, College President

In his book, And Then I Was Surprised by What You Said, Richard Halley has found a balance between motivation and skills as prerequisites to effective listening. Motivation shows in the desire to be a better listening, to establish community with other people, and to care and love, all of which are based on positive self-evaluation. Motivation creates an attitude toward the role and significance of the listener, and without this attitude, listening skills training is largely ineffective. The many interesting examples in the book reflect the author's genuine interest in other people and his dedication to listening as the key to more effective human communication. I used the book as the basis for a weekend retreat workshop and found the participants responsive and enthusiastic. Ethel Glenn Retired Professor of Communication

Man’s inability to communicate is a result of his failure to listen --Carol Rogers

Education is the ability to listen to almost anything without losing your temper or your self-confidence. – Robert Frost

To Love someone is to be happy with who and what they are, accepting them without condition. –

Barry Neil Kaufman

To Know You

To know you

To understand you

To be with you

To believe in you

is

to see you from your point of view,

to be intrigued and surprised,

to be fascinated that I am learning something new about you

yet again.

I can only truly be with you

When I have finally come to understand

Those things that make you unique,

Those things that reflect you humanness,

Those things that help me know

that this could only be you

and no one else in the universe.

Richard D. Halley, 1996

Chapter One

Understanding the Benefits of Listening Well

The title of this book comes from several significant personal experiences. Each of these experiences occurred with people whom I thought I knew well. In each experience I was listening to a friend and afterwards found myself struck with profound surprise that I could now see a new part of my friend I had not known before. I seemed to understand my friend’s view of the world differently. In each case I learned about a twist in the person’s thought processes that I really had not expected. I found myself feeling very grateful to be able to understand my friend more fully. And more importantly, I often walked away from such experiences feeling like I belonged to a community, a community which cherished and supported its members, a community I was helping to build and support, a community where my listening made a difference.

During the 43 plus years I have been teaching courses in listening much of the material offered by professionals was focused on ways to validate what people thought others were saying. Most of the material the experts thought people should learn was centered around ways to respond to speakers so that both speaker and listener could decide whether the listener understood. Other exercises focused on memory tricks. Although this material seemed important, something was missing. No one seemed to be offering help with what the listener might do to increase the chances of understanding what the speaker was trying to say before the checking process was used. As the years went by, I became increasingly convinced that aside from intelligence and skill at processing information, the most important factors affecting the quality of a person’s listening were associated with that person’s value system and maturity.

People with kind global perspectives and genuine curiosity about the world seemed to listen more effectively than those who thought they already had the answers and seemed to be intent on imposing their answers on others. Many of us may have experienced these kind listeners in the places where we have experienced a sense of community. Some of us have had more of these experiences than others.

Many of us were lucky enough to grow up in places where we thought of ourselves as belonging to a community. We were secure in the belief that we belonged where we were and that those around us would come to our aid in times of trial or crisis. Everyone seemed to believe that part of their responsibility included nurturing that community and accepting the support of others when it was needed. Unfortunately some of us did not grow up this way and an increasing number of us are growing up in places that feel hostile and cold. These latter folks most likely feel very lonely.

This book is about listening and how listening well can help each of us feel like we live and work in a supportive community. I will attempt to share what I have learned so that you might experience something like the surprises mentioned earlier. Those experiences are incredibly valuable and cherished in my life. For me, the possibility of such surprises is an important reason to learn to listen well. However, when we realize that such listening experiences can significantly contribute to developing a sense of community where we live and work, the payoff for listening well begins to sound like one of the most important things we could ever learn to do.

If you long for a strong sense of community and want to live in an environment that provides that sense of belonging, if you want better relationships with the members of your family, if you want to save a lot of time by increasing the instances when you get things right the first time and not having to redo things because you listened poorly, if you want to increase the quality of the services you provide, if you want to be a more effective