Listening for the Sound
(No, not “of Silence”)
Jason Roll
CMST-105-01: Interpersonal Communication
Prof: Ben Byrne
Listening is probably the most important element to communication because what’s the point of talking
if no one is paying attention? People are likely well aware of the fact that one of the biggest steps towards
being a good listener is being silent themselves, as it is quite difficult to receive a message if you’re
simultaneously trying to transmit one yourself. However, many individuals might overlook some other potential
barriers to good communication and I am certainly one of them. These barriers may be many, but the ones that
seem to hit me the hardest are distractions, interruptions, losing focus, and fact filtering.
My brain tends to be one of those neuro-divergent, hyper-active meat computers that’s never satisfied
with simple conversations for any length of time. This tends to lead me towards distractions rather easily which
will cause lapses in the conversation from my perspective. This is something that I still struggle with today, but
the good news is I am aware that I do this and can take steps to alleviate the risk of distractions that are at
least obvious and within my control to manipulate. This includes putting my phone in my pocket, turning away
from my computer screens or any televisions, and turning towards the other person so that my body can
subconsciously focus in the direction of the speaking I’m trying to pay attention to. Other people seem to have
less issue with maintaining focus than I do, but I have noticed that others do many of the same things in order
to focus on listening. While I can’t see into anyone else’s mind, I tend to think that others just struggle with the
concept of listening less than I do, but this is one of those opinions that I’m okay with being wrong about if
that’s the case.
The second issue I tend to have with listening is the urge to participate in the conversation tends to get
elevated to the point where I want to interject something but it ends up being an interruption. This can be for
reasons that include wanting to relate to what another person is saying, wanting to confirm my understanding
of what’s being said by paraphrasing, or in more rare circumstances offering a criticism of the speaker’s stance
on a particular topic. Waiting for the speaker to finish their point is often difficult because I can struggle with
finding the line between waiting for them to get to the point of what they’re saying versus recognizing that
they’re just rambling and not providing any useful information. This issue also tends to get inflated due to other
people’s tendency to also interrupt me about as often, so my subconscious brain takes that as a green light to
just interrupt them whenever I feel it’s necessary. This tends to function as a tug-of-war unless I or the other
person realize that we’re just interrupting each other and have to reset the conversation.
Not so long ago, I had done some self-reflection on why I interrupt people in conversations and I came
up with the idea that in my younger years I lacked the confidence to actively engage in many conversations so
when people were talking I tended to be more of a lurker. As I got older and started to gain that confidence I
needed to participate, it seemed like everyone else just got more confident and now I wonder which
conversations are going to turn into some kind of fight for verbal supremacy. Thankfully, this issue is far less
frequent or intense when I talk with friends and family, but the “Unacquainted” in the world can be extremely
opinionated and more people these days speak their opinion like quoting scripture. I’ve learned that there are
some people that are worth putting in the effort to interrupt once in a while, and others that just aren’t worth
listening to.
This leads to the third point of my personal listening difficulties which is the lack of focus, otherwise
known as “tuning out.” People in this modern age have gotten so loud in spreading their opinions that I’ve had
to heighten my ability to tune people out to protect myself from bad information. The problem with this is that
sometimes my brain will trigger this protective measure when someone that I consciously regard as “safe to
hear” tries to talk to me. This is completely unintentional but I’ve also had a few rare instances where people I
trust have given me bad information so now every once in a while I will mistake a worthwhile conversation for
something my brain will go into “lockdown mode” for. What makes this particularly frustrating for me is the
appearance of others not having this problem nearly as much, if at all. While I still recognise that I can’t see
into the minds of others and therefore can’t assume that they don’t also have this problem, I can’t help but see
my own issue as greater than theirs. In most conversations I see very little evidence, if any, that someone is
tuning me out. This could simply be my own lack of recognition of the signs or non-verbal cues of being tuned
out, but that also seems to vary from person to person so the pattern is harder to identify.
The last thing I can struggle with periodically is listening specifically for facts in a conversation and
paying either less or no attention to another person’s feelings. I have a number of friends who are more
capable of exhibiting feminine behavior and as such will steer conversations in a way that focuses on how they
feel over objective truths. In many instances this is not a problem, but when someone mentions something that
I believe is factually inaccurate I have to make a very quick decision to either engage or ignore the inaccuracy.
This can lead to the other aforementioned issues where I could get distracted thinking about different ways to
rebut the false fact in a way that wouldn’t cause offense. I could also just blurt out something like “that’s not
true” which inevitably becomes a rude interruption, or my defensive mode could kick in and I tune out the rest
of the conversation. Once again, from my perspective it seems that other people don’t have this struggle like I
do, but the signs of which are not obvious. However, other people’s responses to my participation in these
conversations does lead me to believe that they do not listen for just the facts of a conversation, but they do
give their attention to their feelings and mine as well. I still try to find the “happy medium” between focusing on
the facts of a conversation while still offering validation for how other people feel, but I often feel like I stand
alone in a world where personal opinions and feelings are worth more social currency.
At the end of the day, I’m just trying to find the right balance. Being able to listen while still engaging in
the conversation to show that I hear what they are saying is the goal of each interaction. We as human beings
can spend our entire lives learning, and this topic is one of many that I hope to learn everything there is to
know.