My husband was sharing how he overheard some coworkers talking \u2013 Dave was asking about the family situation of John.\u00a0 Then Dave began to tell John just what he needed to do.\u00a0 Meanwhile my husband knew a bit about John\u2019s situation and saw how Dave wanted to give advice more than understand the choices John and his family had consciously made.<\/p>\n
Families can be notorious for having the answers for each other.\u00a0 The mom\/dad\/sibling who knows just what you need to do, and it would solve all your difficulties.\u00a0 Except they really don’t. This doesn’t just happen in families, it happens with coworkers and friends, almost anywhere.\u00a0 We all like to think we understand what the other person is dealing with and how to help them.<\/p>\n
We share a common bond \u2013 we\u2019re human and have similar life experiences.\u00a0 We went to school.\u00a0 We have a family.\u00a0 We\u2019ve felt unwell.\u00a0 We\u2019ve loved; we\u2019ve lost.\u00a0 We want to connect.\u00a0 Yet with all our shared, similar experiences, the way we think and feel about those things can be dramatically different for each of us.\u00a0 Our perspective about these events is based on more than the actual event \u2013 it\u2019s colored by our prior life experiences, our own personality, the effect of that experience, and the list can go on and on.<\/p>\n
Some people think that as a professional organizer I will come on in and know just what to do to fix their struggles.\u00a0 I could try to do that – although I won’t.\u00a0 It wouldn’t be sustainable that way, since it doesn’t take into account the individual and their situation.\u00a0 The cause of their struggles could be any number of things and without understanding that \u2013 how much of a true solution could there possibly be?\u00a0 All those variations based on their life need to be considered.<\/p>\n
That doesn\u2019t mean that I won\u2019t present lots of ideas and share stories.\u00a0 I will even discourage someone from tackling things in a certain way.\u00a0 Yet, each person is truly an individual so that means they need to learn and experience things their way.\u00a0 How many of us touching a hot stove at some point in life, despite being told not to?\u00a0 Sometimes we need to learn things for ourselves, through direct experience.<\/p>\n
What I try to do most is to listen.\u00a0 Then I ask questions to follow up on what they\u2019ve shared.\u00a0 I listen to the language they use \u2013 are there lots of \u201cshoulds\u201d in what they are choosing?\u00a0 What are those \u201cshoulds\u201d about? \u00a0How did this or that experience effect them? \u00a0My answers are not their answers, just as my experience is not their experience \u2013 the perspective we take away can be strictly our own.<\/p>\n
This was illustrated a while back for me as I was working with one of my clients.\u00a0 I wish I remembered the specific details more, though she was sharing an experience with me.\u00a0 She and I have several things in common \u2013 I can relate to many things in her experience, and I almost jumped in with a comment about \u201cyeah, I know how you feel\u2026\u201d Then I caught myself (it does take practice to counter the familiar response of jumping in with both answers and relating) and instead asked her how that felt.\u00a0 Her response was not what I\u2019d expected \u2013 despite our similarities.\u00a0 That is exactly what stuck with me \u2013 by listening and asking more, I heard her and learned more about her experience.<\/p>\n
One of the greatest gifts we can offer people is to listen to them.\u00a0 Really listen to them.\u00a0 Get curious \u2013 about yourself and others \u2013 and ask follow-up questions.\u00a0 How did you decide on that?\u00a0 What influenced this choice?\u00a0 Deep down what we all want is to be heard \u2013 hoping to be understood.\u00a0 Everyone could be understood \u2013 their choices came from their life and experiences.\u00a0 Practice listening \u2013 it\u2019s harder than you might think!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
It\u2019s quite common for people to jump in with the \u201csolution\u201d to this or that struggle (most obvious when they don\u2019t know you or your situation that well). Yet, listening and asking follow-up questions mean deeper learning and understanding can occur.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[10,8,18,15],"class_list":["post-1491","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-personaldevelopment","tag-behavior","tag-discipline","tag-goals","tag-resources"],"aioseo_notices":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p7p82c-o3","jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.jenniferlinnig.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1491","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.jenniferlinnig.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.jenniferlinnig.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.jenniferlinnig.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.jenniferlinnig.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1491"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"http:\/\/www.jenniferlinnig.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1491\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1494,"href":"http:\/\/www.jenniferlinnig.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1491\/revisions\/1494"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.jenniferlinnig.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1491"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.jenniferlinnig.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1491"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.jenniferlinnig.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1491"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}